A solid three hours of the Fab One ensured, for one night at least, all our troubles seemed so far away, writes SEAN FLYNN
ON A luminous summer night in Dublin, a multi-generational crowd of about 40,000 slowly eased its way out of the RDS with a song in its heart and a spring in its step.
For one night only, all that stuff about Nama, subordinated debt and our forthcoming one thousand years of austerity was put to one side.
Paul McCartney, legend, superstar and ordinary Liverpool geezer, delivered a dazzling performance which will linger long in the memory of those fortunate enough to witness it. As Van Morrison might say, “wouldn’t it be great if it was like this all the time?”
McCartney had touched down in Dublin fresh from mixing it with Barack, Michelle and the kids in the White House. Accepting the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Music, he joked that, after the last eight years, it was great to have a president who knows what a library is. He thought it cool that Dublin – one of his absolutely favourite places – was next up after the White House.
McCartney – 68 on Friday – looked maybe 20 years younger. Better still; the voice was robust and strong; rocking out on Back in the USSR, tender and at perfect pitch on The Long and Winding Road.
And he has oodles of charm. McCartney is the most successful songwriter in popular music. He is the kind of guy who makes presidents and prime ministers swoon (Tony Blair once delayed a cabinet meeting to catch up with the Fab One) but he is also avuncular, cheery and self-deprecating . . . Brooding rock stars with a scintilla of his talent, please take heed.
Dressed in trademark Nehru jacket, he delivered an epic, three-hour, 33-song set featuring some of the most enduring popular music ever written. McCartney dipped into his personal jukebox , rolling out one classic song after another; All My Lovin' , Eleanor Rigby, Paperback Writer, Let it Be, My Love, Band on The Run, Lady Madonnaand a glorious, stripped-back acoustic version of Blackbird.
There was also a generous acknowledgement of dearly departed colleagues. A Day in the Lifeand Give Peace a Chance, warmly dedicated to John Lennon. For George Harrison, McCartney first fired off a jaunty ukulele-led version of Something, before altering the mood and performing the song with all its old guitar-led majesty.
Through it all, the huge screen popped up career-spanning images of the mop tops – from those wacky days on the set of A Hard Day's Nightin 1965 to shiny computer images generated for the latest Xbox games.
Favourite song of the night? McCartney rocking out on Get Back, bringing to mind iconic images of a bearded Macca performing on the roof of the Apple Studio building in 1970. Happy days.
The Fab One gave two encores, and he seemed reluctant to leave the Dublin stage.
He finished with Sergeant Pepperand The End from the Abbey Roadalbum. He said he hoped we had enjoyed the show.
He needn’t have worried about that. On Saturday night, all our troubles seemed so far away.