26 October 1989 | Paul McCartney | Live concerts | Milan, Italy
On Thursday 26 October 1989, Paul McCartney performed at the PalaTrussardi in Milan, Italy. It was the first of two consecutive concerts at the venue and the 18th date of the Paul McCartney World Tour. The tour brought new material from Flowers in the Dirt together with Wings favourites, early rock ’n’ roll and an extensive return to his Beatles songbook.
The date also left a commercially released recording outside the main concert: a performance of C Moon from the soundcheck. That recording later became a companion track to All My Trials, linking the first Milan date with a song recorded at the second.
| Date | Thursday 26 October 1989 |
|---|---|
| Venue | PalaTrussardi, Milan, Italy |
| Tour | Paul McCartney World Tour, 1989–90 |
| Position in itinerary | 18th date; first of two consecutive Milan nights |
| Previous concert | PalaEUR, Rome, 24 October 1989 |
| Next concert | PalaTrussardi, Milan, 27 October 1989 |
| Released soundcheck recording | C Moon, issued with All My Trials in 1990 |
From Rome to Milan on the 1989 European tour
The Italian concerts came after the opening Scandinavian shows and a run through Germany and France. Following the Rome concert on 24 October, the band moved north to Milan for performances on 26 and 27 October. Zürich followed on 29 and 30 October, before the European leg continued through Madrid, Lyon and Rotterdam.
Milan therefore belonged to the early arena phase of a tour that would eventually reach much larger outdoor venues. The complete 102-date itinerary ran from Drammen on 26 September 1989 to Chicago on 29 July 1990, taking in Europe, North America, Japan and Brazil. The Milan audience encountered the show while that long journey was still only a month old.
A six-piece band spanning Beatles, Wings and solo material
McCartney’s touring group combined familiar collaborators with musicians who could cover the changing arrangements of a career-spanning set. Its flexibility mattered: the concert moved between bass-driven rock, piano ballads, acoustic passages and layered keyboard textures.
- Paul McCartney: vocals, bass guitar, guitar and keyboards.
- Linda McCartney: vocals, keyboards and percussion.
- Hamish Stuart: guitar, bass guitar and vocals.
- Robbie McIntosh: guitar and vocals.
- Paul “Wix” Wickens: keyboards and vocals.
- Chris Whitten: drums and percussion.
Linda provided a direct link with the Wings years, while Stuart and McIntosh broadened the vocal and guitar possibilities. Wickens helped support the arrangements of songs originally built with substantial studio instrumentation. Whitten was the drummer on this tour, an important distinction from the later New World Tour lineup.
Flowers in the Dirt meets the Beatles catalogue
The opening Figure of Eight made clear that this was not simply a retrospective. Rough Ride, We Got Married, Put It There, This One and My Brave Face also represented the contemporary Flowers in the Dirt album. These songs occupied prominent positions rather than being separated into a token new-material segment.
Alongside them came Jet, Band on the Run, Coming Up and Live and Let Die. The Beatles selections ranged from I Saw Her Standing There and Can’t Buy Me Love to Eleanor Rigby, Let It Be and the closing Abbey Road sequence. The movement between eras became one of the defining features of McCartney’s later concert format.
For fans exploring McCartney’s wider catalogue, the McCartney Photo T-shirt offers a straightforward artist-focused design.
Concert setlist: PalaTrussardi, 26 October 1989
The documented concert sequence is listed below. Hello, Goodbye is listed in the sequence, while The Hustle is specifically identified as a snippet rather than an additional full-length song. Counts can vary depending on how fragments and the concluding medley are treated.
- Figure of Eight
- Jet
- Rough Ride
- Got to Get You into My Life
- Band on the Run
- Ebony and Ivory
- We Got Married
- Maybe I’m Amazed
- The Long and Winding Road
- The Fool on the Hill
- Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Good Day Sunshine
- Can’t Buy Me Love
- Put It There
- Hello, Goodbye
- Things We Said Today
- Eleanor Rigby
- This One
- My Brave Face
- Back in the U.S.S.R.
- I Saw Her Standing There
- Twenty Flight Rock
- Coming Up
- Let It Be
- Ain’t That a Shame
- Live and Let Die
- The Hustle (snippet)
- Hey Jude
- Yesterday
- Get Back
- Golden Slumbers
- Carry That Weight
- The End
The C Moon soundcheck and All My Trials single
The soundcheck is a separate part of the day’s history. C Moon, originally a Wings song, was recorded during the Milan soundcheck on 26 October 1989 and subsequently issued alongside All My Trials. It should not be added to the main concert setlist merely because the recording comes from the same date.
The release chronology deserves a small correction to accounts that mention only December 1990. The UK All My Trials single was released on 26 November 1990, with the Milan C Moon recording among its companion tracks. A second CD edition followed on 3 December 1990, again including C Moon, this time alongside the Liverpool Lennon medley.
All My Trials itself was recorded in Milan on 27 October 1989, not at the 26 October concert. The two successive Milan dates therefore contributed different recordings to the same later single campaign. The official 1990 timeline places the single’s release on 26 November and identifies the title track with the second Milan date.
Only C Moon is identified here as the released soundcheck performance from 26 October. This is not presented as a complete soundcheck setlist.
Where was the PalaTrussardi?
The PalaTrussardi was the Milan venue named in the tour itinerary. The map below locates the Via Antonio Sant’Elia area associated with the former arena. It is a geographical reference to the concert site, not a suggestion that the 1989 venue can still be visited in its original form.
Complete Paul McCartney World Tour itinerary, 1989–90
The following 102 concert dates cover the tour from its opening night to its final Chicago show. Links lead to existing Beatles Fabdom articles; unlinked dates remain in the itinerary so that it represents the complete tour rather than just our current article coverage. These are performance dates, not a mixture of played and cancelled bookings. The current Milan date is highlighted.
September 1989
- 26 September 1989: Drammenshallen, Drammen, Norway
- 28 September 1989: Scandinavium, Gothenburg, Sweden
- 29 September 1989: Johanneshovs Isstadion, Stockholm, Sweden
- 30 September 1989: Johanneshovs Isstadion, Stockholm, Sweden
October 1989
- 3 October 1989: Alsterdorfer Sporthalle, Hamburg, Germany
- 4 October 1989: Alsterdorfer Sporthalle, Hamburg, Germany
- 6 October 1989: Festhalle, Frankfurt, Germany
- 7 October 1989: Festhalle, Frankfurt, Germany
- 9 October 1989: Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy, Paris, France
- 10 October 1989: Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy, Paris, France
- 11 October 1989: Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy, Paris, France
- 16 October 1989: Westfalenhalle, Dortmund, Germany
- 17 October 1989: Westfalenhalle, Dortmund, Germany
- 20 October 1989: Olympiahalle, Munich, Germany
- 21 October 1989: Olympiahalle, Munich, Germany
- 22 October 1989: Olympiahalle, Munich, Germany
- 24 October 1989: PalaEUR, Rome, Italy
- 26 October 1989: PalaTrussardi, Milan, Italy, this article
- 27 October 1989: PalaTrussardi, Milan, Italy
- 29 October 1989: Hallenstadion, Zürich, Switzerland
- 30 October 1989: Hallenstadion, Zürich, Switzerland
November 1989
- 2 November 1989: Palacio de los Deportes, Madrid, Spain
- 3 November 1989: Palacio de los Deportes, Madrid, Spain
- 5 November 1989: Halle Tony Garnier, Lyon, France
- 7 November 1989: Rotterdam Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands
- 8 November 1989: Rotterdam Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands
- 10 November 1989: Rotterdam Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands
- 11 November 1989: Rotterdam Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands
- 23 November 1989: Forum, Inglewood, USA
- 24 November 1989: Forum, Inglewood, USA
- 27 November 1989: Forum, Inglewood, USA
- 28 November 1989: Forum, Inglewood, USA
- 29 November 1989: Forum, Inglewood, USA
December 1989
- 3 December 1989: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, USA
- 4 December 1989: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, USA
- 5 December 1989: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, USA
- 7 December 1989: SkyDome, Toronto, Canada
- 9 December 1989: Forum, Montreal, Canada
- 11 December 1989: Madison Square Garden, New York City, USA
- 12 December 1989: Madison Square Garden, New York City, USA
- 14 December 1989: Madison Square Garden, New York City, USA
- 15 December 1989: Madison Square Garden, New York City, USA
January 1990
- 2 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 3 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 5 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 6 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 8 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 9 January 1990: National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, England
- 11 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 13 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 14 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 16 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 17 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 19 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 20 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 21 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 23 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 24 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
- 26 January 1990: Wembley Arena, London, England
February 1990
- 1 February 1990: The Palace, Auburn Hills, USA
- 2 February 1990: The Palace, Auburn Hills, USA
- 4 February 1990: Civic Arena, Pittsburgh, USA
- 5 February 1990: Civic Arena, Pittsburgh, USA
- 8 February 1990: Worcester Centrum, Worcester, USA
- 9 February 1990: Worcester Centrum, Worcester, USA
- 12 February 1990: Riverfront Coliseum, Cincinnati, USA
- 14 February 1990: Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, USA
- 15 February 1990: Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, USA
- 18 February 1990: Omni Coliseum, Atlanta, USA
- 19 February 1990: Omni Coliseum, Atlanta, USA
March 1990
- 3 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 5 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 7 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 9 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 11 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 13 March 1990: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
- 29 March 1990: Kingdome, Seattle, USA
- 31 March 1990: California Memorial Stadium, Berkeley, USA
April 1990
- 1 April 1990: California Memorial Stadium, Berkeley, USA
- 4 April 1990: Sun Devil Stadium, Tempe, USA
- 7 April 1990: Texas Stadium, Irving, USA
- 9 April 1990: Rupp Arena, Lexington, USA
- 12 April 1990: Tampa Stadium, Tampa, USA
- 14 April 1990: Joe Robbie Stadium, Miami Gardens, USA
- 15 April 1990: Joe Robbie Stadium, Miami Gardens, USA
- 20 April 1990: Maracanã Stadium, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 21 April 1990: Maracanã Stadium, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
June 1990
- 23 June 1990: SECC Arena, Glasgow, Scotland
- 28 June 1990: King’s Dock, Liverpool, England
- 30 June 1990: Knebworth Festival, England
July 1990
- 4 July 1990: RFK Stadium, Washington, DC, USA
- 6 July 1990: RFK Stadium, Washington, DC, USA
- 9 July 1990: Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, USA
- 11 July 1990: Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, USA
- 14 July 1990: Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia, USA
- 15 July 1990: Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia, USA
- 18 July 1990: Cyclone Stadium, Ames, USA
- 20 July 1990: Cleveland Stadium, Cleveland, USA
- 22 July 1990: Carter–Finley Stadium, Raleigh, USA
- 24 July 1990: Foxboro Stadium, Foxborough, USA
- 26 July 1990: Foxboro Stadium, Foxborough, USA
- 29 July 1990: Soldier Field, Chicago, USA
Explore more Paul McCartney history
The Milan concerts belong to a much wider story of McCartney revisiting and reshaping his music in performance. Continue with Rome on 24 October 1989, follow the tour to Rio de Janeiro on 20 April 1990, or explore the Paul McCartney artist hub.
For another artist-focused choice, browse the Paul McCartney Photo Rose T-shirt.
Frequently asked questions
Where did Paul McCartney perform on 26 October 1989?
He performed at the PalaTrussardi in Milan, Italy. It was the first of two consecutive nights at the venue and the 18th date of his 1989–90 World Tour.
Who played in Paul McCartney’s band in Milan?
The band comprised Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney, Hamish Stuart, Robbie McIntosh, Paul “Wix” Wickens and drummer Chris Whitten.
Was C Moon part of the main Milan concert setlist?
The released C Moon recording is identified with the soundcheck on 26 October 1989. It is separate from the documented main concert sequence.
When was the Milan C Moon recording released?
It appeared with the UK All My Trials single on 26 November 1990 and was also included on a second CD edition released on 3 December 1990.
Was All My Trials recorded on 26 October 1989?
No. The All My Trials recording used for the later release came from Milan on 27 October 1989. C Moon came from the previous day’s soundcheck.
How many dates were on the 1989–90 Paul McCartney World Tour?
The itinerary contains 102 concert dates, beginning in Drammen on 26 September 1989 and ending in Chicago on 29 July 1990. The full itinerary appears above, with links to existing concert articles.
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