Update II (5/27/03) From Ekaterina:
And Moscow girls made him sing and shout. "Finally we got to do that one here", said Sir Paul McCartney after he sang "Back in the USSR" during his Saturday concert in Red Square, Moscow. The show was amazing, my feelings can't be put to words, for it was the greatest show I have ever seen in my life (and I saw a few good shows). Sir Paul was fantastic performing for 3 hours non-stop, speaking Russian all the time and joking with the audience. He was given a hearty welcome and I am sure he will remember the Moscow concert because it was special both for Russia and the Beatle. I can't write a report covering the event, I'll just enumerate the moments I enjoyed the most... That's all I can do. At least, that's all I can do now...The first song was "Hello, Goodbye", everyone was on their feet when McCartney entered the stage. He looked great wearing a red jacket, a red T-shirt and jeans. I remember thinking, "Wow, that's the first man I see who looks absolutely stunning wearing a red jacket!!" There were some tall men sitting in front of me and I had quite a bad view because of them, but then a kind guy named Sergey who sat next to me gave me his bag, I sat on it and from that moment I could see everything perfectly well. For the first half an hour the audience was quite calm. No, everyone was excited of course and happy, we clapped and cheered and chanted. But people were on their seats and I was so nervous I would be yelled at when I finally stood up unable to sit any longer. Luckily, I was wrong!!! After 30 minutes of the concert, people began to respond the right way!!! When Paul started singing "Back in the USSR", everyone jumped up and the pure heaven began. It was indescribable. And he DID mark out that certain line with his voice. "And MOSCOW GIRLS make me sing and shout!" Woo-hoo!!!! The audience sang "Hey Jude" in unison. Paul said, "We will sing a song now, which I think, you'll want to sing along with. Do so if you want to!" and then he added in Russian, "Poite s nami!" then a small pause and then a playful, "Poite-poite!!" We were just awwwwwwwwwww. The man is unique!!! In the end of "Hey Jude" the music stopped and Paul conducted the audience, "A teper' tolko muzhchiny! (And now just men!) A teper' tolko devchonki! (And now just girls!) A teper' vse vmeste! (And now altogether!)" When it was girls' turn, I started to sing, "Na na na na, hey Jude" and to my horror I realized that none of women who were around sang with me, not even Ellen!!! I didn't shut up however. In spite of the fact that my singing was awful! Hehehe!! I liked it that he spoke so much Russian - a couple of phrases in the beginning of every song! And all the members of his band spoke Russian too. A drummer - "Moskva, vy gotovy zazhigat'?????????????" ("Moscow, are you ready to have fun??"). A guitar player - "Ya znayu pyat' slov po-russki. I ya ikh uzhe skazal!" ("I know 5 words in Russian. And I've just said them."). They were so funny and Paul was the funniest. There was a translator on a huge screen and he said, "I want to make sure this translator is working and I am going to say something stupid now and you'll tell me if it's working... The red dog flew on a yellow balloon... Is it working?" We screamed, "YESS!" and Paul looked in the sky and said, "Oh look!! A yellow balloon!" Someone set it free and it flew in the sky. It was so cute! He dedicated songs to his friend John, his friend George, Linda, his lovely wife Heather... When he said, "And this song is for those of you who celebrate birthday today", I was only able to hug Ellen and scream, "Happy birthday, dear!!!! This is your song!!!" It was really her birthday and I am surprised she didn't faint!!! During one of the songs (I don't remember which one) people in the front rows stood up suddently and cheered loudly greeting someone. Apparently, it was our dear President who was quite LATE for the concert! When the song was over, Paul sneered, "What do we have here? Some new arrivals in the audience?" Hahaha, that was sooo right - because everyone is equal before McCartney. He is the god. My lighter died a heroic death during "Let It Be". I mean, most lighters spend their lives lighting cigarettes, how cool is that? Mine was used just once - I lit it in the beginning of "Let It Be" and by the end of the song the lighter was dead. During one of the ballads, Ellen, Sergey and I held hands and waved together. And one of Paul's camera men filmed the three of us!! It was exciting! Paul will look at us and think, "Oh, those crazy fans of mine!" :)))))))))))))) After "Hey Jude" Paul pretended the show was over, the band left the stage and all the lights went down. But the crowd kept singing, "Na na na na na na, na na na na, hey Jude!" till they all returned. And then we started chanting, "Yesterday! Yesterday! Yesterday!" And he sang it! And Red Square sang along, more than 20 000 people. It was amazing! After "Yesterday" Paul said, "We have a special request tonight... We will do this song for all of you". And he sang "Back in the USSR" again!!!!! The crowd was going insane!!! Me included!!! The sad moment of the show... "We've had a great time tonight. You are a lovely audience... But we have to go now... And what's more important - YOU have to go, too!" And then there was this conversation: the crowd, "NO!!!" - Paul, "Oh yeah!"; the crowd, "NO!!!" - Paul, "Oh yeah!" for five or so times. It was sad and funny at the same time.... I climbled on my chair and jumped on it during the final two songs, I could not hold back all the emotions and excitement... And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make.... When the concert was over, Ellen, I and Sergey bought a bottle of champagne and celebrated Ellen's birthday and the Paul McCartney day on a bridge not far from Red Square singing the Beatles songs and drinking champagne. We sang for more that 2 hours, drank 3 bottles and had a wonderful time together. I am so grateful I shared such a magical day with these lovely people. Especially Ellen. The only music I can listen to now is "The Beatles". I also decided to buy all McCartney's albums because just the sound of his voice brings me to Heaven... Thank you Paul for coming to Russia. Like one of the banners at the concert said, we were waiting for you for 40 years... Here is the set-list of the Moscow concert. It differs a bit from the usual one, but not much...:
1. Hello Goodbye 2. Jet 3. All My Loving 4. Getting Better 5. Let Me Roll It 6. Lonely Road 7. Your Loving Flame 8. Blackbird 9. Every Night 10. We Can Work It Out 11. You Never Give Me Your Money / Carry That Weight 12. The Fool On The Hill 13. Here Today 14. Something 15. Eleanor Rigby 16. Here, There And Everywhere 17. I've just seen a face 18. Calico Skies 19. Two of Us 20. Michelle 21. Band On The Run 22. Back In The USSR 23. Maybe I'm Amazed 24. Let 'Em In 25. My Love 26. She's Leaving Home 27. Can't Buy Me Love 28. Birthday 29. Live And Let Die 30. Let It Be 31. Hey Jude 32. The Long And Winding Road 33. Lady Madonna 34. I Saw Her Standing There 35. Yesterday 36. Back In The USSR 37. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) / The End
(5/27/03) From Kostia:
Hi all, This is my account of the Red Square show. First, I should say that I was meant to be at the Melbourne show, in Australia, but it wasn't to be, so Red Square it was... First of all, the media hype here in Moscow was huge, but the tickets to the show, at least for the standing area, were still available in the official Theatre Box Offices 2 days before the show, but at 1500 roubles ($50 USD), they were expensive. On the day of the concert, scalpers sold tickets too, but this time at $1500 USD, right in front of the first police (millitchiya) block. In fact, there were 4 police block before you could get to the show and the center of Moscow was limited to transport. The security was high, well at lest in the reserved seating area, where I was. There was only one merchandise outlet before the start of the show and there was a crowd there, trying to buy a shirt or a cap, I did too, and got very lucky getting two shirts (800 roubles each = $27 USD each), one for me, one for my cousin, but I couldn't get a baseball cap, they sold out!!!!!! One thing to note was that the retailers wore a shirt that had the cover of the 'CHOBA B CCCP' album from 1987 on the back and Moscow Red Square 2003 on the front... The show started 30 minutes late, but the sunset in Moscow is very late (its still bright at 10pm), so it was more than understandable. If Paul started on time, he would have had to squint for the first 30 minutes. Not very pleasant you'd agree!!! Anyway the show started as usual, with a theatrical piece, at 8:30pm. In the beginning, I don't think many people understood it, and for about 10 minutes people yelled 'We want Paul', in Russian of course, but then they all settled down... Paul appeared on the stage, exactly at 8:45pm, he was wearing an all red long sleeve shirt and an all red jacket over the top and worn blue jeans. He opened the show with 'Privet Rebyata, Zdravstvuite Moskvichi!!!!!', which translates as 'Hi Lads, hello Moscovities (people who live in Moscow)', people cheered quite loudly, some screamed 'Hi!' some just screamed and some were already crying, then he added 'Are you ready to Rock!!!' and burst into 'Hello Goodbye'. It was totally awesome, the sound was incredible, the best sound at a rock show that you could get. He then did 'Jet' and then took off his jacket; he said 'Oo, it's getting hot at the Red Square'. The show itself followed the 'Back in the World' set list, except for one thing, which i won't reveal now. Between the songs he spoke a little bit of Russian, but mostly English, however there was a Russian translation set up on the screen above for the people who don't know English. Paul actually tested the translator by saying that he will say something stupid, which he did, it was ' A god flew in a giant red balloon', some people laughed but, some just yelled 'Yeah!!!', I think I did both...For the fist part and the acoustic set people in the in the reserved seating area remained seated, but when he got to 'Back in the USSR' everybody and I mean every living soul that there was on the Red Square got up. From then onwards nobody sat down. Actually I must add that a lot of people sang along, but didn't understand what he said between songs, Paul himself noted that a lot of people learned English from Beatles records, which is true!!!! Paul was in fine voice, and to me it seemed that he sligtly extended songs in his solo set, mostly outros to 'Blackbird', 'We can work it out' and most notably to 'You never give me your money', where he didn't fluff the words like he did on 'Back in the US' and doing a jazz/soul (I don't know what to call it but it was super) end to the song. The solo set was follwed by more band performances, but the most interesting thing was that when he came back for the finale he was wearing a 'No More Land Mines Shirt' and said: ' We got a request here, its a song that you all know...' and he and band burst into 'Back in the USSR' again!!!!! He repeated this song especially for us, here at the Red Square! Then they did a few more numbers and left... People suddenly realized that he didn't do 'Yesterday' and started chanting 'Yesterday, Yesterday...so on', some even started to leave, but he came back saying, "There is a time when we have to go home..." "NO!!!!", screamed the crowd. "Yeah", said Paul, and the crowd yelled again."NO!!!! NO!"
"You have to go home", said Paul. And the crowd again yelled, "NO!!!!"
Paul smiled, thanked the crowd.
And so for the Grand Finale, he did 'Yesterday' and "Sgt Pepper/The End' and that was it.
The best night in my life... A couple of things to add are that during the show, the female staff in all yellow 'Paul McCartney, Moscow Red Square, 2003' shirts sold...'Flaming Pie' CD that's all they had and that the whole thing was organized very well, no trouble at all. I actually thought that there would be crowds in the metro, but it was all fine...
Kostia