The crazy concert

 Here is another photo from the crazy San Francisco 1965 evening concert.   I am not sure why the photographer chose to circle Paul and John but it is a great shot!  

in defense of McCartney (1976 San Francisco)

 

In Defense of McCartney

By David Cheit

The Independent

June 18, 1976

    A Beatles reunion is a special fantasy. If it ever happens, its mere existence will transcend any of the more concrete details of a performance. The songs won't have to be good just so they could be. Period.

     Until the dream comes true, we have to settle for what we can get. Wings is no match for the Beatles, but when you can get Paul McCartney on stage, and he sings " Yesterday " for you, it doesn't matter much who he's playing with. 

    That incredible thirst for a taste, a drop, anything to bring back the Beatles experience was in shouting, arm-waving, foot-stomping evidence last weekend when Paul McCartney brought his band of the '70s to the Cow Palace. The inadequacies have been adequately covered in local reviews. Yes, Paul's voice was unable to make the highest notes. Yes, the sound system was inappropriate, almost to the point of distraction, and yes, the new group is a far cry from the old group, but under the circumstances, everybody went home satisfied.

     If a reunion is in the cards, this certainly was an encouraging preview. It showed that Paul is ready to return to the Beatles' music. He has said he couldn't face it for so long that he could only recently consider performing it again. It also showed his capability as a performer. True, the strenuous tour has taken its toll on his vocal cords, but the acoustic numbers, "Blackbird" and "Yesterday", were nothing short of entrancing. 

    The Wings tunes can't possibly be held in the same reverent light as the Beatles classics, simply because they're not Beatles songs, but they still stood up very well and were received with enthusiasm, with one or two dull exceptions. 

    Other criticisms of the tour have been aimed at Linda McCartney, whose vocal and instrumental contributions to the Wings are, to be sure, undistinguished, but that kind of pickiness doesn't do justice to the way McCartney has managed to preserve his image through the years, while John, George, and Ringo all went through various phases of what's sometimes perceived as weirdness.

     Linda is part of that image. She has helped make Paul something of an all-American Beatle. The spirit and unpretentiousness of the '60s remain, but now Paul is in his 30s. He's a dedicated family man. He's married to a pretty American girl. It's an appealing image, and none of the other Beatles has it.

     Paul hasn't changed much since the days when the Beatles represented a vaguely sinister presence with their funny long hair and odd slang vocabulary. It's everyone else who has changed.

McCartney Has Renewed Glow in the Limelight (San Francisco 1976)

 

McCartney Has Renewed Glow in the Limelight

By Steve Connell

The Sacramento Union

June 15, 1976

    The ex-Beatle Paul McCartney is no longer the boyish mop-top British idol of the 1960s, but thanks to his much-celebrated Wings Over America tour, he's once again in the limelight and very much alive and well. 

    He proved all that, plus much, much more here Sunday and Monday nights in the cavernous Cow Palace. Both shows were sold out far in advance, and Sunday's was like nothing I have ever seen. Incredible might not even be enough of a superlative to describe the affair. Even before the concert, the aura of anticipation hanging over the ticket holders and those who were frantically looking for someone with extra tickets for sale was in evidence.

     Some three hours before the show time, they were already lined up to the back of the huge parking lot, waiting and waiting in hopes of getting some kind of decent seat for the festival seat show. The air was buzzing with electricity, and when it finally got going, when Paul made his first triumphant rise to the stage, where he hadn't set foot in nearly 10 years, a roar of approval, so deafening I could hardly stand it, ripped through the hall like a tidal wave. Cameras were flashing in the darkness at a rapid-fire pace, like a million strobe lights blinking at once. I think every rock critic in California must have been there, and of course, there were people from everywhere and numbering nearly 20,000. 

    I talked to one fellow who flew out from Georgia just for the show; another drove from Seattle. I'm sure there were countless others who traveled just as far, and I doubt it was any of the throng walking away disappointed. 

    McCartney is indeed professional in every sense of the word. While I hadn't previously been too impressed with his band, Wings proved to be extremely talented. Paul's wife Linda plays keyboards and sings with Denny Laine and Jimmy McCulloch on guitars, Joe English on drums, and a superb horn section of four. And they blend nicely. They perhaps use too much volume, but the Cow Palace has never been known for good acoustics. 

    They started with newer Wings material, tunes off the Venus and Mars, and Wings at the Speed of Sound LP, plus tunes like "Maybe I'm Amazed" from Paul's first solo album. But when the evening wore on a bit, and McCartney and Company moved into a series of old Beatles, it was the crowd that went nearly ecstatic. These were tunes that brought back memories and tugged at the heartstrings, songs like "Lady Madonna", a very moving "Long and Winding Road," I've Just Seen a Face", "Blackbird", and the classic " Yesterday " with Paul soloing on acoustic guitar.

     A very psychedelic "Live and Let Die" with smoke bombs, blinding flash explosions, and flashing lights galore was an overpowering spectacle. In all, McCartney performed for over two hours, 28 tunes, including two rocking out encores (who said he wouldn't give the crowd its money's worth?)

     Throughout it, his distinctive vocals were pleasing and clear. His guitar and piano playing easily adequate. His bass work truly excellent, and he'll display those talents three more times on this tour in San Diego, Tucson, and Los Angeles. My advice to any rock music fan would be if you're going to be in one of those areas and come by any means, wangle a ticket out of somebody to go. It's a show that shouldn't be missed.

Backstage at the Cow Palace

 

August 19, 1964 - San Francisco 

Cow Palace

 

Frisco's Near Riot

In many ways I think the two shows the Beatles did at the Cow Palace in San Francisco, California on August 31, 1965 were the most out of the control shows they ever did in the United States.   There are other shows that were pretty wild and crazy such as the Cleveland 1964 and 1966 shows, but the Cow Palace '65 shows were wild because fans were getting carried up onto the stage while the show was going on!      Look at the photos and read the newspaper accounts and decide for yourself.

Somebody on Guard
Associated Press

Five teenage girls were injured when a youth leaped on stage with Britain's Beatles, touched drummer Ringo Starr on the shoulder and then did a swan dive off the stage into the front row seats.

The incident occurred Tuesday at the Cow Palace as thousands of screaming, fainting and sobbing teenagers threw jelly beans, stuffed animals and themselves at the singers.

Police said there were no serious injuries and that everyone recovered.

Wave after wave of frantic teenagers, mostly girls, charged the line of police and guards in front of the stage during the Beatles' concluding performances on their American tour.   A private guard, John Edwards, 43, either fainted or was knocked out at the afternoon performance but returned to help control the evening crowd.  The shows drew 28,000 fans.

The evening performance was stopped about ten minutes while Beatle Paul McCartney pleaded with the pushing, shoving teenagers to let police remove Mrs. Julia Stewart, who is five months pregnant from the arena floor, where she had fallen in a faint.  She was taken to a first aid station.

The audience participation performance marked the last day of the Beatles eight city tour of the United States.  Sources said they would take back more than a million dollars to the United Kingdom.

Between shows the Beatles told reporters that they'd make their third movie next year in Spain-- a western.  No details were given.


Beatles end U.S. tour in wild S.F. concert
UPI

The Beatles fly back to London today after a 19 day tour capped by farewell performances here almost spilled out of control as hysterical girls leaped onto the stage to grab their beloved Liverpudlians.

"This was the wildest of the whole trip," leader Paul McCartney said after the final show last night.  "We don't blame the police--there just weren't enough of them."

Playing at the Cow Palace, a cavernous auditorium designed for stock shows, the British four were on a stage almost completely surrounded by a sea of 17,000 adolescents whose unbelievable screaming drowned out sounds of real pain.

At least 51 girls were carried out.  Some had just fainted.   But some 30 suffered minor injuries from the crush against the stage.   At one point, a teenage girl flung herself against Paul McCartney and almost toppled him off the stage.  Others grabbed George Harrison and John Lennon.  Drummer, Ringo Starr, high on his podium, was comparatively safe except for the thousands of stinging jelly beans, as well as teddy bears, shoes and lipstick cases thrown at the stage.


Beatles Aide ripped Frisco near-riot. 

UPI

Brian Epstein, manager of  the Beatles, today criticized the management of San Francisco's Cow Palace where a near-riot broke out during the performance of the shaggy haired singing quartet Tuesday.

Mr. Epstein, at a new conference held several hours after the Beatles returned from a concert tour of ten American cities, blamed the management for "insufficient security."

The Beatles netted an estimated one million from the tour.

During the disturbance which forced the Beatles to cut short the second show, the fans threw rings, pens, flashlights, Teddy Bears and jellybeans onto the stage.

"They may have underestimated the Beatles' appeal," he said of the management.  "There is a problem here.  Their adulation can be underestimated."


Here is what Alf Bicknell had to say:

The boys played the Cow Palace San Francisco.  It's over, Thank God!  What can I say?  If all the rest of the shows were put together they could never beat this for enthusiasm from the boys. Oh, but the crowd was wild!  I've never seen the likes of it.  Incredible.  So frightening out there tonight as well.  At one point, I thought the show was going to stop and not continue.  Pulling those kids up on the stage, it's a wonder that one of them, or more, wasn't killed.  What happened to the security to put the fans to close?   They just climbed up onto the stage, on top of those being crushed.  Anyway, everyone mucked in, and thank God, again, no one was hurt.

 
And Alf memories of it from 1990:
Cow Palace.  Amazing!  I think this was one of the first concerts, the only one that I can remember, that the Beatles had to leave the stage due to the pandemonium and excitement of the people.  And it was exciting!  I used to get excited every time they went on stage, but this was special.  A guy appeared out of nowhere, from the back of the stage, over a high wire.  John used to wear a sort of sailor's hat, and this guy grabbed it, which seemed to be a one-bounce movement.  With the hat in hand, he dived straight into the audience.  Before I go any further, it was some while later that the hat was returned, to everyone's amazement.  I remember it so well.  John was absolutely delighted.

But the excitement of the concert.  It had got to such a hectic state.  They all had to leave the stage, back to the dressing room.  I think Paul had to go and ask people to quiet down, not to subdue anyone, but just for the fear of anybody getting hurt.  There are photographs to prove how bad it had gotten, with me running on stage.  I was never on stage with the Beatles before.  It was very exciting.

Cow Palace fan photos

I often wonder how different fan taken concert photos would be if teenagers of the 1960's had the digital cameras that we have today. These fan photos always are poor quality, but I still like the feel of them because you know that whoever took them was trying to capture a once in a lifetime experience. And even with the poor cameras of 1965, you can still make out who is in the photographs and even imagine yourself in that audience on that day.....