Paul McCartney Promises Israel Show Will Go On Despite Outcry

Despite demands from pro-Palestinian groups to cancel his return concert in Israel, Paul McCartney promises Israeli fans he'll go on with his September 25th concert in Tel Aviv. "I was approached by different groups and political bodies who asked me not to come here. I refused. I do what I think, and I have many friends who support Israel," McCartney said in an interview. The concert marks Macca's first performance in Israel since the Beatles' cancelled concert in 1965, when the Israeli government thought the Fab Four would corrupt the nation's youth. "The Beatles had a pretty positive influence on the world and only regimes that wanted to control their peoples were afraid of us. We mostly laughed at the Israeli government decision," McCartney said. In other Beatles news, Hamburg, Germany has dedicated a city square to the band to commemorate the band's time there in 1962. The square will feature steel statues of all four members of the Beatles, plus original bassist Stuart Sutcliffe.

Related Stories:
• Rare Early Beatles Tape Sells For $23,000
• Air Traffic Control, Police Escort Aided Paul McCartney's Arrival at Billy Joel Shea Stadium Show
• Paul McCartney Joins Billy Joel at Shea, Rocks Quebec

• 
  MUSIC Exclusive Live Chat With Linkin Park and Incubus
• 
  MOVIES & TV Peter Travers: 'The Avengers' Has it All
• 
  POLITICS Matt Taibbi: Jon Corzine Is the Original Zimmerman
• 
  VIDEOS Exclusive Premiere: Tenacious D's 'Tinnitus'

Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

More Song Stories entries »

Twitter