McCartney and his music ageless, uniting

Eyes widened to the diameter of dinner plates, mouth curved into an open circle, like he was attempting to swallow a giant Cheerio, Paul McCartney looked like the physical embodiment of that of which he spoke.

"Feel the sense of childlike wonder," he urged on "Sing the Changes," a high-spirited hallelujah to growing up without growing old.

Some things are ageless, and McCartney's one of them -- he's 68, about to turn 69 -- but he still radiates youthfulness like a packed playground.

At a sold-out MGM Grand Garden on Friday, McCartney frequently sang of adult concerns -- mortality, prejudice, love, war -- but underscored it all with a self-aware goofiness that acted as an embalming fluid of sorts to preserve a winking, adolescent cheekiness.

Basically, he came across as the coolest dork ever, telling tacky jokes, enjoining the crowd to bark like dogs, briefly adopting a Jamaican patois at one point and dancing the way one normally only does when no one else is looking.

He was a study in nonchalance, ambling about the huge arena stage as if he was performing in his living room in front of a small group of friends.

But if McCartney's physical bearing is that of a muscle relaxer incarnate, it's in the service of a serious repertoire of songs, many of which double as the brick and mortar of pop music.

During their 2½-hour set, McCartney and his air-tight backing band dug into various Beatles, Wings and McCartney solo tunes like a bird of prey wrapping its talons around dinner.

McCartney sounded like he was courting tonsillitis on the raw-throated chorus of The Beatles' "Got To Get You Into My Life," while Wings' fist-in-the-air "Jet" was powered by some particularly forceful drumming from Abe Laboriel Jr., a cannonball of a man who played the song as if his fists had been cast from granite.

Laboriel and guitarists Rusty Anderson and Brian Ray harmonized with McCartney to perfection on numbers like "All My Loving" and "Let 'Em In," from The Beatles and Wings, respectively, their voices intertwining with one another like strands of DNA.

Those sweet sounding tunes contrasted sharply with the curled-lip blues of "Let Me Roll It," a forest-dense jam with some roiling organ fills where McCartney swung his axe in the air like a lumberjack trying to fell a Redwood.

Throughout the show, McCartney swapped instruments with the frequency of a teen girl trying on different outfits for a big date, playing bass, electric and acoustic guitar, piano and mandolin, the latter during a heart-in-throat take on the George Harrison-penned Beatles chestnut "Something," with Harrison's widow, Olivia, watching from the wings. (About the only instrument McCartney didn't try his hand at was the drums, and to his defense, we wouldn't want to attempt to pry the sticks away from the boulder-sized Laboriel, either.)

Olivia Harrison wasn't the only member of the Beatles' extended family in the crowd on Friday, as she was seated next to John Lennon's son, Sean, and widow, Yoko Ono.

Together, the three of them stood and lent their voices to "Give Peace A Chance," a goose bumps-inducing sing-a-long that served as a coda to a beatific "A Day in the Life."

There were plenty of fireworks on this night -- sometimes literally, such as when massive plumes of flame shot up from the stage and sparks rained down from the rafters during "Live and Let Die," making it feel like an impromptu Fourth of July celebration had broken out in the arena -- but this moment burned as bright as any pyro.

McCartney took it all in with a smile as he listened to the crowd sing.

The audience became the performer.

The song ceased to be the band's.

This call for togetherness had been answered.

Contact reporter Jason Bracelin at 702-383-0476 or email him at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com.