Concert In Red Square

. . .see more photos from the Red Square Show. . .

"MY REVIEW OF PAUL McCARTNEY'S MOSCOW CONCERT"

May 24th, 2003, Moscow, Red Square. Needless to say, Paul's concert out there was a major historical event in the first place, and a "good time event" in the second. To be honest, he could have easily given that concert ten (if not fifteen) years earlier - apparently, this never happened due to financial and organizational reasons, and we had to wait for the man to turn 60 to see him in person against the St Basil background. But even now, it was the first activity in my life which I had the "honour" of sharing with the President of the Russian Federation. Should I really feel honoured? Errh...
...well, before this turns into a big political discourse, let's switch back to what actually happened. Since this was a major-mega-event, you can imagine ticket prices for the front (seated) rows - I had to satisfy myself with a standing ticket, although I was still much luckier than the majority of those present. Well, at least I could actually see the tiny little Paul in his red T-shirt with the obligatory "no more land mines" on it running around the stage, although most of the time I preferred looking on the big screens anyway. On the other hand, the sound was perfect, easily the best I've heard so far on any concert, be it the huge Rolling Stones show or the tiny Jethro Tull one. Apart from moments where a particularly familiar Beatles song would come on and the crowd started singing along, the voice was perfectly audible, and so was every single instrument.
The show began with Paul's latest invention - sort of a "round-the-world-fancy-dress-ball" with lots and lots and lots of "characters" passing round the stage, presumably to emphasize Paul's worldwide importance - which was extremely colourful and just as excruciatingly boring, but then again, maybe that was the point, because just as I (and everyone around me) felt I could take it no more, out he comes, Hoffner in hand, and rips into 'Hello Goodbye'. The rest is history...
Let's say this: I may rip Paul's live albums to pieces, but a live album and an actual live performance are like two worlds apart. When listening to a live album with a critical ear, you're spotting every mistake, every vocal breakdown, and only waiting for the next one to write something scathing and insulting. And serves the artist right, I guess, because in Paul's case at least, live albums are nothing more than either an extra means to make some money or another PR trick, like the whole "McCartney/Lennon" shenanigan around Back In The US. But when you're actually listening to the very same, or to an absolutely similar, performance that's happening right before you, in the here and now, you don't see mistakes - you could care less about them. What you feel is the energy and the passion and the excitement of the crowd and the massiveness of the sound. And I've felt all that. And it was cool.
Granted, I did feel a wee bit bored towards the end of his lengthy acoustic/solo section. After the first few crowd-rocking pleasers, like 'Jet' and 'All My Loving' and 'Let Me Roll It', had died down, and Paul had proudly announced that "we have come here to rock Red Square!", he put his band to rest, took out the acoustic and started going the 'Blackbird'/'We Can Work It Out' route, which was fine but eventually - for me - became a bit too draggy.
However, when the band returned and they launched into 'Band On The Run', that's where the real ecstasy began. Isn't 'Band On The Run', like, the ultimate arena-rock number? It's just totally crushing, and Paul strained his voice to the max in all the right places. And then, no sooner had the final chords died down that he started 'Back In The USSR', and that, of course, heh heh, was when the lid blew off the kettle. To be frank, the crowd I've been in was extremely cool - nobody pressed and pushed around, everybody was having fun and managed to have it not at the expense of his/her neighbour. If anything, McCartney is great because he attracts great crowds. People of every age imaginable (well, I didn't see any babies, but you gotta understand, it is still not in the Russian tradition to bring babies to huge events), and all of them seemingly nice and friendly and intelligent. Well, almost all of them, but I feel I'm getting off topic again.
The moment of Paul singing 'Back In The USSR' on Red Square (and he did it twice - one more time "by special request", as he said, in the encore!) has, of course, entered history already, but the funny thing is, when I saw little bits of it in news footage later, it seemed so puny and small compared to what I have experienced back there - when you couldn't actually hear the words because 20,000 people were singing along, 20,000 Russian people, many of which probably learned English because of this one guy (well, him and several others)! The inner snob in me, of course, keeps sneering and whispering elitist arrogance into my ear, but this is one of these moments when the inner snob should simply fuck off.
In between songs Paul tried speaking Russian, forced his band to speak Russian, and cracked an occasional pre-rehearsed joke or two. The band was good, but I somehow wish Paul didn't change his colleagues so often - as soon as I adjust to his entourage, he fires it and gets a different set of ugly mugs. The drummer, who must be weighing twice as much as my entire family put together, was pretty cool (although nobody plays the 'The End' drum solo better than Ringo does!), and Rusty Anderson did a great job on guitar; his soloing on 'My Love' and 'Maybe I'm Amazed' was almost immaculate (almost, because these are the songs where you can't change one note in the guitar solo without ruining it).
I even fell under the spell of the final run of crowd-pleasers - even the audience interaction bit on 'Hey Jude' is exciting and involving when you get to witness it (and participate in it) yourself instead of seeing it on tape or hearing it on record. And when Paul finally left the stage after almost three hours of playing, satisfaction was guaranteed for all, I guess.
You could always argue that theoretically, a Paul McCartney show can't be all that great. Come on, even the Beatles themselves weren't the best live band in the world, and this is one fourth part of the Beatles. Come on, he just plays the songs the way they are. Come on, his backing bands are always interchangeable. Come on, the setlist is so painfully predictable it's almost laughable (although he did do 'She's Leaving Home', which even I couldn't have expected!). This is all true - when you're dealing with a McCartney live album. But being present at a McCartney live show transcends all that. It's like hearing the best music in the world - Beatles music - all around you, inside, outside, coming from the stage, spreading all over a huge area from a multitude of speakers, reverberating and coming back onstage being "given back" by thousands of people, all of them beyond themselves of happiness. It's a religious experience with no actual religion involved. And it's definitely real, no matter how old it is. I had my doubts - serious doubts - when I was heading towards the big meeting place. The moment 'Hello Goodbye' started, all the doubts happily jumped out of the window. And it's a day I'll definitely be proud to remember.