Hey, everyone. It's me, Giggins. It's my absolute honor to be chatting about an album that is one of my favorites. It means a lot to me; it means a lot to a lot of people watching this video, I'm sure. Ram by Paul and Linda McCartney.

Paul's second LP after Leaving The Beatles and the first and only album credited to Paul and Linda, Ram finds the couple reveling in exploration, playing with textures The Beatles would have never touched, and a looseness that someone as famous as Paul McCartney rarely gets to show.

When this LP came out in May of 1971, critics really didn't know what to make of it, and some fans scratched their head, too, particularly some of the guys in The Beatles. Ringo famously said, "Paul's going strange!" Some songs pissed off John so much that he wrote retaliation songs that ended up on the Imagine album. With the original copies of Imagine, there's a little postcard that came in it with a picture of John holding the ears to a giant pig. To quote "A Hard Day's Night": "You're a swine."

In order to understand Ram, we need a little context on Paul's life and The Beatles at this time. The Beatles' long split was a messy one, and a lot of factors came into play; it wasn't just one particular thing. These guys had known each other for 13 years. I mean, a lot can happen in that time. But by the end of The Beatles, after Brian Epstein had died, they were without a manager. Eventually, John, George, or Ringo signed with Allen Klein, who used to manage The Rolling Stones.

Paul wasn't too hot on this guy. He was like, "I think he's going to take us for too much money here." He was like, "How about Lee Eastman, Linda's dad? How about him?" The other guys were "No, there's probably going to be a bias there."

By the spring of 1970, Let It Be was about to come out, or became known as Let It Be, and Paul wanted his secretly done solo album to come out before it. But the powers that be at Apple [Records] said, "Look, let's push out Let It Be first, then your album could come out." Paul was like, "Fine, whatever." He put out a press release that he wrote the questions and the answers to. One of the questions was simply, "Do you ever see yourself working with John Lennon ever again?" And he just said, "No."

Even though they'd all left at different times over The Beatles career, George famously left during the Get Back sessions in early '69. John actually left the band in the fall of 1969, saying he wanted a divorce. Paul was the first one to publicly say he was done, thus effectively ending The Beatles. He soon wanted nothing to do with the group, nothing to do with their legal BS, the fighting, the crap that went around with being a Beatle. He wanted nothing to do with it.

He entered a pretty deep state of depression for a while and eventually got his act together with help from Linda. By the end of 1970, they went to New York City to start recording and finding bandmates for what would become the Ram album.

During October, November, December, and a little bit into 1971, Paul was doing Ram, and they had personally picked up band members to be on this record because the first album McCartney was just Paul doing everything by himself. On this record, they wanted to find bandmates and start a new group. Look up the interview process because it's pretty interesting stuff.

Here's the final piece of the puzzle, for me anyway, that leads to Ram being the album that is. At the end of 1970, Paul wanted out of the contract that The Beatles had signed in 1967. That contract stated they had to put out a certain number of albums and be an active band until 1976. Paul was like, "No, I'm done. I don't want anything to do with this."

He did the unthinkable: he sued the rest of The Beatles. He sued his friends! Technically, that was the only way out of the contract, and unfortunately (or fortunately for whatever party you might be on), it worked. The other three did not view him in a kind context for quite a while. Even Ringo — peaceful Ringo! — put out a song called "Early 1970", and he talks about meeting up with the other guys and hanging out and jamming. When he gets to the part about Paul, he says, "I wonder if he'll play with me." It's Ringo, man; c'mon!

With all that context — thank you for sticking through that — we get to Ram, an album with cute stories about farm life, heartbroken declarations about picking yourself back up again, potential digs at John and Yoko, butter pies, and trying to carve out your own identity after being in the biggest band literally ever in the world.

"Too Many People" is a charging rocker with excellent guitar solos, excellent group vocals, and moments that you can't help but wonder if they really were about John and Yoko. Paul has said that some bits were about them many years later — the whole part about "preaching practices" and "You took your lucky break and broke it in two."

A lot of the media saw what John and Yoko were doing as a bit foolish or clownish, which is sad, really, because they were just advocating for peace. I guess Paul may have been a bit on that side as well at that time, being like, "Yo, calm down," or something. Regardless, there are a lot of other messages on this song about looking out for yourself, looking out for others. It's just a dynamic rocker with great change-ups, an excellent fade-out. This one really hits 11 as it ends.

"3 Legs" comes up next, and I either read about this one time, or I've interpreted it myself over the years, that this is also another song about The Beatles, where the other three legs are John, Ringo, and George, and he's the missing fourth leg. So it's "My dog, he's got three legs / Your dog, he got one." I love the super dry production in the beginning of this track, and it's a country-flavored feel before it takes on a really awesome amount of reverb that just sends this thing into a different, almost White Album-esque rocker.

Those lines, "When I thought you was my friend," and then those lines about a fly trying to get knocked down by paper — that could be legal stuff, legal paper, trying to get knocked down legally. There are a lot of layers on this one for being as simple as it sounds.

"Ram On" is a wonderful, little ukulele jammer about perseverance and not giving up. In a time where he was not feeling the love, he wrote this cute little song about wanting to give your heart to someone as fast as you could. I love the reverb, heavy percussive elements, the soaring background vocals that sound like sunshine in the clouds, the layers of emotion with his vocal ad-libs, and trying to literally whistle his blues away.

"Dear Boy" is a track where we finally leave, for now, The Beatles stuff. This one's about Paul singing about Linda's ex-husband and basically how he missed out on the most incredible person in the world, to him. The whole song is just a flex being like, "Yo, man, you missed out, dear boy" You know, he's really, really hitting it like, "Dear boy, you missed out. She's the best thing ever. What were you thinking?" Very cool harmony vocals on this one. Lots of fast-paced piano playing and plenty of tension.

Then you get Paul McCartney's first American no. 1 solo single here with "Uncle Albert / Admiral Halsey". This track really is one of his first big masterpieces, even if it had some help from a producer who put some pieces together, added the thunderstorm bit, and created this little mashup thing. Regardless, the parts are there. You feel like you're lost in this world of beautiful storytelling where you're hearing multiple sides of different angles of things where it's like, "Hey, we'll call you if some trouble comes up. Hey, nothing's happening. We're just chilling, but we'll happily be called away."

Then you get to this hands across the water bit as if everything was just resolved, and it's just rainbows and sunshine everywhere. You're also treated to some of the best lines ever on this album, or I'd even say in Paul McCartney's career. ("A Butter pie (butter pie?) / The butter wouldn't melt, / So I put it in the pie, alright?") Is it an anti-war song? Is it about happy days not being lost at sea? It's up for many interpretations, but at the end of it all, you're treated to an excellent song with lots of passionately performed sections.

"Smile Away" comes out of the fade-out of that previous track, and this one for me is just a really simple, upbeat, charging rocker, but Paul really lets loose, screaming on this one, having a great time. The lyrical sections of this song are that you can smell his teeth from a mile away, you can smell his feet, you can smell his breath. But through it all, he's smiling.

So, he's literally smiling through the bullshit, a theme he'd come back to on and off throughout his career, most particularly on "My Brave Face".

"Heart Of The Country" is one of my favorite tracks on the record. It's a nice slice-of-life song. It's just quaint, comfy, cozy: life on the farm, drinking tea, finding calm during the tumultuous storm that was his life at the time. This one sounds like it could have been a White Album-era demo; it's got that quirky, comfy, cozy feel that he was playing with those textures at that time.

But Paul's gentle voice on this song is just wonderful, and the awesome vocal scats that he does following the guitar lines are super cool. He really paints a picture of serenity on this one; it just sounds appetizing.

And then you get "Monkberry Moon Delight", which is a total 180° from the last song. The change-up on here is absolutely insane. It's wacky, it's strange, it's got these horror movie pianos that sound like something out of the creepiest haunted house you ever walked into. And then Paul's voice — growling, distorted, manic, and filled with anxiety — could it be about the end of The Beatles? Could it be about nonsense just for the hell of it? Could it be an exercise in screaming his feelings away? It could be a lot.

But the song just riffs and jams out for a long time at the end, almost as if he's trying to expel all these terrible feelings from his brain.

And then "Eat At Home", again: right back to the cutesy stuff here. I love that jump because you get a great duet vocal from Paul and Linda. For the most part, it's a duet throughout the entire song, but it's a simple, straightforward track. It's a welcomed sense of normalcy after the crazy Goosebumps episode, fun house mirror that was "Monkberry Moon Delight". It's a cool, little jammer — nothing too exciting — but it's got a lot of catchy hooks and an easy, breezy attitude.

"Long Haired Lady" comes up next, and I love the vocal call-and-response from Paul and Linda on this one. It's also the longest song on the record, but the production on this thing is just atmospheric. It sounds like a dream. Crisp drums, Paul's gentle, warm lead vocals and the verses, and then that hypnotic delivery in the chorus to drive home this easy-on-the-ears feeling that this long-haired lady is taking care of him and making him feel great. The repeated lines at the end of "Love is long, sing your song" and that bounty piano with the swirling, buoyant horns and the joyous strings during the fade out.

It's a nice, lovely, hypnotic feeling, like I said before, and just a lost in love song. A little love letter from Paul to Linda. Just like on the front cover where it says "L-I-L-Y: Linda, I love you." There you go!

"Ram On" returns at the end of this album for just a little bit. It's a coda, if you will. It slowly fades in, it makes its presence known, then it slowly fades out.

"The Back Seat Of My Car" ends this record. For me, this song is absolutely about not listening to the powers that be, not listening to people putting you down, forging your own path, making your own road, traveling forward, and getting through everything and having to pass in your rearview mirror.

This song has so many beautiful sections, from peppy brass, to swirling strings, to charged-up drums and handclaps and some of Paul's best piano chord combinations. The song so effortlessly switches between frantic excitement to focused determination.

Again, I think it's an exact document of how Paul was feeling at this time. He's going to see this out on his own terms, and no one can hit the brakes on his car, if you will, as he's destined for sunnier skies.

The reason I find Ram to be culturally significant is that it's an album by a guy who was in the most famous band of all time, starting over again and making sounds that he hadn't made with the band that made him famous. There's a magic in the production on this album as well because it does have a homespun feel. Even though it was done at professional recording studios, it sounds homey and quaint, and it captures the magic of McCartney I, which was done by Paul at his house by himself.

A lot of people over the years have said this album has inspired indie rock or bedroom pop, and I can see that because you've got a guy who wasn't afraid to take a risk. (Well, in The Beatles, they took a lot of risks.) But this album is so different; The Beatles could have never made something like this because, for as wacky and weird as they got of course, there's a looseness on this album that, even though the Beatles got weird, they never got super loose. I would say the only time they got super loose was on "Wild Honey Pie".

Whereas on this album, Paul's literally screaming and being wacky and weird, particularly on "Monkberry Moon Delight". For a guy as well-known, famous, and professional as he was, this must have been very hard on the ears at first because you were so used to his polished, "Can't Buy Me Love" thing. And here he is screaming about whatever, and you have to interpret it and figure it out.

That's a bold move to make, and a lot of indie musicians really took to that ethos and that attitude. Who knows how many records were inspired by this one.

At the end of it all, I think this also represents a challenge for famous people to do something different and either find a new audience or keep the one that they have, but be willing to accept changes. You got to remember, too, with Paul and John, they'd been playing together for 13 years, 1957 to 1970. They went through everything together: they learned every chord together, every business dealing. Every single thing they went through, they did it together.

When The Beatles broke up, the other three made incredible records. George was killing it, Ringo was the biggest seller of them all, and John was diving deep into his own psyche on his albums. But Paul had the hardest challenge of them all because, while the other three had figured themselves out and were making incredible albums, they were almost extensions of their Beatles' selves. It sounded like George from The Beatles. It sounded like John from the Beatles. Paul McCartney didn't want anything to do with The Beatles at this time, and that meant not sounding like himself, not sounding like the idea of his Beatle self in that context.

So who was he without the others? What did Paul McCartney sound like? He had to ram on.