{"id":551474,"date":"2026-03-29T01:35:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T01:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/551474\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T01:35:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T01:35:10","slug":"remember-when-wings-responded-to-getting-banned-from-the-radio-with-a-nursery-rhyme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/551474\/","title":{"rendered":"Remember When Wings Responded to Getting Banned From the Radio With a Nursery Rhyme?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1972, Paul McCartney<\/a> and his band Wings<\/a> had an unlikely hit with a tune the former Beatles<\/a> star wrote, set to the nursery rhyme \u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d. Released as a non-album single in May 1972, the song reached No. 9 on the U.K. chart and peaked at No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100.<\/p>\n

During a segment of the latest episode of the Audible audio series Words + Music, \u201cThe Man On The Run\u201d, McCartney explained how Wings came to record \u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Paul McCartney Reflects on How a Shared Passion With John Lennon Led to the Creation of The Beatles]<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201c[When] my daughter Mary was a little baby \u2026 at home, I would sing my version of \u2018Mary Had A Little Lamb\u2019,\u201d he recalled. \u201cAnd so it kind of developed into a song through just singing it to her. I thought it was catchy. Had a little catchy chorus. You know, we recorded it. I thought that\u2019s quite nice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wings recorded the song during the sessions for their 1973 studio album, Red Rose Speedway. The track featured the group\u2019s early lineup of Paul and his wife, Linda; multi-instrumentalist Denny Laine; drummer Denny Seiwell; and guitarist Henry McCullough. It also included backing vocals by young Mary and Linda\u2019s older daughter, Heather.<\/p>\n

McCartney and Wings mimed the song during the James Paul McCartney BBC TV special, which first aired in April 1973. The band also released four separate promotional music videos for the tune, each with a different setting. They included clips of Wings performing \u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d in a barn, in the countryside, in the desert under a circus tent, and with a psychedelic background.<\/p>\n

About the Controversy with Wings\u2019 Previous Single<\/p>\n

\u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d was a follow-up to Wings\u2019 debut single, the politically controversial protest song \u201cGive Ireland Back To The Irish<\/a>.\u201d McCartney, with wife Linda, wrote \u201cGive Ireland Back To The Irish\u201d in response to the event known as Bloody Sunday, an incident on January 30, 1972, when British troops stationed in Northern Ireland shot and killed 13 civilian protestors.<\/p>\n

The BBC and several other radio stations banned the song. <\/p>\n

When Wings released \u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d, many people assumed that the band had put it out with the intent to be as uncontroversial as possible.<\/p>\n

During the Words + Music interview, McCartney maintained, \u201c[It] certainly [wasn\u2019t] going to get banned, but I don\u2019t think that was the motive. We just thought, \u2018Yeah, it\u2019s nice. It\u2019s catchy and \u2026 it might work well on the radio.\u2019 Well, of course, people read into it, and it was seen as the opposite side of \u2018Give Ireland Back To The Irish.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

At least one Wings member had mixed feelings about releasing \u201cMary Had A Little Lamb\u201d as a single. In a 1972 interview with Melody Maker<\/a>, Laine commented, \u201cAs a song, I was happy with \u2018Mary Had A Little Lamb\u2019, but as a single, I don\u2019t know. Personally, I would have preferred to have started off with something a bit more rocking.\u201d<\/p>\n

More About the \u2018Words + Music\u2019 Episode \u201cThe Man On The Run\u201d<\/p>\n

As previously reported, the Words + Music \u201cThe Man On The Run\u201d episode is a three-hour presentation that examines McCartney\u2019s life and musical career following the 1970 breakup of The Beatles.<\/p>\n

The feature includes interview clips of McCartney recorded during the making of the documentary Man On The Run, which got its TV premiere in February on Amazon\u2019s Prime Video streaming service.<\/p>\n

The audio presentation includes interview segments that didn\u2019t appear in the movie.<\/p>\n

You can check out the Words + Music episode \u201cThe Man On The Run\u201d now at Audible.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Photo by Dick Barnatt\/Redferns<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 1972, Paul McCartney and his band Wings had an unlikely hit with a tune the former Beatles…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":551475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[2617,88,245272,216,13501,13469],"class_list":{"0":"post-551474","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-classic-rock","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-mary-had-a-little-lamb","11":"tag-music","12":"tag-paul-mccartney","13":"tag-wings"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=551474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/551475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}