Wonderful Christmastime
Year: 1979
Written By: Paul McCartney
Released
in 1979, 'Wonderful Christmastime' was a Christmas song by Paul
McCartney. When released, the song was received very well around
the world and still has much popularity around the world during the
Christmas festive period. As well as being released on its own, the
song was later added as a bonus track on the CD reissue of Wings'
Back to the Egg. Paul McCartney wrote, published, and played all
instruments on this song.
Paul
McCartney said he recorded the song entirely on his own, and that
he did this during his sessions for his solo project McCartney II.
The song has an easily recognisable synthesizer riff which was
played on a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5.
When
talking about this record, Paul McCartney has stated of how is now
embarrassed about this record. Despite this though, 'Wonderful
Christmastime' continues to receive a large portion of airplay
every year. Due to this and the fact he wrote the song, performed
and played all the instruments, plus from royalties from cover
versions, Paul McCartney makes around $400,000 per year from this
song. Including his royalties from 'Wonderful Christmastime' Paul
McCartney's average annual earnings are around $15
million.
The music
video which accompanied 'Wonderful Christmastime' was filmed at the
Fountain Inn in Ashurst, West Sussex, during the video, the Inn,
looks as though it is holding a party. There is also a television
at the Inn which is playing McCartney singing, when looking at the
screen, the camera moves to actually show the filming of what is
shown on the television. Paul McCartney during
the video is seen playing the piano on many occasions. Members of
Paul McCartney's band, Wings, feature in the music video; however
their vocals do not actually feature on the
recording. The music video sees the stars
appearing to move and co-ordinate as to make images in the
sky.
'Wonderful
Christmastime' makes an appearance in the 1998 animated film
'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: The Movie', its cameo playing is
when Santa takes off on Christmas Day, in the film.
The song
didn't chart on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, but it did have success
in the UK Singles Chart reaching number six. Notable covers of Paul
McCartney's 'Wonderful Christmastime' have come from Barenaked
Ladies, Hilary Duff, Rahsaan Patterson and Demi Lovato.