Wings Silly Love Songs

1. AUDIENCE CASE STUDY
1
WINGS– ‘SILLY LOVE SONGS’ MUSIC VIDEO (1976)

2. THE BAND AND ALBUM – WINGS AT
THE SPEED OF SOUND
The band ‘Wings’ was
formed by Paul and
Linda McCartney, with
Denny Seiwell and
Denny Lane in 1971.
The band later
recruited Jimmy
McCulloch, Henry
McCullough, Geoff
Britton, Joe English,
Steve Holley and
Lawrence Juber. Their
fisrt studio album
‘Wild Life’ was
released in 1971 and
their final album
‘Back to the Egg’
released in 1979.
‘Wings at the Speed of Sound’ (1976) was
their fifth studio album and was the first
album Paul had recorded in England since ‘Red
Rose Speedway’ in 1973, and features the hit
single ‘Silly Love Songs’.
“Rolling Stone's reviewer saw this record as
something of a concept album, describing it
as "A Day with the McCartneys".The
introduction, ‘Let 'Em In’, is sometimes
perceived as an invitation for the listener
to join the McCartneys on this fantasy day,
with explanation of their philosophy (‘Silly
Love Songs’), a lunch break (‘Cook of the
House’), and a chance to get to know
McCartney's friends (Denny Laine in "The Note
You Never Wrote", Jimmy McCulloch in ‘Wino
Junko’"
The album went to number 2 in the United Kingdom (and was the
4th best-selling album of 1976)

3. WINGS OVER THE WORLD/SILLY
LOVE SONGS MUSIC VIDEO
Wings Over the World was Wings’ 1975-76 tour round America, Canada, the UK, Australia
and Europe and featured songs from albums ‘Band on The Run’, ‘Wings at the Speed of
Sound’ and ‘Venus and Mars’. It also featured songs from Paul’s Beatles days such as
‘Lady Madonna’.
The promo music video for ‘Silly Love Songs’
(single 1976) was recorded during their tour and
features clips of the band’s performances and a
‘behind the scenes’ style glimpse of the tour.

4. AUDIENCE DEMOGRAPHIC
The main audience for this music video may be followers of The Beatles or Paul
McCartney.
AGE: Considering many of The Beatles’ fans were teenagers/young adults the
majority of the Wing’s audience would be in their 20s/young adults, the songs
‘pop rock’ style was being taken over by both rock and roll (The Rolling Stones)
and early glam rock (David Bowie) to which the teen majority followed.
ETHNICITY/NATIONALITY: The song/video doesn’t appeal to just one ethnicity, both
the band and audience are a mixture of ethnicities and the variety of genre in
Wing’s work, from ‘pop rock’ to ‘disco funk’ create a huge platform for all. The
audience nationality would also vary considering the huge world tour and the
success of the band worldwide.
SEXUALITY: Again sexuality isn’t specific to the video although Paul and Linda’s
relationship is inevitably presented throughout.
GENDER: The video may appeal to all genders too, with again such variety of
people presented it doesn’t stick to any specifics.

5. PRODUCTION
As mentioned before the video has clips of the
audience, performance and behind the scenes of
the Wings World Tour. The effect of this brings
the audience closer to the band.
The use of clips of the audience not only
provides a promotional aspect of the tour, in
revealing the amount of people/the excitement of
the crowd, but also allows the audience to feel
a part of the band. Those who attended a concert
can watch and reminisce and fans who didn’t can
see the representation of themselves/the band’s
interactions with their fans.
The clips of the performance again serve to promote the band but also help to give
the audience a feel of the tour, the use of the live shows dubbed over with the
studio single allows for the audience to see the music being played and again
brings them closer to the band

6. PRODUCTION
The use of the clips of the band’s tour behind the scenes
gives the audience both a relation to the band and an
insight into their music.
The clips give the audience the feeling of being part of
the band, with the small venues and closeness of each
member revealed it allows for the audience to feel a part
of something.
These clips also present the personalities of the band
members, again giving something the audience can relate to
and adding a side to music you don’t often see.
They also reveal elements of the
recording process creating
closeness and familiarity with
their music. This can also be
seen in videos of songs from
Paul and Linda’s 1970 album
‘Ram’ which include clips of
their home in Scotland where
they recorded the album.

7. LINKS TO THEORY
In 1948 American theorist Harold Lasswell suggested media texts has the purpose
or function for individuals in society of; surveillance, correlation,
entertainment and cultural transmission. It may be argued that the ‘Silly Love
Songs’ video is purely entertainment although it could be said that Bulmer and
Katz’ development of Lasswell’s theory also applies.
Bulmer and Katz (1974) argued that individuals may choose a text for the
following purposes; diversion (an escape from reality), personal
relationships(identifying with artists/fans feeling a sense of
belonging),personal identity (individuals identity being represented) and again
surveillance.
The idea of personal relationships and personal identity are both relevant to
the Wings video, fans may see themselves in the audience as well as the
personal relationships presented within the band. The idea of feeling a sense
of belonging is also created through the use of the more personal clips of each
band member again creating a relationship with the viewer and artists.