Paul McCartney didn’t only write many of The Beatles’ greatest songs, but he played bass on them too.
However, there was one song he passed up the opportunity to play on – not because he didn’t like it, but due to a fight he’d had with some of his bandmates.
Reminiscing on the time the band recorded Revolver track “She Said, She Said”, McCartney, who turns 81 today (18 June), told Many Years from Now: “I’m not sure, but I think it was one of the only Beatle records I never played on.”
He continued: “I think we’d had a barney or something and I said, ‘Oh, f*** you!’ and they said, ‘Well, we’ll do it’.”
McCartney said he believed George Harrison played bass instead.
While it’s unclear what the argument was about, John Lennon once said that he teased McCartney for refusing to take the LSD with Peter Fonda, an experience that inspired the song.
Far Out highlights him as saying: “We just decided to take it again, in California. We were in one of those houses like Doris Day’s house, and the three of us took it, Ringo, George and I – and maybe Neil. Paul felt very out of it because we are all slightly cruel: ‘We’re all taking it, and you’re not.’ It was a long time before Paul took it.”
Despite not playing on the song, McCartney is still credited. The musician also played drums on several songs, including White Album tracks “Back in the USSR” and “Dear Prudence”.
In an old interview, McCartney also named the “hilarious” Beatles song he would class as his favourite.
McCartney’s 80th birthday in 2022 arrived just one week before he headined Glastonbury for the second time ever.
