Inglewood • Friday, May 13, 2022

About

This was the sixth date of the “Got Back” tour.

From Variety, May 14, 2022:

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.[…]

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.) […]

From paulmccartney.com, May 23, 2022:

It’s impossible to imagine more imposing concert venue — or possibly a more intimidating physical structure of any kind — than Los Angeles’s monolithic SoFi Stadium. Resembling nothing so much as a gigantic alien spacecraft, SoFi occupies a near-300 acre footprint in Inglewood, its sleek ultra-modern seemingly aerodynamic exterior crowned with a literal million-square-foot canopy. 

And as if that sheer physical intimidation weren’t enough, there was the challenge of following Paul’s aforementioned Dodger Stadium blowout in 2019. The now-legendary show that closed Freshen Up in the U.S., and eventually became the finale of the entire tour, had only grown in stature in the three years since, with local and national media alike giving up unanimous raves from “Macca continues to put artists half his age and younger to shame with epic shows” (Entertainment Weekly) to “McCartney was in top form” (Los Angeles Times) to “McCartney remains a show-stopping entertainer of the highest order” to, simply and eloquently, “Wow” (American Songwriter)—and mere days prior to Paul’s SoFi date, Los Angeles magazine rated Dodger Stadium 2019 in its list of “McCartney’s Top 5 Greatest Performances in L.A..” 

So… no pressure, right? Well, what would surely break the brains and bodies of us mere mortals is, at most, another hard day’s night for Paul McCartney. For the first stadium gig of the GOT BACK tour, it was apparent from the moment Paul and the band careened into ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’ that the 50,000 of us lucky to pack SoFi this most auspicious Friday the 13th that history was unfolding before our eyes and ears. ‘Junior’s Farm’ featured Rusty and Brian’s dueling leads in white-hot form, ‘Letting Go’ first brought out the Hot City Horns to pump things up for a stretch that included ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’ and ‘Come On To Me’. The production seemed to grow before our eyes, as massive lighting trusses repositioned as if with minds of their own during a ripping ‘Let Me Roll It’, and later on numbers including the newly arranged Abbey Road double-shot of ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’ and ‘She Came In Through The Bathroom Window’. 

‘Getting Better’ led an impassioned “Better, Better, Better…” singalong, while a spirited ‘Let ‘Em In’ practically got tens of thousands marching in place. ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’ was transcendent, followed by the return of ‘We Can Work It Out’ to the running order. ‘Blackbird’ and ‘Here Today’ found Paul filling the sprawling SoFi bowl from his elevated platform, holding the capacity crowd in rapt attention with only his voice and acoustic guitar. The “2 ½-hour survey of crackling riffs, honeyed harmonies” (Los Angeles Times) never let up, punctuated by the tender George Harrison tribute ‘Something’ and a predictably rowdy call-and-response portion of ‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’, while a turbo-charged ‘Get Back’ kicked off the home stretch of the main set.  

It’s no exaggeration to say that virtually every moment of Paul’s return to L.A. was a highlight. His voice rang strong and clear throughout, bolstered by an impeccable sound mix as well lighting and production that would transform the massive SoFi interior: creating an intimate roadhouse vibe for ‘In Spite Of All The Danger’, ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘Dance Tonight’, only to drive home the point that we were witnessing Paul in complete and total command of the largest stadium in the NFL—and what better way to do the latter than to threaten to blow the roof off the place: ‘Live And Let Die’ was nothing short of breathtaking sensory overload, the pyrotechnic-fireworks combo seemingly on steroids, with columns of flame shooting the better part of the 275 feet to the SoFi ceiling. 

As the last blast of ‘Live And Let Die’ faded, Paul made his way to the magic piano to cast the spell that is ‘Hey Jude’. It’s nights like this that the undisputed singalong champion of rock history takes on an even deeper resonance. There’s a wellspring of love and optimism that can only be tapped, a magical emotional rainbow that can only be conjured by Paul McCartney leading an enraptured chorus of 50,000 voices in an extended refrain of “Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na”—it is truly impossible to put into words “the feels” (as the kids say) that are generated as those syllables become the most profound in the world. 

The encore opened with ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’ amplifying the marvel of the McCartney-Lennon virtual duet to stadium scale with stunning results, and closed as ever with ‘The End’ — spurring a crowd reaction that would be expressed in writing by the OC Register: “Its signature line – ‘The love you take is equal to the love you make’ – is always powerful. On this night, when all we really needed was the comfort of a Beatle on stage, still making beautiful music, it felt ever more so.” […]

Steve Martin – Paul McCartney’s US publicist Steve Martin

Last updated on May 23, 2022

SoFi Stadium

This was the 1st and only concert played at SoFi Stadium.

Setlist for the soundcheck

The setlist for this soundcheck is incomplete, or we have not be able to confirm in an accurate way that this was the setlist. If you have any clue, pls let us know and leave a comment.

Setlist for the concert