When Wings Tour Concert?

The When Wings Tour – A Look Back at Paul McCartney’s Epic 1976 Concert Tour

The Wings tour of 1976 was McCartney’s first live concert performance since the dissolution of The Beatles in 1970. The ‘Wings Over America Tour’ which was as aptly named, was a 3-month tour with 31 dates across the United States and Canada. It was a comeback for McCartney who had been rather inactive in the first half of the seventies, producing music now and then with his new group Wings.

But by the following year, Wings had evolved into a very polished hit-making machine with further strings of chart-busting singles and albums to firmly establish them as part of the elite league of popular musicians. Therefore, there was much anticipation for the band in what was their first proper North American tour. This was an alarming demand for ticket sales with all the shows being sold out within minutes even though the tickets had cost as much as $25 which was very expensive at the time.

The Stage is Set

This was marked by the opening night on the 3rd of May in 1976, when the band set out from Fort Worth, Texas, as part of a grueling 3-month tour. Finally, with the sunset, the people gathered at the Will Rogers Memorial Center Auditorium and it was filled to the maximum of 6000 occupancy. Every seat was occupied by enthusiastic fans who had camped in the parking lot for hours to witness McCartney’s comeback performance.

The lights went out and the crowd was immediately transformed from boisterous to reverent when Paul McCartney and Wings happily took the stage. Standing on stage wearing multi-colored suits with flared trousers which have become characteristic of his outfits in the 70s, McCartney looked pleased with himself as well as with the audience that was privileged to get tickets for the show of the decade.

The band therefore quickly proceeded to play the first song – the rock ‘n’ roll-infused “Venus and Mars”. The song instantly managed to energize the audience and gave the promise of an even more exciting two-and-a-half-hour performance that was to follow.

A Playlist of Songs That Have Been Popular for Decades

Throughout 31 performances of the “Wings Over America” set list, Paul was able to include a song from each era of his musical career. This comprised early Beatles songs, songs from his new Wings album “At The Speed of Sound” and of course, a good dose of Wings’ favorites such as “Live and Let Die” and “Band on the Run”.

Every evening the band changed the set list but some songs remained constant, these were Beatles` numbers “I’ve Just Seen A Face”, “Lady Madonna”, “The Long and Winding Road”, and “Yesterday” which McCartney dedicated to Lennon and Harrison every time.

Wings also used the tour to introduce other songs from their upcoming album such as Silly Love Songs and Let ’em In which became popular hits. These huge hit singles, silly love songs as some would like to dub them, were far from silly when performed live as this preview showed and a tantalizing glimpse into the next phase of Wings.

Epic Jams & Friends

Besides performing their collection of popular songs, Wings also employed their headline tour to display their musicianship. Songs included long versions and solos where the band was given a chance to improvise in ways that their recorded albums didn’t necessarily enable.

Songs such as “Band on the Run” and “Hi, Hi, Hi” were the concert’s mainstays, and these songs alone were usually longer than 10 minutes. “Letting Go” also very often was stretched into a 15-minute monster with phenomenal solos of Jimmy McCulloch and Denny Laine. These relatively more liberal stage adaptations became a major selling point for the tour among the fans.

It was also common for Wings to invite other musicians to perform at their shows as special guests. During the Led Zeppelin concert in Los Angeles, McCartney invited his mate John Bonham and the other members of the group to drink backstage. Bonham even got up and played with the band to perform versions of ‘Lucille’ and ‘Wild Life’.

On June 11th, Paul Simon was present during the Wings concert in San Francisco and even got to sing onstage with McCartney doing a duet on songs from Simon & Garfunkel’s “Homeward Bound” and “The Boxer”. These unforgettable sit-ins turned out to be moments of the tour.

A Massive Production

One of the biggest concerting bands of the decade, “Wings Over America” featured lighting and staging, which echoed the proportions of the music created. The band played in circular with a circular stage having several levels and with the stage, every segment of the audience had a good view of the musicians who energetically moved around the stage.

A large lighting rig with hundreds of PAR cans was also placed above the stage and the musicians were washed in a shower of rainbows. Songs such as “Live and Let Die” had laser shows and pyrotechnics to make it an audio-visual delight that has to be seen to be believed.

The tour also saw the use of the IMAG video screen projection system for the first time by McCartney, which is in use today. The innovative technology made each and every fan feel connected with the band through the live close-up shots displayed on huge video walls. This innovative feature of the production was performed before such visual technology was utilized in big concert tours for several years.

However, one could not fail to notice that with such a vast structure, some issues were bound to arise. Because of many gear demands and individual stage needs, the band needed to rent a private airplane to move from one place to another with more than 26 tons of equipment. Even while rushing between cities wherein the band was occasionally performing just a few hours after their arrival, Wings completed their coast-to-coast tour without experiencing a single show cancellation or postponement.

A Landmark Success

It was only on June 23, 1976, after the band’s North American tour was over that fans and the media could declare the tour as legendary. Fans as well as critics applauded this as the proper return of Paul McCartney.

After entertaining more than half a million ticket buyers across sold-out arenas, McCartney solidified his comeback as a phenomenal concert artist after several years away from the live stage due to Beatles. The tour also broke attendance records at various venues, and it was an effective way of reintroducing McCartney’s stardom to a new generation of followers.

In terms of financial returns, the band also crowned their highest-grossing tour as the most successful rock tour to that point. It paved the way to encourage other legacy acts like the Rolling Stones to embark on the same stadium tours over the next decade.

The new songs which were featured on the tour would later become hallmarks following the release of the Wings Over America live album on November 1976. Driven by the exposure of the tour, the album moved to the top of the charts in both Europe and America.

Finally, the legendary 1976 set made Paul McCartney an eternal legend, who was still able to attract listeners with the same fervor as in the early Beatles years. To this very day, the “Wings Over America” tour remains one of the greatest live productions in the legendary McCartney’s long and successful career.