Some things in life are always true. Seeing Paul McCartney in concert, even at age 67, is one of them. Sir Paul wowed a near-capacity crowd at FedEx Field on Saturday night with a mammoth, Beatles-centric 35 song set that also included hits and album cuts from his Wings era and solo career. Yes, he played (by my very unofficial count) at least 11 of those 35 songs at the then MCI Center in 2005, but not even I am going to complain about that.
It takes a skilled and seasoned performer to turn a football stadium into something cozier and more intimate, but it’s something McCartney and his band did with aplomb by making jokes, telling stories and doing everything possible to make the crowd feel like they were a part of the show. The stage set up, with a video screen behind the band and two giant video screens on the sides of the stage certainly helped. Playing to the DC audience, he dedicated “Michelle” to Barack and Michelle Obama, introducing it by saying it was a song that “Barack might want to sing to someone in his house.” The most touching part of the night came during “Something,” which McCartney played solo on a ukulele given to him by George Harrison, before the band came in with a crash during the later half of the song. A old photo montage of Harrison ran in the background for the duration. John Lennon and Paul’s first wife Linda Eastmen also got songs dedicated to them. Sorry, Ringo.
Not all of the nights material was from the distant past however, as Macca bravely played “Sing The Changes,” a song off of Electric Arguments from The Firemen, a McCartney side-project, late in the set. Many in the crowd took the opportunity to make a trip to the bathroom before the big finale of stone-cold classics still to come. High points in the show included a very energetic “Paperback Writer,” a rocking “Live And Let Die,” complete with pyro and fireworks, and a slinky “Get Back.”
During the show McCartney remarked that D.C. had been the site of The Beatles first show on U.S. soil, which was at the Washington Coliseum in 1964. It’s easy to see why Sir Paul remains such a popular performer over 40 years later. His material is obviously second-to-none and he still displays that boyish charm that drew everyone in in the first place. Older fans go see him to recapture what it felt like to be young, younger fans want to experience Beatlemania first-hand — but most of all, everyone goes home happy.
Full set list after the jump.
