What I saw for Paul McCartney’s secret shows camping

Attempted bribery, vehicle breakdowns and tears followed. But nothing was as bad as a ticket master.
Photo: Nick Robins-Early

On Thursday morning it is 4:30 a.m. and around 90 fans are outside the Bowery ballroom in the icy rain. In a few hours, hundreds will join a queue that wraps around the Manhattan corner of Delancey and Bowery. You have only decided to believe that a beatle will play a third secret concert at an event location of 575 people, where the appearances on Tuesday and Wednesday drew the A-List stars and the feeling of a unique opportunity. When a fan who has been there since the early hours of the morning, he wrote on X: “New York’s hottest club is the 500 -person line for the Paul McCartney show that does not yet exist.”

Almost six decades since the Londoners walked through the street to throw the Beatles on a roof, 82-year-old Paul McCartney Beatlemania has been occupied by Instagram (where he announced his shows every day). There were campouts in straight-over-freezing temperatures, instrumental singalongs, crying and vehicle breakdowns, in the hope of fighting a ticket of $ 50 for a show on one level one-165 of the size of MCCARTNEYS regular event locations. At a time when attempts to see your favorite artist up close, it usually includes a little invigorating when you are in a queue (the fans had to appear physically in the Bowy Ballroom, the fans had to appear, the fans had to appear in a queue. To get your ticket), no fearful refreshment of devices.

“It is a compromise,” tells me a 32-year-old who lives in Bed-Stuy from the inside of a ripe hemisphere that he built in front of the box office. “You regret it for the rest of your life if you don’t camp to get a Paul McCartney ticket if you had, or you do and you are tired for a few days.”

Jack, who asks to use a pseudonym an earlier show. He is third for the alleged event on Thursday and by far the most prepared to defy the elements. Peter, a place in front of Jack and a Ph.D. Student from Boston got into a bus when he heard about the shows and brought little more than a long orange scarf and headphones to hear the audio book by Patti Smith’s Only children.

“My father has provided Rubber soul On, and I was obsessed for years and years. I just love him, ”says Peter. “I love the whole thing.”

The hysteria about tickets has become more and more intensive since McCartney and Bowery Ballroom announced the first show late Tuesday morning, which was sold out in a few minutes. The fans appeared the next morning, McCartney turned up, turned another night and noticed that the venue moved its previously planned event to another place. On Thursday morning the message was sufficient and McCartney fan forums were flooded with posts in which people asked to appear earlier and earlier.

“It’s Paul McCartney, man. He is a beatle; That’s it. You have to see a beatle, ”says Adam, a 26-year-old chess teacher from Bushwick, who arrived at 8 p.m. on Wednesday evening and is visibly trembling. “Especially in such an event location without phones. Are you kidding me?”

Near two brothers and her friend who brought the guitars from New Jersey, a reproduction of “I saw them standing there.” Several people go up and down who murmur themselves and down To determine snake. Others offer money to advance and are rejected hard.

Over a hundred people stood along the Bowery before 5 a.m. and crowded under the scaffolding to avoid the rain.
Photo: Nick Robins-Early

Anyone who hits the line seems to weigh how quickly he wants to keep himself against dignity. There are all-out sprinter. Others try to get decent by long to get into the queue. Most have settled on a jogging that looks like they had just heard that their plane is increasing. When I passed the line on Wednesday, I heard a screeching before I turned to see a gray minivan taxi in a hardened thousand year old darts about traffic. He collected his phone from the street, hired his hat and ran to a place. “I hope this guy gets one,” said a man next to me.

Fans who have seen McCartney live describe it as something that has discovered that Santa Claus is not only real, but will also play with heterosexual bangers for two hours. The people who were in one of these Bowery ballroom shows talk about it in even more surreal, almost hallucinatory terms. Pieter, a 34-year-old multimedia journalist from Crown Heights, who made it to the show on Wednesday evening, was 15 feet from McCartney when Suite Suite Suite broke out during his encore “Golden Slumbers”. While “Hey Jude” he turned to see Paul Rudd and Jon Hamm arm in arm and sing along.

Almost everyone I speak to describes McCartney as an ubiquitous figure in her life and music as part of the core development reminders. There is the 64-year-old Michael, whose British Nanny played the Beatles and who still has a family Meet the Beatles LP with the word “sweet” next to Paul’s name. Beth, 55, “was a Latchkey child, and the Beatles held me after school.” The cousins ​​Sofia (18) and Molly, 20, grew up with the Beatles in the music room of their grandparent and see fanirling over McCartney as part of their cultural heritage.

“I live through the girls who came in front of me in the 1960s,” says Molly, wearing a button with the inscription “I still love the Beatles.” “Justice for” temporary secretary “!” She screams and refers to a cult song made of McCartney’s second solo album. “Tell her about” Temporary Secretary “?” A man asks.

But all are at least 100 people back from the front of the line. While the hours are continuing, there is still no official announcement that McCartney is playing at all, let alone a sign that they will proceed far enough to see it. Rumors circulate online and in the crowd. There is no show. There is a show, but it’s Friday. Some argue that the data on temporary no-parking messages prove that it will take place on Thursday. In the meantime, a woman has heard that it is actually a secret arcade fire show, which is her reason for coming. “Don’t get me wrong, Paul McCartney is also great,” she says.

Around 1 p.m. there is a jubilation because the employees of the event location begin to distribute small blue vouchers in size with which some people can buy tickets for a last show that can take place on Friday, Valentine’s Day. “Let no one cut the line!” Someone screams. The rolls of blue vouchers don’t make it far. A total of only 75 to 80 tickets are triggered, the rest is probably reserved for insiders and celebrities. Someone in the line cursed Jerry Seinfeld. “Please, I have my young son with me,” a man told a bouncer. “I also have a 17-year-old son and he can’t come either,” replies the bouncer.

The lucky dozens in front of the line are enthusiastic and break out into the Na-Na-Na-Na-Chor from “Hey Jude”. A ticket -free husband encourages his wife without keeping him. “I feel alive!” Jack, who packed his tent, shines after the claim for his ticket. “This is the best day of my life!”