Sir Paul McCartney: I'm always tempted to pose with tourists on Abbey Road

Getty Images
Getty Images

Sir Paul McCartney has revealed he is often tempted to “join in” with tourists posing on the zebra crossing made famous by The Beatles’ Abbey Road album.

The 77-year-old was this morning reflecting on the 50-year anniversary of the band’s seventh album on Radio 2, which the musician said he had “beautiful memories” of.

He added: “Nowadays I drive past but you can’t get past — there’s people on it. I’ve often thought of just jumping out and joining in.”

He also admitted he did once stop there after a party.

“I was coming back from a Halloween party and the crossing was empty and I had a werewolf mask on so I just went across and did a pose.”

The BBC has set up a pop-up radio station to mark the anniversary, called Radio 2 Beatles.

His most recent studio album, 2018’s Egypt Station, was a hit around the world and Sir Paul said he still loves to perform after a hugely successful career spanning six decades.

The veteran was asked about his collaboration with the rapper Kanye West after the pair performed alongside Rihanna at the 2015 Grammy Awards.

The Beatles during their hey-day(Getty Images)
The Beatles during their hey-day(Getty Images)

The Liverpool-born rock star collaborated on the songs Four Five Seconds and Only One with West, with both becoming chart hits.

He told how he and West met up for secret recording sessions, which were a world away from how he used to write songs with Lennon.

While Sir Paul and Lennon would often sit nose-to-nose, each with a guitar in hand while working on a track, West’s method’s were “more cerebral”.

“It was just talking and thinking and me plonking away a little bit”, he said.

“And you record everything and he takes it away and kind of does stuff with it and just a month or so later, he sent back this record and it was Rihanna singing and so I had to ring up and sort of say ‘Am I on this? Did I have anything to do with it?’ I couldn’t tell!

“He said, ‘Yeah, what it is is, that’s you on guitar, so it’s all the chords and the musical idea’s yours, but we’ve sped it up to suit Rihanna’s key, musical key, so I did it in A so now it was up in D’.”

Sir Paul added: “You can imagine the fun of that. So when you’re saying to me why do I do it, how do I do it, because it’s all that kind of fun. And if someone like Kanye’s going to ask me, then I’m going to show up.”

Radio 2 Beatles is a four-day pop-up DAB radio station airing from September 26-29

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