Rock and Roll at the Hollywood BOWL!

Report by Blake Toland:

What an unbelievable night it was at the famous Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. It was the first of two nights and Paul's first Hollywood Bowl concert since 1993. The weather was actually perfect considering clouds were rolling in and there was a threat for rain. The Concert began with two large screens on each side projecting photos of Paul's career through the Beatles, Wings and solo days. The show began with the Venus and Mars/Rock Show, a fitting start for a Hollywood Bowl concert, as the lyrics mention. Jet rolled right in next. After hearing two Wings songs in a row, I knew this night would be amazing.

All My Loving and the crowd pleasing Got To Get You Into My Life were awesome and this whole time I was on my feet having a blast. Highway, Let Me Roll It with the Foxy Lady Jam and the Long And Winding Road were performed leading up to what I believe was the highlight of the night. Paul played Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five, perhaps my favorite Wings song of all time.! I could not believe I was hearing that song live for the second time on US soil (he played it in Glendale on the first night of the tour). I may have been the only one on my feet during that one along with my friend, being about half way back from the stage. I was told to sit down after that! We moved after being treated so rudely. In my opinion, half of the audience should of stayed home and watched the show on television. If your not in the mood to enjoy a rock and roll show and get up and dance and sing, stay home!! Continuing the set was a new song called I Want To Come Home. My Love, I'm Looking Through You, Every Night, Two Of Us, Blackbird and Here Today were songs performed about half way through the show. Dance Tonight was a fun song and you would think people would stand and Dance Tonight? Maybe in certain sections. Mrs. Vandebilt was a great one, everyone was singing to that one, a definite crowd pleaser. By this time I was down in the throughways where you acce! ss your seats. There you can actually stand. Eleanor Rigby, So! mething, Letting Go and Sing The Changes propelled the crowd into Band On The Run, the most popular in the Wings catalog. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da was a surprise, such a fun song to sing along to. Back in The USSR, I've Got a Feeling and Paperback Writer were nearing the end of the main set. A Day in the Life was powerful leading into Give Peace a Chance. Let It Be was emotional, and should be.

The most high energy part of the show by far was Live And Let Die, with the fire balls coming off the stage and the fireworks from above. Well done Paul!! Hey Jude ended the main set with an almost eight minute version sing a long. The first encore included Day Tripper, Lady Madonna and Get Back. The finally ended with Yesterday, Helter Skelter and the ending song which Paul has been performing for quite some time now is the Sgt. Peppers Reprise leading into the End. I was hoping for Golden Slumbers but I don't think that has been performed since his 1989/1990 World Tour. I mean this was just a pow! erhouse show. What a way to come back to Hollywood Bowl after all these years and play a heart pounding three hour show. Paul's band was in top form, with Abe Laboriel Jr. on drums, quite possibly the best drummer out there these days. Paul 'Wix' Wickens played keyboards and as usual, deserves so much credit. I'm always excited to watch him play the keyboards. Rusty Anderson and Bryan Ray were solid on the guitars and really round out the show. This group of guys are the best Paul has ever played with.

And as for audience problems, I moved and didn't let them ruin my night. No one should be told to sit down, bottom line! I wrote a review from The Paul McCartney concert on November 11, 2005. I was only 19 at the time, being 23 now, I am a little more wiser and am honored to have seen Sir Paul McCartney again. Once again Paul, you have exceeded my expectations with a fantastic Rock and Roll Show. Thank you so much and I really hope to see you again. Just know there are a lot ! of young fans out there like me that cherish your music and wi! ll alway s be a part of my life. Till the next time Paul..... Thank you!

LA Times - Randy Lewis

Photo: Paul McCartney at the Hollywood Bowl on March 30, 2010. Credit: Chris Pizzello / Associated Press

It’s hard to think of much in the pop music world more impressive than a 67-year-old musician  holding forth for nearly three hours, outdoors on a chilly March night, while delivering some three dozen songs, the least of which would be a career highlight for almost any other artist.

Perhaps the only thing more mind-boggling than that description of Paul McCartney’s sold-out show Tuesday in the first of his two nights this week at the Hollywood Bowl was the realization when it was all over that, without much trouble and no serious dip in quality, he could have filled another set of that magnitude with all the choice Beatles, Wings and solo tunes he didn’t get around to: “She Loves You,” “Can’t Buy Me Love,” “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Getting Better,” “She’s Leaving Home,”  “Maybe I’m Amazed,” “Hi, Hi, Hi,” etc. etc. etc.

It was  no-brainer that he'd open Tuesday’s concert with “Venus and Mars Rock Show,” what with its line in the chorus about a “rock show at the Hollywood Bowl.”  The rest was a romp through nearly half a century of some of the most enduring rock music ever written. And that’s just his portion of it, although he did make generous nods to departed colleagues John Lennon — singing “A Day in the Life” and “Give Peace a Chance” — and George Harrison, in a reading of “Something” that went from lighthearted to deeply moving, something McCartney does effortlessly.

The minor shock of the evening was that Ringo Starr didn’t get so much as a mention, although his presence was felt in some of the vintage film clips used as a visual backdrop to a couple of songs as well as during the pre-concert programming on the giant video screens that flanked the Bowl’s stage.

McCartney’s ace four-piece band re-created the sound of the various original recordings accurately, without being slavish, although some string and horn parts delegated to keyboardist Paul Wickens to handle by way of synthesizers were a disappointment in “Eleanor Rigby,” “Lady Madonna,” “Got to Get You Into My Life” and “Yesterday.”

If Paul McCartney can’t scare up some bona fide orchestral players, in Hollywood no less, who can?

The show’s star was relaxed as ever, downplaying his superhuman musical achievements. And even if it wasn’t spontaneous, his brief pause early on so he could step back from the microphone, cast his gaze around the Bowl’s expansive territory -- where the Fab Four made historic visits 4 1/2 decades ago -- and “drink it all in” was clearly heartfelt.

The set hewed considerably closer to the mainstream than his edge-exploring performance last year at the Coachella Music & Arts Festival, and it included a couple of selections he said he’d never played in the U.S. before this tour: “Nineteen-Hundred and Eighty-Five” from “Band on the Run” and the Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da.”

That perfectly suited Hollywood’s middle-of-the-road crowd, consisting of old-school Beatles fans revisiting their formative years side by side with a sizable contingent of teens and pre-teens smack dab in the middle of theirs, with McCartney and the Beatles as the bond between them.

A word of advice to fans attending tonight’s Bowl show: Arrive plenty early. Tuesday’s show was delayed about 45 minutes past the scheduled 7:30 p.m. start time, in large part because some 18,000 concert-goers were funneled through a ridiculously small number of ushers scanning and hand-stamping their tickets. “Let ‘Em In,” indeed.

A full review will appear in Thursday’s Calendar section.

Hollywood Reporter  - By Erik Pedersen

Bottom Line: Generous, memorable show unites performer and crowd in rare ways.

If anyone could be excused for having a rock star's distant, aloof persona, it would be Paul McCartney.

But that's simply not him; he exudes a genuine likability and unforced charm that flattens any barriers between him and a live audience. And Tuesday's fantastic show also was an example of how music -- certain music -- can bridge cultural and generational chasms.

Whether it was a Wings track, recent solo material or any of the 20-plus Beatles songs, it was easy to hear the past half-century of popular music in the melodies and harmonies. And McCartney shared several stories that offered a peek behind the scenes of that history and helped make this show special.

The opening song was predictable: The Wings rave-up "Venus and Mars/Rock Show" touts "rock 'n' roll at the Hollywood Bowl," and McCartney waxed nostalgic about the venue the Beatles famously played early in their career and where he hadn't appeared since 1993.

"I came up here in the car, and it was like, 'Oooh, deja vu," he said. "It's so amazing, I just want to take a moment to drink it all in." And he did. Later, he added: "This is bringing back the memories. There used to be a pond there; was that really 70 years ago?"

The night's first Fab Four track -- a faithful rendition of "All My Loving," complete with black-and-white Beatlemania footage -- showed that McCartney's voice wasn't in peak form, its "whoo-hoos" abridged at best. But given the communal vibe in the packed Bowl and the generous, nearly three-hour set from a 67-year-old on a brisk night, that was entirely forgivable. Readers who feel compelled to focus on the negative should look elsewhere; click around the snarkosphere because this show was too good to belittle.

Initially sporting a black jacket with no collar that split the difference between the early Beatles look and the gaudy "Sgt. Pepper" outfits, McCartney switched instruments often -- bass, piano, electric and acoustic guitars, mandolin, even a Gibson ukulele given to him by George Harrison. He proceeded to play the first half of "Something" on it, subbing a sweet falsetto for the famous post-chorus guitar lick, before the band crashed in. Funny that the song would be a highlight of a Paul McCartney concert.

He reminisced about Harrison and John Lennon with stories that were amusing or moving but never maudlin, referring to them only by first name, (There was no mention at all of a certain Liverpudlian drummer.) He recalled how he and Harrison used to play old rock 'n' roll on their guitars, then "show off" with a little classical. But he said they botched some Bach, and the result was the opening of "Blackbird," which he played alone on acoustic guitar.

McCartney then introduced "Here Today" by saying he "wrote it for John; a conversation we never had -- the kind of thing you always said you'd say tomorrow." He played the electric guitar hook/riff on the Lennon-inspired "Let Me Roll It," then was in a metal mood, embellishing the 1974 Wings nugget with a fiery "Foxey Lady" coda. Moving to the piano, he told a funny tale about Jimi Hendrix: "We released 'Sgt. Pepper' on a Friday," he said, "and by Sunday, Jimi had learned it and was opening with it." The all-ages crowd gave a group laugh.

Those personal little glimpses into pop lore, interspersed between songs that span and connect generations past, present and future, brought performer and audience ever closer.

When he played "A Day in the Life," for example, a glance around the smiling crowd made one wonder exactly which moment of their life each was reliving. Was it 1967? '74, maybe? '88? 2003? The feeling of community was palpable, especially when the song morphed into "Give Peace a Chance," offered as grand, unaccompanied sing-along and without commentary.

McCartney made good use of the video backdrop, ranging from vintage photos to "Rock Band" avatars. Perhaps most fun was footage of the album-cover photo shoot during "Band on the Run," featuring close-up and candid glimpses of James Coburn, Christopher Lee, et al. The subsequent "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," which McCartney said he "never played on American soil before this tour," got many off their chairs, and "Back in the U.S.S.R." furthered the trend.

McCartney's voice mostly had solidified by the time he delivered a de-Spectorized "Let It Be," and the following "Live and Let Die" featured some ('74) Bond-worthy loud pyrotechnics. Afterward, McCartney rubbed his ears in faux pain before settling down with a seven-minute "Hey Jude" that had most of the 18,000 or so beaming and singing.

Yes, there were vocal shortcomings. "Eleanor Rigby" and "Day Tripper" were a little sluggish, maybe a half-beat behind, and the synthed horns on songs like "Got to Get You Into My Life" were disappointing. But a show like this is critic-proof, plain and simple. Anyone who would quibble about it is doing so for quibbling's sake. The world won't again see such a unifying musical force as the Beatles, and Sir Paul will be welcomed for as long as he chooses to share his songs with an audience.

Let's hope he continues to do just that.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/music-reviews/paul-mccartney-concert-review-1004079845.story