I was sent this article about Jimmy from the August 1977 issue of Beat Magazine by a JM fan who had checked out my site and I thought that you guys would enjoy this. Check it out
WINGS HIT VIRGINS
by Peter Douglas
Jimmy McCulloch doesn't like doing interviews. In fact he's much happier sit*ting with a pint in his hand in the pub without the tape recorder running telling stories about life on the road when he was twelve years old that would make Ken Russell want to cross his legs.
Jim's brother Jack, who shared most of those early ex*periences, was also in Thun*derclap Newman. Most people still remember their record 'Something In The Air', one of the greatest singles ever made. A little later, Jim cropped up again, this time as a replacement for the guitarist of Stone the Crows - Les Harvey, whose biggest claim to fame was his death by electrocution on stage in Wales. It can't have been an easy job to fill, since Harvey, though largely un*recognised at the time of his death was a player in the league of pure genius. Stone the Crows never really made it, but - looking back - it must have been the band that brought McCulloch's talents to fruition. Fronted by Maggie Bell, it featured (apart from Harvey) Jim Dewar on bass, Ron Leahy on keyboards and Colin Allen on
drums. Wings fans will know that the current set includes a song called 'Medicine Jar', co-written by Jimmy and Colin Allen.
Allen had been a sideman for John Mayall at one time, and it was probably through him that McCulloch got the gig in Mayall's band for a short time. But as he told Beat on joining Wings some two and a half years ago, Mayall did not allow him the amount of time and freedom he required for his own projects. This then, is one of the reasons why he has stayed in Wings: he can contribute his own ideas, and still spend some time working out other bits and pieces of his own.
"I know I've got the freedom to do anything, as well as being
involved in Wings. We have quite a bit of time off, so I can start getting back into what I would do if I was on my own. I haven't done anything myself in commercial terms, just getting back down to writing, and producing a band called Glasgow."
By this time we were back in his large Maida Vale flat, sitting in the cheerful chaos of the music room. The cleaning lady doesn't dare to go in for fear of damaging something valuable, and so the clutter of guitars, recording gear and odd bits of obscure apparatus remain un*touched except by their owner, and perhaps by an itinerant jour*nalist who couldn't wait to get his hands on that beautiful Ibanez Artist. . .
He played me a tape he had made at the age of fourteen with a singer up in Glasgow, sorwe
ten years ago, and the freshness and power of the sound was quite extraordinary. He has tapes from every period since then, but most of it is just sec*tions of songs. "You get so far that you end up with nothing," he explained. "It's all bits and pieces, but you don't follow it through. That's why I've never done a solo album. I could go back to something years later - dig it out, and think - great! But to try and re-create that is another thing."
To aid him in composing and recording ideas for songs, he has a Wurlitzer electric piano and a Roland rhythm box, simi*lar to the one Denny Laine used on his solo album. The latter being a mechanical device, sounds too regulated to take the place of a real drummer. What he does, therefore, is to mix it with a snare drum of his own to
provide a certain amount of variation. The proximity of neighbours prevents him from using a drum kit.
"I like being on my own, ac*tually, so I can get into it." Heput another tape on: "This is a little thing I did on my own, again. I played the drums and the bass. It's just an in*strumental: there's a few guitar tracks on here, but it's not mixed at all. That's where I left it, and I just come back to it now, and again." ^i^
We got back to Jp«#pct of musical freedom within a band like Wings, which is heavily dominated by the omnipresent Macca.
"All the guitar stuff has really come out of my head, 'cept for maybe some part that's really a line in the song. So I like to sit down and listen to a song, and what comes out depends on how I'm feeling. An extension of your personality, that's what your guitar is. Instead of putting it into words you just say it through your instrument. Now maybe sometimes that may not work in a certain song. He's got his ideas about how he wants to hear it, because it's his song, right?"
Jim believes in keeping songs as musically simple as possible. In other words, he does not ad*vocate the use of throwing everything into a recording along with the kitchen sink.
"It's what you leave out, rather than putting in too much. I mean, you might only play one note, and that'll fit perfectly." In the same way, his gear is quite modest. His role is essentially that of lead guitarist, though he dabbles with bass and pedal steel as well. Live he uses an SG and a Strat, plus an Ovation for the acoustic numbers, with a spare for each. Like most people, he isn't crazy about Ovations, but recognizes their convenience value, and the fact that they can be easily d.i.'d to the mixing board. In the studio he also plays a 12-string Zemaitis and a Martin D28.
Concentrate
As for the rest, there's a Crown which he splits with Denny, plus an Olympic pre-amp, Marshall cabinet and a 2 x 12" Fender Bandmaster which he's had souped up. Ef*fects-wise he again doesn't like to over-complicate: there's a wah-wah and a volume pedal, and that's about it. "I just like plain sounds. I'm not that keen on weird stuff because it's not necessary in what we play in the band. I do it on my own - I've got Ech-plexes and Binsons and that, but live all that's taken of through the PA. The sound engineer's in control. It takes a tot off your mind, it's something
less to worry about and you can concentrate on what you're playing more if you don't have to think I've got to be at that spot to hit that button at such-and-such a time'. It's OK for bands whose players just stand in one place and don't move all night. But we like to wander around and have a bit of a laugh, and that's what we try and generate to the people."
The next Wings album is now in the can. It was recorded on a boat in the Virgin Islands. Now I bet you thought pop stars led easy lives, didn't you? I bet you thought they never did any work. Well Wings have just spent a month on a boat in Virgin Islands - working.
"That was hilarious. The Record Plant people chartered this boat and the owner didn't know what the hell was going on. He thought the group was coming to record with one of these little cassette things. He had no idea. Then all this stuff goes on the boat, and it was 'No no, I want to cancel the charter! No way, you can't come on with all that stuff - the boat'll sink."
The boat was over a hundred feet long, but it was narrow, so all the gear went down each side. At the back part of the boat, which was open, they had some carpenters in to cover it over. The board, the JBL monitors, the graphic equalizers and the Eventides all went at that end, and they were ready to roll. So why choose the Virgin Islands, where there must surely have been technical difficulties above and beyond the fact that they were on a boat?
"It was just to get in a nice warm climate. There are no studios out there so the only way to record was on the boat. It was great, but it was lonely. We went to the mainland twice, but there was nothing to do on there..."
Yes, it sure is tough at the top.
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Jimmy McCulloch August 1977 Interview
Linear Mode
