Lesson 1: How to rock

Paul McCartney live on Letterman

In a brilliant set on top of the entrance to the Ed Sullivan Theatre in New York, where the Beatles first set the sleepy world of pop alight, Paul McCartney's band gives an object lesson in the elements of rock. The toy bands of today with their pathetic, foppish excuse for boys' brigade marching tunes and the pompadoured screeching prima donnas of ersatz emotion eking out the dead corpse of what used to be their version of rock, should tape this and listen to it 100 times till their eyes are opened and they give up their hopeless careers.

It gets better as it goes along. If you're short of time and just want the best bits, Helter Skelter starts about 14 minutes 50 seconds in. The full set list is Coming Up, Band On The Run, Let Me Roll It, Helter Skelter and a brilliant Back In The USSR. It really starts rocking from about Let Me Roll It and gets heavier and better all the way. The drummer is awesome and the keyboard player is pretty awesome too and the whole band but it's mainly because the arrangements with their heavy booming turns are just very, very exciting if you're in the mood.

Just listening to it again on speakers and can't get the same feeling as when I listened to it first on headphones last night, so maybe try it with headphones. The trouble is I can't really turn my speakers up enough to do it justice (have to consider the neighbours).

Bartell