Paul McCartney kicks off the North American leg of his 2013 Out There tour this weekend. "Macca" and his band open things up over two nights, Saturday and Sunday (May 18th and 19th), at Orlando, Florida's Amway Center. The tour -- which is the former Beatle's busiest road trek since 2005 -- will take in 20 shows over a leisurely 12 weeks playing to both indoor arenas, stadiums, and outdoor festivals. McCartney wraps up his June dates with a quick three-date popover to Europe where he'll play Warsaw, Poland; Verona, Italy; and Vienna, Austria before resuming the second half of North American dates.

McCartney explained that even though some of the songs in his setlist date back 50 years, as a father and grandfather he's able to find new emotions in the tunes that he couldn't possibly have imagined back in his Beatles days: "A song like 'Yesterday' I wrote when I was 20, or 21, or something. And so, it was a quite a young man writing about yesterday -- I didn't have many yesterdays, it was only about few years of them. It's much more emotional now for me, because, y'know, my yesterdays involve bringing up children now, and when they were little babies. As you go on, the songs seem to have more depth. Y'know, words that I just wrote because I liked the sound of them -- now I like the meaning of them."

Happy Birthday to Pete Townshend, who turns 68-years-old on Sunday (May 19th)!!! Townshend, who is the primary creative force behind the Who, wrote nearly all of the band's music and has been responsible for crafting the stories and themes behind such rock classics as Tommy, Who's Next, and Quadrophenia. In February, he wrapped the North American dates for the Who's Quadrophenia & More tour, with the trek resuming next month in Europe. Last year, he published his long awaited autobiography, titled, Who I Am, to critical acclaim.

In January 2012, Townshend signed an exclusive, new publishing deal with Spirit Music Group to administer and promote his past and future songwriting catalogue. The pact also includes a long-term publishing agreement for Townshend's upcoming projects, including new songs composed for potential solo and Who releases -- as well as songs from Townshend's upcoming multimedia piece, Floss, which is based around an aging couple. Back in 2010 he pushed back a series of Who dates to presumably complete Floss. He was quick to explain that the project is not the Who's next "rock opera" posting on TheWho.com, "Floss is not a new Who album. It is a musical play. Some of the music might work for Roger (Daltrey) and me; I am still working on it. I reckon I have another year to go writing."

In 2009 he had announced the Floss project by stating: "Floss will be a (sound and light) musical piece, intended for outdoor performance, or arenas. Several of the more conventional songs from Floss will be featured on a forthcoming Who recording for release in 2010. Floss will be heard in concert for the first time in 2011, at a venue and date yet to be established. I am already having talks with producers in New York."

There is still no date set for Floss' stage premiere.

That same year Townshend and his wife of 40 years, Karen Astley, were granted a preliminary divorce in London's High Court. The couple had been separated since 1994. Townshend has been romantically linked with musician Rachel Fuller since 1996.

In 2006, after a 24-year-wait, Townshend wrote and produced the Who's comeback album Endless Wire. Despite the album hitting Number Seven in the U.S. charts, Townshend has stated that he felt the album fell short of his commercial expectations, and complained that none of the songs garnered the level of airplay he had come to expect with previous Who projects.

A while ago, we asked Townshend why he needs grand concepts such as Tommy, Quadrophenia, and the recent Wire And Glass mini-opera, behind most of his work: "I just write. I'm just a songwriter, y'know that's what I do. Which is why it's very important for me to have some kind of concept to hold me down, some kind of concept to give my work shape, focus, and direction. Because I don't feel that the Who ever had a clear brief (on what to write for them), ever, ever, ever, ever."

Pete Townshend says that he realized very early on that the Who's relationship with their fans differed greatly from the traditional showbiz precedents: "What we suddenly realized is that we weren't speaking for our audience, our audience were telling us what to say. Now, that's a very, very, different process. And it's one that I discovered when I was very, very young, it's one that I continue to honor today. So what I'm trying to do is, when people say to me, 'Hey Pete, your songs are very personal. How do you think that Roger can feel about singing them?' Roger can sing them 'cause they're not personal at all. My songs are your songs."

He says that he makes no apologies for veering away from rock music to dabble in theater, films and novels: "Y'know, some of those people that still to this day regard me as being pretentious because I aspire to live my life as an artist rather than a 'cash is king' rock n' roll performer. If that's pretentious, so be it."

With Christine McVie long gone from Fleetwood Mac's touring lineup, the show is basically an ongoing dialogue between former lovers Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. Although the majority of the band's setlist is made up of material which chronicles their torturous split in the '70s, there are a couple of bright spots showing the couple being positive towards each other.

Fans and critics alike have taken notice of the how the revamped long unreleased Buckingham Nicks song "Without You" and the show closing "Say Goodbye" show an actual real love between the often strained Buckingham and Nicks.

Lindsey Buckingham shed some light on the emotions between the two standout songs: "'Without You,' which I think was written right after Buckingham Nicks, she thinks maybe before, she talks about that being a song about me at a time when everything was before us and simpler times. And then we come on at the end and we do 'Say Goodbye,' which is a song I wrote about her 10 years ago when all our illusions had basically fallen away -- not being a bad thing, really. Y'know, sometimes it tales the loss of illusion in order to keep moving forward. And the song was still about resolve and for the future and about closure."

Fleetwood Mac performs tonight (May 17th) in Calgary, Alberta at Scotiabank Saddledome.