My mom and I saw Paul McCartney at the Hollywood Bowl on Wednesday March 31, 2010. Some memorable parts of the show:
Overall this was a great show and a special experience that I got to share with my mom. We had a great time. Paul is 67 years old and really did well.
- This was our 3rd time to see Paul. We saw him in 2001 at the Staples Center and in 2004 in Dallas.
- His setlist was very close to the 2004 show. Even some of his stories were the same. At the end of "Let Me Roll It" he played a bit of Foxy Lady by Hendrix. And he told the famous story about Hendrix playing Sgt. Pepper's live on a Sunday after it was released on Friday. And he told the story about Hendrix asking Eric Clapton to tune his guitar. I've read that 20 times and he told the same story in 2001. If there is a next time Paul... more stories!
- Paul, George and Ringo disliked Phil Spector's production of the "Let It Be" album so much that they re-produced it. They stripped out a lot of orchestra and female background vocals and kept it raw. The "Long And Winding Road" got a lot of the orchestral crap taken out and I thought the new, raw version was much more listenable. So I don't get why each of the 3 times I've seen Paul live that his version of "Long And Winding Road" had the same, original record orchestra (on synth) in the background!
- We were close enough to the stage that I could watch Paul's left hand strumming the strings on "Blackbird".
- Would have loved to hear more John stories before playing "Here Today". He intro'd it as the conversation that he never got to have with John. And he closed it by saying something like "well now for something less morbid"... then he jumped into "Dance Tonight". Maybe he's tired of 30 years of John tributes?
- In the previous 2 shows I noticed that Paul only played the Paul Beatle songs. "Something" was the exception in 2004. He played it again this time, same style on the ukulele with the same intro story about how great a ukulele player George was. But this time the rest of the band came in on the 2nd verse and played a smashingly great version of Something. Awesome!
- A few songs later he broke the Paul-only-sings-Paul-songs tradition again by playing "A Day In The Life", which is probably my favorite Beatles song. It was incredible... he even huffed into the microphone after "noticed I was late". The middle crescendo before the Paul verses was really well done. They cut the song early though (why, why??) and broke into "Give Peace A Chance" which was really nice.
- "Live And Let Die" was LOUD and loaded with pyrotechnics. At the end of it he jokingly shook his head as the crowd roared and pointed to his ears and his heart (too loud at his age!). It was so damn cold at the Bowl - the pyro warmed us up.
- He closed with the usual Sgt Pepper's Reprise + The End and as usual it rocked.
- Paul played electric on a few songs. He's not that amazing of a player - he reminds me of friends who never quite got their technique down. But damn that guy is an amazing songwriter, singer and melodic bass player.
- The lone down moment: The Hollywood Bowl advertises Park and Ride shuttles to avoid the crazy parking situation at the Bowl. We chose the Santa Monica 6PM departure. There was only one small problem - the stupid shuttle never showed up. At 6:15 we stopped waiting, grabbed 2 other people waiting and sped in my car to Hollywood. Fortunately we only missed one song!
Overall this was a great show and a special experience that I got to share with my mom. We had a great time. Paul is 67 years old and really did well.
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