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9.22am
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20 August 2013
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“Too many reaching for a piece of cake.”
I take that to mean the “eating chocolate cake in a bag” episode from John and Yoko in Vienna at the Sacher Hotel. That chocolate cake would have been a Sacher Torte. Sacher Torte is my dog’s name.
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11.12pm
15 May 2015
Offline Ahhh Girl said
“Too many reaching for a piece of cake.”I take that to mean the “eating chocolate cake in a bag” episode from John and Yoko in Vienna at the Sacher Hotel. That chocolate cake would have been a Sacher Torte. Sacher Torte is my dog’s name.
Wow, what a cool name for a dog! How do you pronounce that?
I’ve heard rumors that “Too Many People ” was partly a jab at John (but so many songs at the time were interpreted that way, from both Paul and John). It would have sounded better if he had sung:
“Too many people reaching for a chocolate CAKE!!!”
A ginger sling with a pineapple heart,
a coffee dessert, yes you know it's good news...
10.18am
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20 August 2013
Offline The lady says it at 20 seconds into this video, @Pineapple Records.
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11.53am
26 January 2017
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What if the line had been “too many baggin up their chocolate cake!”
My favorite line in the song is “Too many hungry people losing weight” Paul absolutely rips that vocal line.
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12.10pm
1 September 2017
Offline sir walter raleigh said
My favorite line in the song is “Too many hungry people losing weight” Paul absolutely rips that vocal line.
^Quality post. Incidentally, I’ve long thought “Too many hungry people LOSING WEIGHT!!” was about John and his continuing food issues/drastic weight loss.
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8.38pm
30 December 2022
Offline This has to be my favourite song on Ram . I love the parts after the chorus, it makes me want to cry. How can a human write so many songs that are so beautiful?
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Beatlebug, sigh butterfly, Sea Belt, Richard7.42am
7 November 2022
Offline It’s my 2nd favorite (after Uncle Albert ). I believe Paul used studio musician David Spinozza to do the amazing guitar solo at the end. I suspect Paul scripted the whole solo, note by note.
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12.46am
30 December 2022
Offline Sea Belt said
I suspect Paul scripted the whole solo, note by note.
I applaud ANYONE who can write a solo on guitar, or just lead guitar for that matter. As a rhythm guitarist, it is my #1 weakness. I can write a solo on a flute easily though. I play lots of classical flute pieces and now I can pick up my flute and improvise. Same with mandolin, I learned lots of Celtic Jigs and now I can improvise. Even though I have been playing mandolin for 4 months and flute for 2 years. Yet I still can’t do it on guitar, the instrument I have been playing for 7-8 years.
Obviously I applaud Paul, for everything. He’s a genius. I also love his vocal “screaming” in the intro of this song.
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15 February 2015
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Neely said
Sea Belt said
I suspect Paul scripted the whole solo, note by note.I applaud ANYONE who can write a solo on guitar, or just lead guitar for that matter. As a rhythm guitarist, it is my #1 weakness. I can write a solo on a flute easily though. I play lots of classical flute pieces and now I can pick up my flute and improvise. Same with mandolin, I learned lots of Celtic Jigs and now I can improvise. Even though I have been playing mandolin for 4 months and guitar for 7-8 years.
I think that’ll be the secret to picking up lead guitar, is to learn other people’s solos and take the little licks and riffs that people use to build guitar solos to heart until you can regurgitate them in your own original context. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s how I learned lead guitar – not that I write solos so much as improvise them, usually; this comes out of being too doggone lazy to learn the original solo note-for-note in many cases, and taking some of the main licks and just kind of riffing around them 
I also think it might be very interesting if you write a solo on flute or mandolin, and then play that on guitar. I think that might give birth to some very interesting and original melodies that a typical guitarist might not come up with. Something to try! 
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1.31am
30 December 2022
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4.16am
7 November 2022
Offline Beatlebug said
At least, I’m pretty sure that’s how I learned lead guitar – not that I write solos so much as improvise them, usually; this comes out of being too doggone lazy to learn the original solo note-for-note in many cases, and taking some of the main licks and just kind of riffing around them
I think some soloists (of any instrument) in pop, rock, or jazz always improvise and never script it — so if they’re going to solidify it in amber by recording a solo for a record, they’ll just wing it in the moment and let inspiration hit. Perhaps if they don’t like it the first time, they’ll wing it again for a second take, etc., but every take will be fresh uncharted territory, no different from improvising on a live stage.
You could have a soloist who scripts their solo in their head before they even play it.
Then there’s the soloist who scripts their solo AFTER they have experimented with many different versions using free-form improvisation and many takes, slowly remembering riffs and licks they want to keep and areas they know could be better, until finally they have pieced together the entire solo as what they consider the best solo for that spot in the song. From that point, the solo is “frozen” — it’s the best that can be. This is the type that makes the most sense to me. Sure you could vary it later when you play live, but for the recording, you preserve that jewel you crafted in all its details.
One soloist I admire seemed to craft his solos methodically — organist Gregg Rolie for Santana — and I think he probably did what I described as the 3rd kind of soloist. Listen to what he chose to do in the time/space allotted to him in the hit song “Evil Ways” — starting the YT a few seconds before he starts his organ solo:
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5.31am
30 December 2022
Offline I just wrote an essay about this song. maybe my english teacher will give me extra credit
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Beatlebug6.00am
7 November 2022
Offline When I try to play alongto this song, those 5 notes the electric guitar does deep down, beginning with the open E note at the bottom, I know the first note is E and the last one is Eb, but I can’t quite figure out the 3 notes in between. At least one of them always seems off.
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6.53am
30 December 2022
Offline Sea Belt said
When I try to play alongto this song, those 5 notes the electric guitar does deep down, beginning with the open E note at the bottom, I know the first note is E and the last one is Eb, but I can’t quite figure out the 3 notes in between. At least one of them always seems off.
I haven’t even tried the lead part. I was going to recommend songsterr.com because that’s where I usually go for lead parts I can’t get by ear, but they don’t have the lead guitar part on there! It’s 1 in the morning for me, but I’ll try to figure it out tomorrow either on piano or guitar (depending if I am at school or home). I do know there is a full band recreation that some guy did on YouTube, so you could look at what he’s doing at that part. I don’t have perfect pitch, but I have had good luck lately with doing things by ear.
Edit: @seabelt I figured it out this morning, i think!
open low E
Then go to the A string and walk up chromaticly from the second fret to the 6th.
The notes would be: E, B, C, C#, D, Eb
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7 November 2022
Offline @Neely
Interesting, I may never have tried quite those series of notes — thanks Neely! I’ll try it soon.
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4.35am
26 January 2017
Offline I’m teaching Michelle to a student and ended up going on about this very subject. The changes of Michelle would be very difficult to improvise over, you’d have to have an excellent awareness of harmony to approach the 3rd of the Bbm and then lead up to the 3rd of D from the Eb major scale.
George doesn’t give himself enough credit as a lead player, his skills as an improvisor aren’t insane but he’s not playing over many 12 bar blues or traditional progressions and changes, he is taking solos over Lennon/McCartney masterpieces that don’t have super intuitive ways to just play in a single key or on a single scale. He was great at fitting pieces together to target notes and weave them together in interesting ways.
As for Too Many People , I listened to Ram the other day and somehow in all the years I’ve been listening to this album repeatedly I hadn’t appreciated Hugh McCracken’s work on the fills and outro. He’s absolutely destroying and I wouldn’t be surprised either way if Paul just let him go off or meticulously composed every note of the solo. If I had to wager I’d put my money on the former but either way its an awesome guitar performance.
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5.00am
11 June 2015
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I have no idea what you all are discussing but I do love reading musician talk!
I dig how Paul gives a shout out to the Wings fans at the beginning of this live Too Many People take from the 2005 U.S. Tour.
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5.16am
7 November 2022
Offline sir walter raleigh said
I’m teaching Michelle to a student and ended up going on about this very subject. The changes of Michelle would be very difficult to improvise over, you’d have to have an excellent awareness of harmony to approach the 3rd of the Bbm and then lead up to the 3rd of D from the Eb major scale.George doesn’t give himself enough credit as a lead player, his skills as an improvisor aren’t insane but he’s not playing over many 12 bar blues or traditional progressions and changes, he is taking solos over Lennon/McCartney masterpieces that don’t have super intuitive ways to just play in a single key or on a single scale. He was great at fitting pieces together to target notes and weave them together in interesting ways.
As for Too Many People , I listened to Ram the other day and somehow in all the years I’ve been listening to this album repeatedly I hadn’t appreciated Hugh McCracken’s work on the fills and outro. He’s absolutely destroying and I wouldn’t be surprised either way if Paul just let him go off or meticulously composed every note of the solo. If I had to wager I’d put my money on the former but either way its an awesome guitar performance.
So George is playing that lead on Michelle that sounds more like a keyboard than a guitar, sort of a muted electric guitar? I suspect that lead was scripted by Paul, even if George played it.
As for Too Many People , I always thought it was Dave Spinozza doing the electric guitar leads.
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5.18am
7 November 2022
Offline sigh butterfly said
I have no idea what you all are discussing but I do love reading musician talk!
I dig how Paul gives a shout out to the Wings fans at the beginning of this live Too Many People take from the 2005 U.S. Tour.
2005, when he still had the voice to wing it (pun intended)
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5.36am
11 June 2015
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I wonder if Paul was making a joke or do you think he forgot that this wasn’t a Wings song?
You and I have memories
Longer than the road that stretches out ahead
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