Thursday, August 24, 1972
Berlin
Concert • By Wings • Part of the Second leg of the Wings Over Europe Tour
Last updated on August 19, 2022
Thursday, August 24, 1972
Concert • By Wings • Part of the Second leg of the Wings Over Europe Tour
Last updated on August 19, 2022
Location: Deutschlandhalle
Concert Aug 21, 1972 • Netherlands • The Hague
Concert Aug 22, 1972 • Belgium • Antwerp
Concert Aug 24, 1972 • Germany • Berlin
Interview Aug 26, 1972 • Paul McCartney interview for New Musical Express (NME)
Interview Aug 31, 1972 • Paul McCartney interview for RollingStone
Next concert Mar 18, 1973 • Charity Brawl
On this day, Wings performed the last concert of its “Wings Over Europe” summer tour.
This was one of the five concerts, from the “Wings Over Europe” tour, professionally recorded, using the 16-track Rolling Stones’ mobile unit, by engineer Alan Parsons, assisted by Jeremy Gee and Graham Fleming.
We filmed a few of the concerts, I think, just for archive purposes really. ‘We should film one of these; kind of thing. And The Rolling Stones had this mobile recording van – you know, there were a couple of outfits that could record you on the road. But we knew theirs was a good one so that came along to record a few of the dates. And I think we had the idea for ‘Bruce McMouse’ around the same time too, maybe because the families were on the tour with us. It’s likely that we would say, ‘Let’s film them and if we do the animation thing we’re dreaming of, these can be the live performances in it’.
Paul McCartney – From “Wings Over Europe” book – Words written in February 2018
Those five concerts were:
PAUL McCARTNEY in Berlin
by Robin Denselow
SEVEN WEEKS on the road, and Paul McCartney’s new band Wings is dramatically improved since the first performance I reported in this column from the South of France. Trailing across Europe and playing every night has transformed the band from weak apology to an excellent vehicle for McCartney’s at last revived talent. At the Deutschlandhalle – a massive concrete barn that is Berlin’s answer to the Wembley Pool – Wings faced a large, suspicious audience for the first time and defeated them by two encores after a painful uphill fight.
At their best, they are now a straightforward rock dance band with a good line in harmonies, reminiscent at times of the Beatles of “Rubber Soul.” McCartney is rightly relying more and more on his guitarists Henry McCulloch and Denny Laine and the interplay between the three of them is now far tighter and more enthusiastic. His songs are at last giving them some leeway: “The Mess I’m In,” for instance, had echoes of The Who in parts, with changes in pace and harmony, a welcome contrast to the nursery rhymes he has been writing of late. Another new song, “1882,” was a slow, tuneful narrative ballad, a bleak horror story about Victorian England a thousand times more impressive than his ghastly “Give Ireland Back to the Irish.” There was a change in McCartney’s stage act as well: faced with hostility, he lost his temper and worked harder than ever.
The good material and hopeful finds were all there, but so were some of the early problems. He still includes four or five simplistic songs (presumably so that his wife Linda can play them) which destroy his act and obviously bore the band. Linda’s singing was still sub-standard with a tendency to go flat as soon as she moved away from the piano. If McCartney could overcome problems like that he will be ready for a successful British comeback.
From The Guardian, August 26, 1972
This looks like a really intimate moment and you might wonder what I was doing there. But I’ll tell you exactly what it was. On stage Linda liked to wear glitter around her eyes, and Paul used to apply it for her before they went on.
Joe Stevens (photographer), c/o Uncut: Wings over Europe. (May, 2011) – From a moral to this song — Paul and Linda backstage before a concert during… (tumblr.com)
This was the 1st concert played at Deutschlandhalle.
A total of 2 concerts have been played there • 1972 • Aug 24• 1976 • Mar 23
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Album Available on Wings Over Europe
Album Available on Red Rose Speedway - Archive Collection
Written by Denny Laine
Written by Bill Monroe
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Henry McCullough
Written by Denny Laine
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Encore
Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney
Wings Live - On tour in the 70s
This is the first detailed study of Paul McCartney's Wings on tour in the 1970s. It covers every single concert from the University Tour of 1972, ending with the abandoned tour of Japan in January 1980. A wide variety of primary sources have been consulted, including all available audio and video recordings; press reviews; fan recollections; newspaper reports and tour programmes.
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downbear • 5 years ago
I was there. Wish there was some video. It was an awesome concert. My seats were way up in the back, so I came up and stood as close to the stage as I could get, with many others.
