‘The Space Within Us’ – Paul McCartney’s DVD

Another McCartney DVD. He doesn’t really expect us fans to buy another DVD of the same songs over again, does he? Well, it turns out that I did buy it because … well … I really have no good reason other than this weird need to be a completist. So I bought the DVD (along with the bonus interview CD from Best Buy) and popped it in my DVD player to watch in installments over the last week.

You know what? I really liked it. As I have said before, a new McCartney live DVD better either have new songs or some other reason to exist. This one is your standard tour video using the same backing band as his last two videos so there is seemingly nothing new here – except the songs. Nearly two-thirds of the songs on this DVD has not been released on a live concert video before. (I could be wrong about that number - I haven't actually counted and checked the other DVDs but it's a lot anyway.) That’s a remarkable feat considering that over the last six years or so Macca has released Back in the US and Live in Red Square. In fact, McCartney has released a video of every tour since he came back to touring in '89. But McCartney’s back catalog is so good that he can keep dipping back and finding cool old things to perform that he hasn’t done in concert in decades, if ever. So songs like “Please Please Me,” “Too Many People,” “She Came in Through the Bathroom Window” and others get a workout by this crack band and they do a great job. There are also a few, but only a few, of the songs from McCartney’s latest studio album, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard. I’d love to see Paul bring back more stuff from the Wings era with this band but if I was seeing him in concert (which I did twice - in '89 and '91 Ithink) I’d want to see cool Beatles stuff and that’s what the crowd gets. The set list is great and the band nails the songs.

Since this is a McCartney concert video this means that there are lots of shots of fans absolutely loving the show, there are people who say how much Paul has meant to the world and tour personnel saying what a nice guy Paul is – a lot of self-congratulatory stuff. Frankly, this gets pretty old because he’s only a rock singer, you know? But, that aside, the DVD is a lot of fun. It is well filmed and the songs rock.