TV Reviews : ‘MTV Unplugged’ for Die-Hard Fans

Last year, there was The Tour, and now there is The Afterthought. Tonight’s episode of the live acoustic music show “MTV Unplugged” features an hour of Paul McCartney and his touring band, sans lasers, giant movie screens and amplifiers, doing less obvious songs from the Cute One’s past that weren’t heard on the recent big world arena jaunt. (The show airs at 10 p.m. on MTV, simulcast locally on KLSX-FM (97.1).)

If you’re a die-hard fan, you may enjoy this low-key denouement to McCartney’s celebrated return to live performance--filmed in January before a live audience at a London TV studio--even more than the tour itself. The fun is not so much the acoustic aspect, though that’s part of it, but more that the song choices aren’t quite so easy to soothsay. No “Let It Be,” but “Be-Bop-a-Lula.”

Beatles songs like “And I Love Her” and “She’s a Woman” take on new life in this restrained setting, and without much in the way of backing instrumentation, it’s curious to hear how different the harmonies sound with players Robbie McIntosh or Hamish Stuart replacing John Lennon in the vocal mix. Macca also plays influential pre-Fab oldies (“Blue Moon of Kentucky”) and a few lesser-heard choices from very early in his solo career (“Every Night”). No selections post-date 1971, and none are holdovers from last year’s tour set list.

Lest it be overpraised, there are no utterly magical musical moments here that would absolutely mandate McCartney’s decision to issue the soundtrack (with a few extra tracks edited out of the broadcast) next month as another live album. On the other hand, the show’s casualness is what makes it work as television, and as a thank-you to more dedicated devotees who might like to hear their hero in a less polished mode. It’s in the playful, generous spirit of his Soviet-issued oldies album, “Back in the U.S.S.R.”