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Paul McCartney’s ‘Got Back’ Tour Scores a Touchdown With Marathon SoFi Stadium Show: Concert Review

Coming up on the cusp of 80, does he "feel like letting go" of his high-energy touring regimen? Apparently not.

By Chris Willman

Chris Willman

Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic

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Paul McCartney has something to prove. What that is is between him and his shrink, although maybe a desire to seem and feel undiminished is not as mysterious as all that. What we do know for certain is that, in the year of our lord 2022, McCartney is doing two-hour-and-40-minute sets that encompass 36 songs. If this seems at all slacker-ish, consider also that the singer is keeping with his touring custom of recent years and doing more informal, hour-long, 8-to-13-song “soundchecks” before the doors open for fans who buy VIP packages, something that puts him stage close to four hours each show day.

Unspoken at Friday night’s SoFi Stadium show in L.A., and un-alluded to in even the slightest way — even though Beatlemaniacs have it marked on their calendars for next month — is that he turns 80 next month, two days after the tour wraps up. It may be unfair to compare the ways in which different performers age, but it’s worth pointing out that McCartney is doing these fairly marathon shows at a point in his life that is past the point at which Frank Sinatra did his final concert, following a few years of publicly noted erraticism. And yet here we are at a point where, for him anyway, 80 seems to be the new July-or-August of his years. No one would begrudge McCartney, or very few would, if he cut a few corners: cutting the set length to a reasonable two hours here, lowering the keys a little there, or dropping some of the vocal ad libs to save his voice for Syracuse. But McCartney is not about to use impending octogenarianism as a rationale to finally half-ass it. In fact, he’s not even going to three-quarters-ass it.

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Of course, SoFi Stadium was filled with repeat customers — veterans of “Wings Over America” at the Forum in ’76 if not the Beatles at the Bowl in ’64 — but you didn’t have to look too far to see the sight of a 20-ish kid attending with a 75-ish grandfather, or even groups of proactive Gen-Z-ers that didn’t need boomer chaperones to see the value in coming. Whatever else might motivate McCartney to prove it all night, he’s surely aware that the “Got Back” tour is the only live experience of his or the Beatles’ music that these younger attendees will have in their lifetimes, and they’re not going to be grading it on a curve. That’s up to the oldsters: Were there enough deep ’70s cuts in the setlist? Is his voice what it was on the 2003 tour? But it’s hard to imagine too many people who were experiencing this as their first or only McCartney show not walking away with some deep feels they may feel compelled to tell their own grandkids about.

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The show here largely follows the template established by the 2019 tour, so anyone who caught the tour finale at Dodger Stadium in July of that year but missed SoFi doesn’t have to worry they missed out on too major a variation on the previous iteration. But McCartney didn’t really design the show with double-dippers in mind; L.A. is one of very few markets he hit in ’19 that he’s coming back to in ’22, whereas several other cities, he hasn’t played in decades (Baltimore) or at all (Spokane). Since three years ago, a number of songs have come out (gone this time are “A Hard Day’s Night,” the “Sgt. Pepper” reprise, “Eleanor Rigby,” “From Me to You,” “I’ve Just Seen a Face” and — bet you saw this one coming, or going — “Back in the U.S.S.R.”). Other have been reinserted from years and tours past (including “Getting Better,” “We Can Work It Out,” “New” and — hey, what’s this buried nugget?  — “Get Back”).

Somewhat surprisingly, “Women and Wives” is the only song from his most recent album, “McCartney III,” to be plugged into the tour, and even that was absent from the setlist at SoFi, for some reason. But maybe the reasons for underplaying “III” generally are obvious; it was a pandemic album, scaled down and clearly not designed with stadiums in mind, unlike its predecessor, “Egypt Station.” McCartney half-joked that when he plays a Beatles song it’s like a galaxy of cell-phone lights, and when he does contemporary material he peers out into a black hole. But there were no bathroom stampedes during the 21st century picks, not even for “Fuh You,” the Ryan Tedder co-write that McCartney continues to seem to love beyond all reason, despite the better recent choices available to him. (Would he take a request for “Deep, Deep Feeling” instead? No, he probably wouldn’t.)

As for older songs that haven’t been tried on tour before, McCartney isn’t doing so much of that rediscovery this go-round, although fans are getting “You Never Give Me Your Money” (last played on tour in 2003) and “She Came In Through the Bathroom Window” (only ever toured in 2005) as a medley for the first time. Maybe the true newbie in the lineup is the idea of “I’ve Got a Feeling” as a Lennon-and-McCartney encore duet, with footage and isolated audio of his late partner snipped out of the “Get Back” film by Peter Jackson for the tour’s purposes.

The loose structure of the show will also raise some deja vu for those returning from 2019: a rocking opening stretch highly reliant on ’70s rockers like “Junior’s Farm” and “Letting Go” as Act 1; a partially acoustic, “Storytellers”-like magical history tour of the Beatles’ rise as the backbone of Act 2, going all the way back to the Quarrymen’s “In Spite of All the Danger” and leading up the Lennon tribute “Here Today” and the Harrison cover “Something”; and then, letting the third hour be birthday sons, na-na-na-na-na-na-na-ing and “Abbey Road” medley-izing.

That structure indisputably works, and so, as part of a winning formula, does a band that has now been together for many more years than the Beatles ever were, guitarist Rusty Anderson, guitarist-bassist Brian Ray, keyboard player Paul “Wix” Wickens and drummer Abe Laboriel Jr. The latter player also doubles as the tour’s sole dancer, mugging up a storm behind the kit during “Dance Tonight” before finally being forced to sit down and help kick out an acoustic jam midway through the tune. Anderson and Ray do an eternally expert job of recreating parts McCartney largely did on his own on his own on his DIY records, and get to step into the shoes of Lennon and Harrison in joining in for the triplicate guitar solos of “The End.” Horns have sometimes been replicated as keyboard parts on past tours, so the sight of a real three-man horn section on selections like “Letting Go” and “Got to Get You Into My Life” was a welcome one. The real star of the show, in some ways: the Hofner bass, which McCartney not only plays for a substantial part of the show, but which has been animated for the pre-show countdown, descending on the big screen like some version of the Times Square New Year’s Eve ball, and landing like a giant version of the “2001” monolith before attendees see it in the wooden flesh.

And what of McCartney as a singer… at age 79-and-11/12ths? He has been, by some almost objective measures, the best all-around singer as well as most accomplished mainstream songwriter of the rock ‘n’ roll era — and how convenient it was during the 20th century to have both of those in one package. The catalog is set in stone, but his ability to ape Little Richard’s scream, or to navigate the eternally tricky twists of “Maybe I’m Amazed,” eternally is not something we can assume or expect. It’s just assumed that rockers can sing their classics forever, until we’re jolted awake to the fact that they cannot, as with the recent instance of videos being circulated of a certain ’80s icon who is not coming within a prayer of hitting the notes on his band’s most enduring hit anymore. Any fears that this would happen with McCartney are fortunately unfounded, so far. Which is not to say that attentive fans will not take note of and discuss inevitable balladic passages in which you will hear an interesting combination of vigor and time-wisened fragility in his voice. But make no mistake — he’s going for the notes he’s always gone for, and hitting them, without the usual accommodations powerhouse singers have to make as they reach an advanced age. He still howls . And if you listen carefully, it’s maybe a softer, less throat-ravaging version of the howl than he used to do. That’s more of a technical adjustment than anything that is going to stand in the way of anyone enjoying a balls-out resurrection of “Helter Skelter,” anyway

Yes, “Helter Skelter” is still in the set, and still as gratifying as it ever was, with McCartney maintaining his king-of-the-heap status on the precipice of an age where we used to think Chuck Berry going through the motions with a pickup band in front of a few hundred people was as good as grandfather-statesman rocking got. As much as McCartney made history with the Beatles 60 years ago, it feels like he’s making history again in pushing the envelope of how long you can keep doing this kind of a massive, demanding show (as opposed to a Dylan or a Willie, who also are out there and doing it, but with lower expectations of heightened stadium energy). Being on stage in front of 60,000 people being able to confidently coo and bellow songs that you wrote 60 years prior is not something that God wrote into the human contract, but McCartney (like the Stones and Who and not too many others) is are out to prove nature and the Almighty wrong. McCartney’s only nod to the passage of time was a final promise that “we’ll see you next time.” Do we get this privilege, at this high a performing level, again in two or three years? In six? Who knows, but for now, there’s reason to be grateful that he just can’t stop going back to the top of the slide.

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Paul McCartney Announces 2022 U.S. Tour

Paul McCartney has announced his first tour dates since 2019 . The U.S. run kicks off this April in Spokane, Washington and winds up in New Jersey in mid-June. Check out the dates below.

“I said at the end of the last tour that I’d see you next time,” McCartney said in a press release. “I said I was going to get back to you. Well, I got back!”

McCartney released his latest album, McCartney III , in 2020, before enlisting a host of collaborators (Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, St. Vincent, Devonté Hynes, Damon Albarn, and others) for a companion LP, McCartney III Imagined , the following year. Peter Jackson’s stupendously long documentary on the making of Let It Be came out last year. Read “ The Beatles: Get Back Rewrites the Fab Four’s Ending .”

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04-28 Spokane, WA - Spokane Arena 05-02 Seattle, WA - Climate Pledge Arena 05-03 Seattle, WA - Climate Pledge Arena 05-06 Oakland, CA - Oakland Arena 05-13 Inglewood, CA - SoFi Stadium 05-17 Fort Worth, TX - Dickies Arena 05-21 Winston Salem, NC - Truist Field 05-25 Hollywood, FL - Hard Rock Live 05-28 Orlando, FL - Camping World Stadium 05-31 Knoxville, TN - Thompson-Boling Arena 06-04 Syracuse, NY - Carrier Dome 06-07 Boston, MA - Fenway Park 06-08 Boston, MA - Fenway Park 06-12 Baltimore, MD - Orioles Park 06-16 East Rutherford, NJ - MetLife Stadium

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Paul McCartney Sets ‘Got Back’ Tour of Australia

"I've got so many amazing memories of my time in Australia over the years," McCartney comments.

By Lars Brandle

Lars Brandle

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Paul McCartney has his sights set on a return to Australia, for his first tour there in six years.

The evergreen octogenarian had promised “news coming soon” on his socials , and he delivers with the announcement of a new, Australian swing to his Got Back Tour , which will play two markets for the first time – the satellite cities of Newcastle (north of Sydney) and Gold Coast (south of Brisbane).

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The two-time Rock And Roll Hall of Famer will embark on his run with an “intimate” date at Adelaide Entertainment Centre, Oct. 18, the only arena show on the itinerary. When McCartney and the Beatles played the South Australia capital in 1964, at the very peak of their powers, an estimated 350,000 people lined the streets to catch a glimpse of the Fab Four. That’s roughly one-third the city’s current population.

The six-city stretch includes outdoor dates in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. Perth misses out.

“I’ve got so many amazing memories of my time in Australia over the years,” McCartney comments in a statement, confirming the Australia leg. “Our last trip was so much fun. We had such an incredible time. Each show was a party so we know this is going to be incredibly special. Australia we are going to rock! I can’t wait to see you.”

Those memories and parties coalesced into a tour for the ages. Macca’s five-city One On One Tour won the Helpmann for best international contemporary concert in 2018, awarded by Live Performance Australia, and was declared a career highlight by legendary promoter Michael Gudinski, the late founder of Frontier Touring.

Joining McCartney on the road is his longtime band, Paul “Wix” Wickens (keyboards), Brian Ray (bass/guitar), Rusty Anderson (guitar) and Abe Laboriel Jr (drums).

Following the release of Peter Jackson’s three-part 2021 documentary series The Beatles: Get Back , McCartney embarked on a 16-date U.S. run on his Got Back Tour , which last year nudged his total career gross north of the $1 billion mark , making him one of just 11 artists to surpass the 10-digit mark in Boxscore’s 30-year-plus history.

Paul McCartney – 2023 Got Back Tour of Australia : Oct .18 — Adelaide Entertainment Centre Oct. 21 — Marvel Stadium, Melbourne, VIC Oct. 24 — McDonald Jones Stadium, Newcastle Oct. 27 — Allianz Stadium, Sydney Nov. 1 — Suncorp Stadium, Brisbane Nov. 4 — Heritage Bank Stadium, Gold Coast

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Paul McCartney Kicks Off 2022 North American Tour in Spokane: Recap, Photos + Setlist

McCartney's first US outing in three years featured a virtual duet with John Lennon

Early into the opening night of the “Got Back Tour” on Thursday (April 28th), Paul McCartney pointed out an attendee’s sign held aloft. It displayed a message that this night in Spokane, Washington — McCartney’s first live show since July 2019 — marked the fan’s 124th McCartney concert.

“It’s beautiful, we love it,” the Beatle said as cameras flashed the sign to the 12,000-plus folks filling Spokane Arena. “But it’s slightly obsessive.”

McCartney’s deadpan humor didn’t disappear during his time off the road, nor did his ability to craft a stunning, nearly three-hour set that somehow manages to thrill the Beatlemaniacs, give proper due to his too-often-neglected Wings work, and slip in a few surprises and new songs as well.

Even so, with a catalog as stacked as McCartney’s, it’s impossible to include every “Jet,” “Back in the U.S.S.R.” and “A Hard Day’s Night” when you want to showcase tunes from your most recent albums. “Women and Wives” from 2020’s McCartney III made its live debut, and he played two songs from 2018’s Egypt Station (“Fuh You” and “Come On To Me”).

The kickoff of the “Got Back Tour” was an unusually intimate affair for a McCartney roadtrip. Spokane Arena, tucked in a small city in Eastern Washington, is by far the smallest venue he’ll play on his “Got Back Tour,” a jaunt that includes shows at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, Fenway Park in Boston and Met Life Stadium in New Jersey (get tickets here ).

Paul McCartney, photo courtesy of MPL Communications Ltd

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‘Thank you, Spokane’: Paul McCartney rocks a packed Arena with Beatles classics, solo tunes and a hilarious fan interaction

It’s getting better all the time now that Sir Paul McCartney has got back in our town.

Spokane will never be the same. Less than two months before reaching octogenarian status, Sir Paul has finally played Spokane. The capacity crowd at the Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena roared Thursday night as McCartney kicked off his long-awaited Got Back tour with “Can’t Buy Me Love.”

“This is the first night of the tour, and I think we’re going to have a really good time,” McCartney said.

While playing his Beatles bass, McCartney launched into “Got to Get You Into My Life.”

McCartney abandoned the bass in favor of the guitar for “Let Me Roll It,” which featured a snippet of Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxy Lady.”

McCartney followed by delivering an anecdote about Hendrix covering the title track from “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” and the late guitar hero asking Eric Clapton to tune his guitar during a show in a London club in 1967.

The first big surprise followed with McCartney rendering the Beatles classic “Getting Better,” which hasn’t been played since November 2005.

McCartney dusted off “Love Me Do,” which, of course, turned into a singalong with the crowd.

“That really takes me back,” he said.

McCartney reminisced about the early days of Beatlemania and even implored, “C’mon, girls, give me a Beatles scream.”

And they did.

McCartney also dialed it back with “Blackbird” atop a raise video stage.

Amid the Black Lives Matter movement, “Blackbird” is more poignant than ever.

McCartney pulled heart strings as he followed by strumming “If You Were Here Today,” which he penned after his childhood friend and songwriting partner, John Lennon, died.

“How many people tried to learn ‘Blackbird’ and you all got it wrong,” McCartney cracked. “How do kids know it?”

“Back in the USSR,” a live staple, was cut, which was not surprising. For the encore, McCartney emerged waving the Ukrainian flag and then launched into the Beatles classic “Birthday.”

It was a gesture befitting so much of McCartney’s career – celebratory, reflective, political and revolutionary.

It was an evening of endless highlights. There was the rhythmic “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five,” the lovely “Maybe I’m Amazed,” a love song he wrote for Linda McCartney and a favorite on the wish list for many, including Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward.

He also played the urgent “Band on the Run” and a high-octane version of “Get Back” bolstered by Peter Jackson’s amazing clips from his extraordinary film of the same name.

It was a special moment regarding the relationship McCartney had with Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. Jackson’s “Get Back” footage enabled a Lennon-McCartney duet to happen. And then there were incendiary versions of “Birthday” and “Helter Skelter.”

“Wow, is all I can say,” McCartney said. “You’ve been a fantastic audience for our opening night.”

It was evident that fans felt the show was worth the effort to score the tickets.

Tickets to the concert were released in waves in late February. Many fans struck out. Some went to the secondary market, often having to pay hundreds of dollars above ticket price.

And then this week, new batches of tickets were released for wanting fans after the stage configuration was finalized, allowing for more seats.

The audience, primarily comprised of Baby Boomers, shrieked, danced and exulted as McCartney performed. It’s as if the Beatle legend’s classics are a sonic fountain of youth.

Speaking of defying age, McCartney looked smashing in a blue blazer and blue jeans at 79 (he turns 80 on June 18).

The great Brit remains charming and humorous as he delivered songs from a canon that is unparalleled in terms of depth and quality. Who else has such range, brilliance and the ability to strike such a chord? McCartney finally played Spokane a mere 58 years after changing the world by performing on “The Ed Sullivan Show.”

The Beatles changed the world and McCartney changed Spokane. Fellow icon Bob Dylan will kick off his tour at Spokane Arena on May 28 . Other significant recording artists will follow. And hopefully McCartney will return to Spokane sooner than later after giving us all fortunate enough to experience his 2 hour and 41 minute concert .

Perhaps McCartney will come back since the enthusiasm from the crowd, particularly during the encore, was so passionate and loud.

McCartney and Spokane impressed during a historic night.

“Maybe we’ll get back in the same room,” McCartney said.

Next up for Sir Paul: Two nights at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle on Monday and Tuesday.

Unleashing the power of career readiness programs

As the new school year begins, local juniors and seniors in the Greater Spokane area find themselves standing at the precipice of their future.

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• All setlist songs  ( 1016 )

Years on tour

• 2024  ( 1 )
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• 2022  ( 34 )
• 2021  ( 1 )
• 2020  ( 1 )
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• 2018  ( 40 )
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• 2006  ( 1 )
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• 2004  ( 19 )
• 2003  ( 40 )
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• 1992  ( 5 )
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• 1990  ( 66 )
• 1989  ( 50 )
• 1988  ( 1 )
• 1987  ( 5 )
• 1986  ( 4 )
• 1985  ( 1 )
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• '04 Summer Tour  ( 14 )
• 1991 Surprise Shows  ( 6 )
• 2018 Secret Gigs  ( 5 )
• Back in the U.S.  ( 23 )
• Back in the World  ( 33 )
• Driving Japan  ( 5 )
• Driving Mexico  ( 3 )
• Driving USA  ( 27 )
• Freshen Up  ( 39 )
• Good Evening Europe  ( 9 )
• Got Back  ( 34 )
• Memory Almost Full  ( 6 )
• On the Run Tour  ( 37 )
• One on One  ( 77 )
• Out There!  ( 96 )
• Summer Live '09  ( 11 )
• The New World Tour 1993  ( 79 )
• The Paul McCartney World Tour 1989-1990  ( 104 )
• U.S. Tour 2005  ( 37 )
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• VIP soundchecks with ticketed audience  ( 209 )
• Avg Setlist
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Average setlist for tour: Got Back

• Can't Buy Me Love ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Junior's Farm ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Letting Go ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Got to Get You Into My Life ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Come On to Me Play Video
• Let Me Roll It ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Getting Better ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Let 'Em In ( Wings  song) Play Video
• My Valentine Play Video
• Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Maybe I'm Amazed Play Video
• I've Just Seen a Face ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• In Spite of All the Danger ( The Quarrymen  song) Play Video
• Love Me Do ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Dance Tonight Play Video
• Blackbird ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Here Today Play Video
• New Play Video
• Lady Madonna ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Fuh You Play Video
• Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite! ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Jet ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Something ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• You Never Give Me Your Money ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• She Came in Through the Bathroom Window ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Get Back ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Band on the Run ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Let It Be ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Live and Let Die ( Wings  song) Play Video
• Hey Jude ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• I've Got a Feeling ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Birthday ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Helter Skelter ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Golden Slumbers ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Carry That Weight ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• The End ( The Beatles  song) Play Video
• Song played from tape No More Lonely Nights Play Video

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See the Beatles’ First Tour Through Paul McCartney’s Lens

Sixty years after the Beatles appeared live on “Ed Sullivan,” McCartney reflects on his photos capturing those halcyon days. The Brooklyn Museum will exhibit them, and some will be for sale later.

By Lucie Young

They are now a collector’s trove — Paul McCartney’s own photos, shot 60 years ago, when the Beatles took Europe and America by storm: images of screaming fans (one carrying a live monkey); a girl in a yellow bikini; airport workers playing air guitar, and unguarded moments grabbed from trains, planes and automobiles.

McCartney, now 81, doesn’t like to sit still and reminisce about the past, so he chatted while driving home from his recording studio in Sussex, England. “My American friends call these small, one-way lanes ‘gun barrels,’” he said, warning his interviewer that at any moment the signal might die (it did). In the end, it took two days to complete a coherent conversation about the breakthrough period when the Beatles went viral, captured in the traveling exhibition “Paul McCartney Photographs 1963-1964: Eyes of the Storm,” which features 250 of his shots. Currently it’s at the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Va. , and comes to the Brooklyn Museum May 3-August 18. (Don’t be surprised if the artist shows up for the opening.)

It was McCartney’s archivist, Sarah Brown, who found 1,000 photographs the musician had taken over 12 weeks — from Dec. 7, 1963, to Feb. 21, 1964 — in the artist’s library.

“I thought the photos were lost,” he said. ‘‘In the ’60s it was pretty easy. Often doors were left open. We’d invite fans in.” Even the recording studio wasn’t a safe space. “I was taking my daughter Mary to the British Library to show her where to research for her exams, and in one display case I saw the lyric sheet for ‘Yesterday,’” he said. A sticky-fingered biographer had swiped the original from their studio.

Rosie Broadley, a senior curator at the National Portrait Gallery in London, where the show was inaugurated, said, “His photographs show us what it was like to look through his eyes while the Beatles conquered the world.”

McCartney won an art prize at school and practiced photography with his brother, Mike (who later became a professional photographer). He graduated to a 35 mm SLR Pentax camera when the Beatles hit it big.

“It was the most sophisticated hand-held camera of the era. It would be like having the latest iPhone today,” Darius Himes, Christie’s international head of photography, said, adding: “We were all quite surprised by Paul’s sophisticated eye, and his awareness of trends in the visual arts. The yellow bikini shot is like a striking mix of Stephen Shore, William Eggleston and William Klein.”

The Beatles traveled with a flock of cameramen and were not shy about gleaning tips. McCartney admitted some of his earliest shots in the exhibition are a little fuzzily focused. “I console myself that one of my favorite photographers, Julia Margaret Cameron , also liked soft focus,” he said.

“His photos get better as he practices,” Broadley noted. The exhibition, and its accompanying book, take visitors on a whirlwind trip through six cities beginning in Liverpool and London, and ending in Miami. The images from the British leg are exhibited in small ‘‘austerity’’ walnut frames, to indicate Britain was still in throes of a postwar recession. The Fab Four might look nervous in these photos, but they had already reached stardom on their home turf, having bagged three No. 1 singles.

After a brief stint performing at the Olympia in Paris, alongside Sylvie Vartan, they heard that “I Want to Hold Your Hand” was No. 1 on the American charts and sped to New York. The crowning moment in America was their live television debut on the “The Ed Sullivan Show” on Feb. 9, 1964, singing five propulsive pop hits — an event watched by 73 million people.

In Miami, McCartney’s photos burst into Kodachrome color and the newly minted celebrities seem to bloom in glamorous new surroundings: lounging poolside, sipping scotch and riding around in motorboats. By April, the Beatles’ songs held the top five spots on the U.S. Billboard charts.

Musing on the images, he said, “There is an innocence to them,” adding, “I think it was a lot more fun than it was. We worked probably 360 days out of the year.” It was an all too brief halcyon period. Two and a half years later, the Beatles stopped touring. The logistics, the screams, the armored cars, had become a nightmare.

Like most successful artists thriving past retirement age, McCartney has projectitis. He’s working on a new album with the producer Andrew Watt (“Hackney Diamonds”), and just released the 50th anniversary remaster of the Paul McCartney & Wings classic “Band on the Run.” “His live shows continue to be of such high voltage one half expects him to burst into flames,” the Irish poet Paul Muldoon wrote in McCartney’s recent book, “The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present.”

His next project is organizing a gallery sale of some of his photographs. “It’s a process I like,” he said, describing the joy of curating. “I’ve done it a few times with Linda’s work” [a reference to his first wife, the photographer, Linda Eastman]. His current homes, shared with his wife Nancy Shevell , are adorned with images by Linda and Mary, though, curiously, none of his own. But that may change. ‘‘The sale,” he said, “will probably encourage me to get some for myself.”

Here are edited excerpts from our conversation, in which he reflected on popular images in the exhibition.

John Lennon. London, January, 1964

My favorite photos are of John and George. There’s a huge sentimental aspect to them. No one else could have taken this pic. John was a great character. A very different kind of guy to the other boys I knew. We met at the village fete. He was playing with his band. He was a year and a half older than me [and] my first friend who wore glasses. He was always taking them off and polishing them. I found it fascinating. He’d take them off in public, which rendered him half blind. Onstage, he just stood there and gazed out into the blackness. Maybe it helped him focus on playing.

John, George and Ringo backstage in their dressing room. London, 1963.

We began by playing in really crummy little clubs and bars in Liverpool and Hamburg. In Germany, we slept in a little room, with a Union Jack flag for a blanket. Back in England, it started to get a little better. We played in ballrooms, got radio work and then TV work. It was like a staircase ascent for us. What nobody realized is, by this time [seven months after the Beatles’ first No. 1 hit on the U.K. charts], we were really fully formed beasts. We’d come from the postwar years into a Britain that was now experiencing joy for the first time in decades, and we ate it up.

Self-portraits. Paris, 1964.

Our Pentax cameras were probably a gift. There was a lot of artistic black and white photography emerging at that time. We admired David Bailey [who had a Pentax camera], Don McCullin , a stunning war photographer, and Norman Parkinson . When he took our picture, he’d say ‘give me big eyes’ and we’d all play along. I like to shoot through the mirror because things look good in a mirror. We all smoked. Smoking gave us a suave, grown-up feel. We were pretty young. I was just 21.

Ringo Starr. Paris, 1964.

Our aim was always to have fun. I think that communicates itself and became part of the reason we were so popular. It is just a characteristic of Liverpool people to have a laugh. [Paul snapped this shot of Ringo during a staged photo shoot with Dezo Hoffmann, one of their court photographers.] Dezo was a very nice guy. He would give us hints as to the aperture and all the various things needed to make a good photograph.

Fans welcoming the Beatles at Central Park. New York, February 1964.

Here’s a pic of Beatles fans acting like they should. … Going crazy! We didn’t know what we were gonna get in America; if anyone would turn out to meet us. On the plane over, the pilot radioed ahead and was told there were gangs of fans waiting. [Over 4,000 screaming girls held back by 200 policemen.] Manhattan was big, tall, loud and brash. There were stories of fans breaking into our room at the Plaza Hotel. Those were more stories than reality. We probably wished it would happen.

Ringo Starr setting up his drum kit during rehearsals for “The Ed Sullivan Show.” New York, February 1964.

We had done television in England, so we were used to it; the cameras and the lights and all that. What we didn’t really know was how important Ed Sullivan was. He was the BIG ONE. There were two stagehands waiting to draw back the curtains for us to go on and one said: ‘You nervous?’ I said, ‘I dunno. Not really.’ He says: ‘You should be. There’s 73 million people watching.’ Then I got nervous. But if you watch that performance, I can’t believe how confident we look. The weird thing about the stage set is Ringo’s [precarious] drum rostrum. I can’t work out how he got up there.

Photographers in Central Park. New York, February 1964.

New York journalists thought they were pretty smart and I’m sure they were used to handling dumb pop stars. We had a lot of fun with them, especially at the news conference at J.F.K. [Airport]. We gave as good as we got. It became a game of who could come up with the smartest answer. Often it was the truth. Someone asked George, ‘Do you ever get your hair cut?’ He said, ‘Yeah, yesterday.’ And he’d been to the barber’s the day before.

Unknown man. Taken from the window of train from New York to Washington, D.C., February 1964.

We loved music and performing. It beat working in a factory. A few years before these pictures, we’d all been fully immersed in working class life in Liverpool. I have a fascination with working class people like this man [a railroad worker caught from a train en route to Washington, D.C.]. Working class people are the smartest people I’ve ever met. My cousin Bert [Danher] was an insurance salesman, but he also compiled crosswords for The Guardian and The Times. The photography I admire is spontaneous, like the work of the great [Henri] Cartier-Bresson. It was good to just grab shots on the run. We didn’t have time to think.

Unknown girl. Washington, February 1964.

Some of my favorite photos are of fans. I really like this one of a young girl with a headscarf looking in a Zen-like manner into my camera. I took it and never looked at it again until I did a print [for the National Portrait Gallery exhibition]. When we started blowing up the images, we got to see all the individual characters. In one photo, at Miami airport, there’s a woman holding up a monkey. You wouldn’t get that past health and safety these days.

George Harrison. Miami Beach, February 1964.

This is George living the life in Miami. [McCartney switched to Kodachrome to record the group’s antics in Florida.] Miami felt like wonderland. These pictures were taken at a time when we were all young and beautiful. I mean these are good looking boys, you know! From this perspective, I feel very blessed to have not only known these guys, but to have worked with them and done such great things with them. I feel very blessed.

An earlier version of this article misidentified the member of the British royal family who met with the Beatles in 1963. The Beatles met the Queen Mother (and Princess Margaret) that year; they met Queen Elizabeth II in 1965. 

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Paul McCartney, Cate Blanchett and Jon Bon Jovi watch Taylor Swift's Eras Tour from VIP tent

Paul McCartney stepped out Sunday night to support longtime friend Taylor Swift on night three of her Eras Tour shows in London.

Fans caught video of The Beatles singer walking to the VIP floor tent before the "Bejeweled" star took the stage. Donning a black suit, McCartney could be seen excitedly clapping, showing off a wrist full of bracelets and acknowledging the Swifts in attendance. 

After a weekend full of surprise A-list appearances, London may officially be the most star-studded Eras Tour stop to date.

On Friday, Prince William celebrated his 42nd birthday with his children Prince George, 10, and Princess Charlotte, 9. According to a selfie shared on social media, the trio met with Swift and her boyfriend Travis Kelce before the show.

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Joining the Kansas City tight end in the VIP tent on Friday was his brother Jason, sister-in-law Kylie, "Queer Eye" star Jonathan van Ness and "Bridgerton" actress Nicola Coughlan .

On Saturday, actors Tom Cruise , Liam Hemsworth, Hugh Grant, Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher and director Greta Gerwig were seen dancing to "Shake It Off."

On Sunday, McCartney was joined by Sophie Turner, Gracie Abrams , Ellie Goulding, Cate Blanchett, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Andrew Scott and Jon Bon Jovi.

During her show Sunday , Swift complimented the magnitude of her third performance in the British capital during her "Lover" monologue.

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"I have my ways of telling, before I even hit the stage, what kind of crowd I'm walking out to see," she said swaying her pink guitar.

The singer-songwriter added she sends her parents out before the show to serve as spies and they report back on the crowd's energy.

"I've got to tell you my dad bursts into the dressing room," she laughed. "Bursts in! He's like, 'Hey, you don't understand. You don't get it. Night one was crazy. It was here. Night two is up here. Night three it's off the charts Tay.'"

The last time Swift and McCartney were publicly spotted together was in a Super Bowl 58 suite when the Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers.

The two have been friends for years. In 2020, Swift interviewed McCartney for a "Rolling Stone" series called "Musicians on Musicians."

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After London, Swift is headed off to Dublin, Ireland for three shows.

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Bill Gates' daughter Phoebe confirms she is dating Paul McCartney's grandson Arthur

A relationship between tech and music royalty has been made official.

Phoebe Gates, the daughter of Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates and ex-wife Melinda Gates, confirmed in a diary for Nylon on June 21 that she is dating Arthur Donald, the grandson of Beatles icon Paul McCartney.

Gates, 21, shared a photo with Nylon of her getting a piggyback ride from Donald as part of a series of snaps from her recent graduation from Stanford University. In the diary, she called Donald her "boyfriend," confirming a romance that had been rumored since last year.

Donald is the son of McCartney's daughter, Mary McCartney, and husband Alistair Donald.

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Phoebe Gates sparked rumors of dating Arthur Donald in October 2023

The first hint that the two were seeing each other came in October 2023, when Gates shared a cozy shot on Instagram of Donald in a blazer and her in a blue dress on a balcony in Paris.

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Phoebe Gates calls Arthur Donald her ‘boyfriend’ alongside graduation pics in June 2024

In her June 2024 diary for Nylon, Gates shared a picture of Donald carrying her after her graduation ceremony from Stanford.

"My boyfriend, Arthur, giving me a lift post-ceremony," she captioned it.

She also shared another photo of them together, with Donald in a navy blue blazer and T-shirt and her in a light blue silk dress.

"With Arthur, he cleans up nicely," she wrote.

Gates graduated from Stanford with a degree in human biology in three years with this year's graduation ceremony playing a huge role in her motivation. Her mother, Melinda, gave this year's speech to the graduates of the prestigious California university.

“I knew I had to make it happen if I could, because I wanted to watch my mother deliver this year’s commencement speech as a graduate,” she told Nylon. “I can’t think of a better ending!”

She also shared a photo with her mom on her graduation day.

"Final hug with mom, who reminded us all today that we can channel the passion of our generation into actual change," Gates wrote. "The next chapter begins now."

Scott Stump is a trending reporter and the writer of the daily newsletter This is TODAY (which you should subscribe to here! ) that brings the day's news, health tips, parenting stories, recipes and a daily delight right to your inbox. He has been a regular contributor for TODAY.com since 2011, producing features and news for pop culture, parents, politics, health, style, food and pretty much everything else. 

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