Paul McCartney to launch 2022 Got Back tour at Spokane Arena on April 28

After a long and winding pandemic-ridden road, it’s time for Spokane to come together.

One of the most significant concerts in Spokane history is on the horizon. Paul McCartney will kick off his  Got Back tour April 28 at the Spokane Arena. It will be McCartney’s first performance in the Lilac City.

Tickets go on sale to the general public at 10 a.m. Friday, Feb. 25, while American Express cardholders and members of the Paul McCartney fan club can purchase tickets at 10 a.m. Tuesday, Feb. 22, at spokanearena.com and ticketswest.com. 

“I said at the end of the last tour that I’ll see you next time,” McCartney said in a news release. “I said I was going to get back to you. Well, I got back!”

Well, McCartney isn’t technically getting back to Spokane, but who cares? The music legend is finally coming to town, and his most intimate Got Back date is at the Spokane Arena, which has a capacity of 12,368.

That’s quite a contrast from the majority of his upcoming shows, many of which will be at stadiums, such as SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif., which just hosted the Super Bowl, and ballparks – hello, Fenway Park in Boston – on the brief tour. From Spokane, McCartney will head to Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle for shows on May 2 and 3, the only location where McCartney will perform two nights.

The final date is scheduled for June 16 at Met Life Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. But it all starts here.

Few recording artists compare to McCartney.

He is an unabashed genius and a big reason the Beatles altered music, pop culture and, well, the world. Being the best at sonic craft and the most popular has always been mutually exclusive, except when it came to the Beatles.

There is no group on the level of the Beatles who has ever been labeled a boy band. The legendary Fab Four morphed wildly during the social upheaval of the 1960s and introduced innovation in a relentless manner.

“Paul was such an inspiration for so much of what I did,” the Beach Boys star Brian Wilson said during an interview a decade ago while promoting a reunion tour . “There was never a band like the Beatles.”

As brilliant as the Rolling Stones, the Who and the Kinks were at the apex of the British Invasion, the Beatles were simply on another level. Each member played a significant part, but no Beatle had the range of McCartney, who could write a dance hall tune, such as “When I’m 64,” and a raucous rocker like “Helter Skelter.”

McCartney is perhaps the greatest manipulator of emotion through song.

McCartney classics such as “Golden Slumbers” and “Here, There and Everywhere” have that effect.

Fans will likely experience Beatles classics such as “Let It Be,” “Hey Jude” and “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” and the Wings and solo material, during the Got Back tour.

McCartney has easily been the most successful band member since the Beatles breakup in 1970, and he continues to make meaningful music.

“Jet,” “Band on the Run” and “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five” are examples McCartney’s terrific solo songs.

Thanks to the pandemic, it’s been nearly three years since McCartney’s last concert – July 2019 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. He turns 80 in June, prompting questions and worries whether this might be his last tour.

That’s another reason his concert is a can’t-miss performance. Prepare for a three-hour set with nearly 40 songs and an unforgettable evening.