Adelaide's Working On A Plan To Get Paul McCartney To Visit

While the highly anticipated return of music legend Paul McCartney has been received with overwhelming joy around the country, SA fans have been dealing with heartbreak, but Adelaide Lord Mayor Martin Haese hasn’t given up on the Beatles legend yet.

Speaking with The Music, Haese - who opened a Beatles commemorative plaque on the balcony of the Town Hall last year – was quick to cite the band’s massive reception in 1964.

“There’s a long history with Sir Paul McCartney and Adelaide and we were disappointed that Adelaide didn’t get into the tour schedule,” Haese said.

Their 1964 tour initially excluded Adelaide until radio personality Bob Francis got a petition signed by 80,000 people and convinced the promoter to alter their schedule.

The band then received a welcoming party of more than 300,000 lining the streets.

There’s now another radio host, David Penberthy, from the same station, FIVEaa, who is going to organise a similar petition.

“I said, ‘I’m right behind you – the Lord Mayor is right behind you.’ We’d love Sir Paul to come here; in fact, I’d invite him to come and stand on the balcony of Town Hall again.

“It’d be wonderful, even if he didn’t do a concert if he came to Adelaide and we could do some kind of civic celebration of whatever he would like.”

SA fans have been flooding social media with their heartbreak since Wednesday night’s tour announcement.

“Lifelong fan here and totally crushed that Adelaide has once again been underestimated,” one fan said on McCartney’s Facebook.

“Adelaide gets screwed over again,” added another.

“The young Paul cites the excitement of the Beatles Adelaide reception in ‘64 as a highlight only rivalled by the Beatles return to Liverpool, so I can't understand why he isn't coming to Adelaide,” said a Facebook user.

“I have no doubt that Adelaide would sell out a Paul McCartney concert within an hour easily as there are many loving and devoted fans,” Music SA General Manager Lisa Bishop told The Music.

“Just look at the massive turnout for Adele, The Rolling Stones etc. I totally understand that people are feeling Heartbroken.

“We are a UNESCO City of Music, an ideal place for us to warmly welcome Paul McCartney, as we did the Beatles back in the ‘60s.”

It seems the timing of the tour is one reason why Adelaide is missing from the poster, with Adelaide Oval – which Frontier has booked for Ed Sheeran next March – hosting The Ashes from the 2 – 5 December, while McCartney is only available for a limited time, touring Aus from 2 – 11 December.

The One On One production also makes things tricky, with McCartney's tour production manager Mark Spring last year stating “it's not the status quo” and “each building is unique so it takes a bit of time to put it in”.

The production for a Vancouver McCartney concert in 2016 reportedly took just under 300 workers three days to setup.

While it’s easy to argue that the singer could loop back to SA after his Dec 11 in Sydney, there’s only five days before his Auckland show, which isn’t a lot of time to get such a big production and crew to another country, something Frontier boss Michael Gudinksi confirmed to News.com.au.

“Look, I would have loved to have had Paul McCartney for six weeks and put on a show in Adelaide, a show in Tasmania,” Gudinski said.

“If I could have done that, I would have. I know that it’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it is.”

Paul McCartney kicks off his Australian tour in Perth on Dec 2 before playing Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney.

Check out theGuide for all the info.

David & Will’s letter to Sir @PaulMcCartney about visiting #Adelaide… Let’s make it happen! pic.twitter.com/T8gh3iQybq

— FIVEaa (@1395FIVEaa) June 23, 2017