Review: Paul McCartney - Liverpool Arena

The current Paul McCartney "Out There" tour has visited most of the world's continents but it was always going to be a special homecoming gig for his recent Liverpool concert.

The audience came from all over the world to witness this event with fans in attendance from Australia, Japan, Siberia and closer to home, Italy. You might expect the age range to be wide ranging and yes, there were a few fans present that probably were old enough to have seen The Beatles in the Sixties before the band stopped touring around 1966 but the majority of the audience were in the 35-44 age bracket.

"Good evening Liverpool" the ex-Beatle announced to the sold out audience "We're gonna have a party tonight" he continued, after opening up the gig with The Beatles track Eight Days a Week. He has a tight 4 piece band with him who never miss a beat.

Cartoon images of The Beatles show on the huge video wall behind him as he performs Got to Get You Into My Life - his voice sounding just as good as you remember the original version.

Of course it wasn't always going to be Beatles songs, Listen To What The Man Said, the Wings track kept everyone on their feet; in fact the whole audience were on their feet for the 3 hour concert with 40 songs to savour.

Sir Paul shares with the audience his story about how Jimi Hendrix learnt songs from the Sgt Pepper album only two days after the album had been released and performed a song off the album in concert.

My Valentine is a song he wrote for his wife, Nancy who was in the audience tonight, whilst Maybe I'm Amazed is the song he wrote for Linda McCartney whilst in Wings. It adds a personal touch to the night when you hear what inspired him to write the songs.

All of The Beatles are mentioned throughout the gig: George Harrison's Something is performed with Sir Paul playing a ukulele, as Harrison was a collector of ukuleles. Here Today is dedicated to John Lennon as a conversation that he would had like to have had with Lennon.

There were new tracks too from his last studio album with New and Queenie Eye sounding good.

The set list reads like the most well known songs of the last 50 years with Let I Be, Love and Let Die (accompanied by a spectacular firework display) and Hey Jude concluding the gig.

Of course there were going to be encores: During the first one a fan from France (dressed up in a Sgt Peppers Outfit) carries out a marriage proposal on stage, the fan says he "wants to marry The Beatles" until Sir Paul tells him to get on with it and be serious, the French girl says yes to the proposal and everyone cheers. I wonder if he will still love her when he's 64?!!

Can't Buy Me Love, Yesterday and Helter Skelter mean the night is coming to an end? You have to admire his stamina. "It's been a brilliant homecoming" he shares with the audience. Listen to what the man said - he wasn't wrong. In years to come all present tonight will be proud to say - I was there.