Live Review: Paul McCartney – 18th October 2013 – Covent Garden, London, UK

Covent Garden in London has long been home to street performers of many a kind, from magicians to dancers to musicians to mimes, but it’s rare for even the greatest venues – no matter a simple street in front of a church, to have a musician up to the standard of Paul McCartney play in the area – but that is exactly what happened.

Covent Garden is often busy, with many people going around the various shops, restuarants and cafes – but it was noticeable that something else was going on by the sizeable stage truck and barriers that were in front of the St. Pauls church. It wasn’t long before the whispers that Paul McCartney was playing were circulating in the area. It didn’t take long for the rumours to be confirmed. By the time McCartney came on stage, the square in front of St. Paul’s Church was packed, with people on balconies, scaffolding and in every seating and standing area to be seen – as well as cameras of every shape and size in almost every hand.

McCartney entered the stage, shouting out a great “hello” to the rapidly growing audience ahead of him, and was met with a massive blast of cheering and applause in response. McCartney informed the audience that he and his band were going to play a song from his most recent album, New (also the title of their first song.) The track went down well, with there already being several people singing along despite the album’s relatively recent release. After that, McCartney and his band went on to play another three of the tracks from his new album, and then play the first track, New again. Each of the tracks featured the hallmarks of classic McCartney songs, with big arrangements and melody lines that you seemed to know and want to sing along with almost immediately. McCartney (whilst switching at various points between electric and acoustic guitar, as well as piano) and his band all played unsurprisingly tightly with fantastic stage prescence.

After the band played the first track again, it all seemed to be over as soon as it had started – half of the audience walking off doubting that they had actually just seen Paul McCartney, the other half sticking around the stage area and still doubting that they had actually just seen Paul McCartney.

Set List:

1. New
2. Save Us
3. Everybody Out There
4. Queenie Eyes
5. New (repeat)

Nick Roberts

::: covering the latest live events in London (UK) for RenownedForSound.com