The best-selling album of 1974, which is why it's on my list despite being released in '73.
I've never heard any of the tracks on this album past the title track, which I love, and the second song Jet, which is a winner for me because of the brass.
Beyond that, the whole thing really is a great, complete album experience. One reason I've long loved the opening song is the medley quality to it (when the chips are down, I'd pick the Abbey Road medley as my favourite thing by the Beatles), so when the closing sequence of the album includes callbacks to other songs on the same album, well - this is right up my alley. As soon as it finished I listened to the whole album again.
Let Me Roll It is a really fun tune; No Words really struck me as an echo of If I Needed Someone; and Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five is exactly my kind of closing track.
It's no bold statement to write a glowing review of a fifty-year-old, well-loved album by a former Beatle - but here it is. As much as I'm ready for this project to deliver some nostalgia for me in revisiting things I know well, I'm just as excited to find blind spots like this.
Band on the Run also featured as the best-selling international album at the 1975 Juno Awards (Canada's Grammy Awards, if you aren't familiar with them). Top Canadian album from that year was 1974's Not Fragile by Bachman-Turner-Overdrive, so of course I'm listening to that, too.
Similar to my limited exposure to Band on the Run, beyond the renowned You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet (a track from what would be a pretty good album featuring stuttering by various artists), I knew nothing about this BTO classic. It's straightforward rock and not pushing any envelopes (which is especially interesting now that I've read that the title Not Fragile was coined in direct comparison to the very pushy Fragile by Yes), but it is great at doing what it does well.
Rock Is My Life, and This Is My Song is my standout favourite upon first listen.
Glad to have found a YouTuber who posted videos for both sides of the vinyl:
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