“Nothing ever came of this because McCartney couldn’t recognise good stuff.” Why Paul McCartney's dream of making a sci-fi musical film about earth-invading aliens with legendary author Isaac Asimov never got off the launch-pad

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"The picture opens with the arrival on Earth of sex extra-terrestrial characters. They are from a dying planet and are looking for a new home. They are wraith-like energy-beings who are parasitic on matter-beings. On board ship they are occupying matter-beings from their own world. The nature of these creatures is not important; but they may be lizard like."

So began legendary sci-fi author Isaac Asimov's 'preliminary treatment' outlining the plot of a musical film with the working title Five And Five And One, based upon an original idea by former Beatle / Wings frontman Paul McCartney.

As revealed in The Guardian, McCartney's original 1974 plot synopsis and Asimov's expanded vision for the film, were discovered by writers Allan Kozinn and Adrian Sinclair, while researching The McCartney Legacy, Volume 2: 1974-80, set to be published by HarperCollins on December 10.

McCartney's own treatment began: “A ‘flying saucer’ lands. Out of it get five creatures. They transmute before your very eyes into ‘us’ [Wings]. They are here to take over Earth by taking America by storm and they proceed to do this supergroup style. Meanwhile – back in the sticks of Britain – lives the original group, whose personalities are being used by the aliens…”

The musician also left space in his outline for spots in which he intended dropping in new songs by Wings.

In Asimov's proposal, the aliens would be “strangely affected” by hearing music, and would “decide that they must use the musical key to unlock human emotion”.

Sadly, the plans for this rather outlandish cinematic masterpiece-in-waiting were never realised, largely because McCartney wasn't overly impressed by the American writer's expanded revisions of his ideas.

‘Nothing ever came of this because McCartney couldn’t recognise good stuff’ was Asimov’s damning verdict on the rejected treatment, handwritten on his original manuscript.

A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne's private jet, played Angus Young's Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.