Paul McCartney, country and western star? Well, maybe that’s stretching it a bit, as the ex-Beatle has mostly hung out in the pop and rock realms throughout his career. But there was a time he slightly dented the country charts (at No. 51) with the one-off “Sally G,” which he recorded with his band Wings.
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What’s the song about? And what inspired McCartney to write it? Let’s take a look back at when he took a genre detour, and, as usual, came out with a winner.
Macca and the Nashville Cats
Paul McCartney and Wings scored their biggest success in 1973 with Band on the Run, an album that restored the artist to the good graces of many critics who had been unkind to his immediate post-Beatles work. Wings were forced to record the album with just three members (McCartney, wife Linda, and Denny Laine) contributing, since two quit right before they were set to start. Since McCartney envisioned touring the world again with Wings, he needed a full lineup, which is why guitarist Jimmy McCulloch and drummer Geoff Britton were recruited in 1974.
The first stop for the newly assembled five-piece was an unusual one: a farm in Lebanon, Tennessee. Legendary country songwriter Curly Putnam rented out his country estate for the summer of 1974 to the McCartneys and the members of Wings. McCartney intended to use the time to rehearse this new band.
But since Wings wouldn’t have a new full-length ready in ’74, McCartney wanted something in the pipeline for that year so that they could strike while the momentum of Band on the Run still lingered. Thus, they recorded several tracks during that summer in nearby Nashville. The last of those tracks was “Junior’s Farm,” which showcased the new lineup and would be released as a single in October 1974. “Junior’s Farm” very much resembled the charging rockers on Band on the Run, but the single’s B-side represented a surprising stylistic turn for the McCartney and his band.
Sneaking “Sally” Through Printer’s Alley
While the trip to Tennessee was meant as a kind of working holiday for Wings, that didn’t preclude a little fun. One night, McCartney and an entourage were led through the section of honky-tonk bars and clubs in Nashville known as Printer’s Alley. That led to some inspiration, as McCartney described in the book Paul McCartney in his Own Words:
“When I’m in a place, it’s not uncommon for me to want to write about where I am. Elton John did ‘Philadelphia Freedom,’ you know. You see a lot of that, someone will turn up and write a song the next day. Being in Nashville, I wanted to use a couple of local guys. I never worked with a Nashville steel guitar player, and I had to have a bit of material I could bring in and ask them to do. This bloke named Buddy took us out to Printer’s Alley, which is a little club district. There were a few people just playing country music, and we imagined a bit more than we had seen for ‘Sally G.'”
The “local guys” he used were pedal steel and dobro player Lloyd Green and violinists Johnny Gimble and Bob Wills. McCartney played his bass and Geoff Britton the drums, while Linda McCartney and Denny Laine added backing vocals. Interestingly enough, this new country-flavored song “Sally G” would be one of the few Wings tracks to feature Britton, as he quit during the sessions for the 1975 album Venus and Mars.
What is “Sally G” About?
What’s striking about “Sally G” is how seamlessly McCartney slides into the country genre. He immediately starts off with a slyly humorous line to set the stage, describing Tennessee as being, Somewhere to the south of New York City. Thus begins a tale about a guy who falls for a country singer, only to get left behind in the end.
McCartney name-drops Printer’s Alley and the country song “A Tangled Mind” to prove his Nashville bona fides. In the final verse, after Sally lies and cheats her way out of his life, he takes stock of his woeful situation: I never thought to ask her what the letter “G” stood for / But I know for sure it wasn’t good.
And so, with the girl who took the part that was the heart of me long song, he’s left with a broken heart and a song. Then again, those are the ingredients that so many Nashville legends have utilized to touch people’s lives. Who knew that Liverpudlian Paul McCartney could travel a country lane so well as he did with “Sally G?”
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