Written by Scott Russell, contributor
According to my calculations, the average SCAD student is only about 24 years old. However, regardless of our collective youth, I’m confident that Sir Paul McCartney needs no introduction.
McCartney, backed by what has become his most long-lasting band, captivated an enormous sold-out crowd at the Philips Arena on Wednesday, October 15. The concert had originally been slated for the summer – Saturday, June 21, to be exact – but the date was rescheduled after McCartney contracted a virus that forced him to cancel five tour dates and postpone seven others.
This eagerly anticipated event was stop 55 on McCartney’s herculean “Out There” tour, which has covered four continents over the course of the past 17 months. Just as staggering as the tour was the performance itself: McCartney’s 39-song set spanned his entire 57-year music career, from his youthful glory days with The Beatles and his decade of success with Wings all the way up to his widely acclaimed 2013 album, “New.”
In the wake of his illness, there was doubt about how much longer the 72-year-old McCartney could continue touring; after seeing him live, I can attest to the absurdity of that notion. Sir Paul’s ageless energy and effortless charisma were on display all night long, not to mention the immense instrumental chops and melodic singing voice that helped make him a household name. He paused after nearly every song to acknowledge his adoring audience, chirping one cheerful “thank you” after another.
The massive crowd, made up mostly of baby boomers and ex-flower children, mustered a youthful enthusiasm to match McCartney’s – the middle-aged woman sitting next to me sang along and danced in her seat from start to finish. At one point in the show, a younger fan shrieked, “I love you, Paul,” to which McCartney replied, in a mock scream, “I love you, too!” The audience erupted with laughter and a smiling McCartney asked, “How lucky am I?”
McCartney’s rock ‘n roll bona fides are beyond question, but the singer only added to his legend by sharing a pair of stories that only a musical icon could tell. The first story followed a brief but raucous rendition of “Foxy Lady,” which McCartney dubbed “a tribute to the late, great Jimi Hendrix.” Days after The Beatles first released “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” in 1967, Hendrix performed the album’s title track with McCartney in attendance. In the process of soloing on the song, Hendrix rendered his guitar wildly out of tune and turned to another member of the audience to ask his assistance in retuning it: none other than Eric Clapton.
McCartney also recounted his tale of becoming one of “the first rock and roll men to be invited” to play a concert in Moscow’s renowned Red Square, after which he and his bandmates met various high-profile members of the Russian government. One Russian official approached McCartney and informed him that the first record he’d ever bought was “Love Me Do,” and another told him, “We learned English from Beatles records. Hello, goodbye.” Hearing McCartney recreate this hilarious exchange in his best attempt at a Russian accent was a delight.
The evening as a whole was laden with a sense of musical history. McCartney played his rendition of “Paperback Writer” with the same guitar that he used on the song’s original recording in 1966. One fan-made sign in the crowd read, “Five decades of joy!” Another, which McCartney paused to read aloud, said, “We saw you in ’76!” My seat neighbor shouted, “I saw you in ’65!” in reply. Towards the end of the night, McCartney used a ukulele given to him by dearly departed former bandmate George Harrison to play “Something,” a starkly beautiful Beatles classic Harrison wrote. McCartney also paid tribute to the late John Lennon with an emotional rendition of “Here Today,” which he referred to as an “unfinished conversation between me and John.” The entire arena fell into a reverent silence, during which only scattered sobs and his song could be heard.
At one point the jumbotron showed a young boy in the front row, seemingly oblivious to the spectacle in front of him. In that moment, I sincerely hoped that McCartney’s music would continue to live on through that boy’s generation and generations beyond, the way it has through mine.
