Tripping The Live Fantastic

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Disc 1

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Disc 2

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About

Just got back from the world tour and this is being written shortly after.

From Rio to Glasgow, Tokyo through most everywhere and back again, this album captures some of the sounds of those nights on tour – when ‘Spaceman’ ran the red flag up, Curtis pushed the rig out and together with more than 100 others they staged the show.

“Showtime” was the call and the shuffle through halls to backstage rituals nightly served to energise this merry band.

And at soundchecks we played old songs from memory or made up pieces to keep ourselves amused. These “trinkets” are sprinkled throughout the album and hopefully convey a certain good humour.

We saw fans with messages replying to our own … we saw emotions and we saw hope for the future … couples necking … grown men crying … children far too young to know … and we played for all of them.

Paul McCartney, August 1990, liner notes

Tripping the Live Fantastic is Paul McCartney’s first official live album and his first release of concert material since Wings’ 1976 Wings over America live package. It was released in 1990 as triple LP, double cassette and double CD. Tripping the Live Fantastic reached number 17 in the UK and number 26 in the US. It was also simultaneously released in an abridged form, entitled Tripping the Live Fantastic: Highlights!

History

A document of the huge success of The Paul McCartney World Tour, Tripping the Live Fantastic encompasses McCartney’s entire musical career from his famed Beatles hits to his recent hit album, Flowers in the Dirt, while also including some unique covers. Interspersed throughout the package are occasional soundcheck recordings as well. The title is an allusion to the phrase “tripping the light fantastic“, meaning to dance or move to musical accompaniment, originally from the poem L’Allegro by John Milton.

Despite reversing the famed Lennon–McCartney credits on Wings over America, McCartney left the credits for his Beatles songs contained on Tripping the Live Fantastic in their original form.

This album spawned a few singles which contained live B-sides from this tour. These B-sides were live songs that were not featured on the live album, which made the singles collectors items.

Tripping the Live Fantastic: Highlights!

Tripping the Live Fantastic: Highlights! is an abridged version of the double CD/triple LP Tripping the Live Fantastic. Released in 1990, it documents the highly successful Paul McCartney World Tour of 1989–1990.

Cutting out all of the soundcheck recordings and leaving merely the concert highlights (hence the album’s title), this set is notable for the exclusive inclusion of “All My Trials“, not found on the more complete Tripping the Live Fantastic double CD set or on the US commercial release version, where it was replaced by “Put It There“, but it was issued on the Columbia House mail-order Highlights release.

Not charting at all in the UK, Tripping the Live Fantastic: Highlights! reached number 141 in the US on the Billboard 200 and, proving to be a sustained seller, went platinum, whereas the original set, which reached number 26, failed to even go gold.

Get Back

A VHS concert film was also released, entitled Get Back. The film was directed by Richard Lester.

Paul McCartney: Coming Home

The Disney Channel filmed Paul McCartney: Coming Home during this period. The show highlights McCartney’s return to Liverpool where he introduced a tribute to John Lennon, featured on the B-side of the “All My Trials” single, comprising “Strawberry Fields Forever“, “Help!” and “Give Peace a Chance“.

Paul McCartney: Put It There

Another VHS film was released, titled Paul McCartney: Put It There. The film featured McCartney and his band rehearsing for the tour.

From Ultimate Classic Rock:

[…] Released Nov. 5, 1990, barely three months after the Paul McCartney World Tour concluded, Tripping the Live Fantastic collected 37 performances from the 103-date trek, cherry-picking numbers from shows around the world and interspersing them with soundcheck jams. Alongside the two-CD set, McCartney also issued a single-disc Highlights recording that trimmed the track listing down to 17 songs and kicked out the jams — and both releases were accompanied by a battery of film and television documentaries, adding up to a multimedia McCartney celebration that would go on for over a year. […]

McCartney’s newfound willingness to embrace the Beatles portion of his songbook was a major part of the narrative surrounding the shows, and the theme of creative and personal homecoming — which started with Flowers in the Dirt — was reflected in tour-related merchandise like the hour-long special From Rio to Liverpool. Even though Beatles songs had long been a part of his shows, he’d understandably wanted to put more energy into building a discography on his own; with eight solo albums and seven Wings LPs behind him, that was no longer as much of a concern. As proof, Tripping‘s first single, a rendition of “Birthday,” was released ahead of the record in honor of what would have been John Lennon‘s 50th birthday.

It all added up to a live album that not only had the benefit of a career-spanning track listing, but also presented a looser, more energetic version of McCartney. Liberated from the weight of his legacy — not to mention the oppressive production of the ’80s — he delivered some of the most relaxed and confident performances of his career, and released them without resorting to the heavy overdubs and post-production relied upon by many artists.

And just as they had while he was on the road, McCartney’s fans turned out in droves for Tripping the Live Fantastic. While he no longer commanded as much commercial clout as he had when Wings topped the charts with Wings Over America in 1976, he was enjoying a sales rebound after Flowers in the Dirt, and Fantastic continued that hot streak, peaking at No. 17 — and the Highlights set, while it didn’t climb as high, proved a far more consistent seller, and eventually went platinum.

As often as not, live albums are little more than holding patterns between new releases, but Tripping the Live Fantastic is something more — a consistently compelling snapshot of an artist who’d already had several careers’ worth of ups and downs, in the midst of a creative rebirth that honored his past while embracing the future. As many concert LPs as McCartney releases — he’s added five since Fantastic — this one may never be topped as his definitive solo live album.

Last updated on November 11, 2022