By GILLIAN G. GAAR

Five years to the day that Paul McCartney had last performed in his hometown of Liverpool, he returned to the kind of welcome that might await a conquering hero when he performed before a packed house of 36,000 fans at Anfield Stadium on June 1.

The Zutons and Kaiser Chiefs were also on the bill to give the show a totally Liverpudlian flavor, though it was clear who everyone was really there to see. “Anybody looking forward to the headliners?” Chiefs’ lead singer Ricky Wilson queried at one point during the band’s set, bringing the expected fusillade of cheers. But the Chiefs’ own material, like the high energy “Ruby,” drew plenty of applause for the band, and the audience gamely went along with Wilson’s efforts to get the crowd to do “the wave.” During their own set, Zutons’ lead singer Dave McCabe jokingly introduced their song “Valerie” as “an Amy Winehouse cover”; it was actually Winehouse’s cover of the song that brought the Zutons to international attention.

McCartney, using the same backing musicians he’s played with since his 2001 album Driving Rain, played a 26 song set that was surprisingly diverse in places. Such as opening with a high voltage version of “Hippy Hippy Shake,” once a staple of the Beatles’ set back in their pre-fame days when they sweated it out at the Cavern Club, just a few miles down the road. There were two songs from 1997’s Flaming Pie, and, oddly, only one song from his latest album, Memory Almost Full, the single “Dance Tonight.” He also performed an unreleased song about Liverpool, an appropriate choice given the setting.

But most of the set was devoted to Beatles classics, with a few nods toward that other band, Wings (“Jet,” “Let Me Roll It,” complete with an “Are You Experienced” guitar outro, the reggae-fied “C Moon,” and “My Love,” dedicated to his first wife, Linda). [What, no dedications to Heather Mills? – weekend copy editor] The crowd blissfully sang along from start to finish, from “Got To Get You Into My Life” to “I’ll Follow The Sun” to “Penny Lane”; the singalong during the extended outro of “Hey Jude” must’ve been heard for miles. George Harrison got a nod via a cover of “Something,” which began with McCartney accompanying himself on ukulele, the full band coming in halfway through. And however slight the song actually is, the flamepots and fireworks that accompanied “Live and Let Die” never fail to impress.

Dave Grohl, then touring the UK with Foo Fighters, took time out to appear with McCartney on a few numbers, playing guitar on “Band on the Run” and drums on “Back in the USSR,” wearing a mile-wide grin that threatened to split his face in two. The evening’s biggest surprise came during the encore. After the obligatory “Yesterday,” McCartney then performed “A Day in the Life,” which segued into “Give Peace A Chance,” an undoubted gesture of goodwill toward Yoko Ono, who was present at the concert, sitting next to Harrison’s widow, Olivia. The final number, “I Saw Her Standing There,” had Grohl back on drums (handily overpowering McCartney’s own drummer, Abe Laboriel Jr.), with McCartney generously inviting him down to take bows with the full band at the show’s conclusion.

The delirious crowd was then dazzled by a long fireworks display, a fitting end to a rousing evening.