Just for a bit of fun, while it’s still fresh in the mind, I thought I’d analyse Paul McCartney’s set list from his “Got Back” concert in Melbourne a couple of weeks ago.
Paul McCartney set list, Melbourne 21/10/2023
| Song | Band | Album |
| Can’t Buy Me Love | Beatles | A Hard Day’s Night |
| Junior’s Farm | Wings | single |
| Letting Go | Wings | Venus and Mars |
| She’s a Woman | Beatles | single |
| Got to Get You Into My Life | Beatles | Revolver |
| Come On to Me | Solo | Egypt Station |
| Let Me Roll It | Wings | Band On The Run |
| Getting Better | Beatles | Sgt Pepper |
| Let ‘Em In | Wings | Wings at the Speed of Sound |
| My Valentine | Solo | Kisses On The Bottom |
| Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five | Wings | Band On The Run |
| Maybe I’m Amazed | Solo | McCartney |
| I’ve Just Seen a Face | Beatles | Help! |
| In Spite of All the Danger | Quarrymen | single |
| Love Me Do | Beatles | Please Please Me |
| Dance Tonight | Solo | Memory Almost Full |
| Blackbird | Beatles | White Album |
| Here Today | Solo | Tug of War |
| New | Solo | New |
| Lady Madonna | Beatles | single |
| Fuh You | Solo | Egypt Station |
| Jet | Wings | Band On The Run |
| Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite! | Beatles | Sgt Pepper |
| Something | Beatles | Abbey Road |
| Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da | Beatles | White Album |
| You Never Give Me Your Money | Beatles | Abbey Road |
| She Came in Through the Bathroom Window | Beatles | Abbey Road |
| Band on the Run | Wings | Band On The Run |
| Get Back | Beatles | Let It Be |
| Let It Be | Beatles | Let It Be |
| Live and Let Die | Wings | Live and Let Die |
| Hey Jude | Beatles | single |
| I’ve Got a Feeling | Beatles | Let It Be |
| Birthday | Beatles | White Album |
| Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) | Beatles | Sgt Pepper |
| Helter Skelter | Beatles | White Album |
| Golden Slumbers | Beatles | Abbey Road |
| Carry That Weight | Beatles | Abbey Road |
| The End | Beatles | Abbey Road |
First, we can break down the number of songs by band.
As you can see, quite a bit of songs from Wings and his solo career, but there’s more Beatles than anything else.
If we find the original album from each song, we can see that the final (recorded, not released) Beatles album Abbey Road gets more tracks than anything else. There are also a lot of singles – back in the 60s, many songs got a single release but not an album release.
Finally, by percentage of each album played. Abbey Road actually ranks second here, with 6 out of 17 tracks played. But the winner is the superb Wings album Band On The Run, with 4 out of 9 tracks played, or 44% of the album.
From all this can we reach any conclusion? Perhaps only that McCartney knows what the crowds like!
