Everybody we are back.
(crowd cheering)
Now uh,
ladies and gentleman,
Paul McCartney has a brand new CD out,
it's called "Flaming Pie".
It's a great CD, there's some amazing songs.
And I had the rare opportunity
last week to go to London
and talk to the man himself.
And he said we could talk about the CD
and anything else that came up.
Ladies and gentleman,
here's my little chat with Paul McCartney.
♪ I'm the man on the flaming pie ♪
♪ Stick my tongue out and lick my nose ♪
On this album alone,
I mean you're famous for it,
but you're playing base, you're playing guitar,
you're playing drums, you're playing harmonium.
Is there an instrument that you've tried
you just couldn't tackle?
Uh yeah, there's many of them yeah.
Seriously it's like the blowing instruments I'm no good at.
You can't do the blowing like this--
The blowing things?
That's the technical term for them.
That is what they're technically known
in the orchestral world, in the symphonic world,
as I am entering into.
I did actually start off on trumpet.
My dad gave me a trumpet when I was about 14.
And I eventually traded it in for a guitar.
Asking him first, saying "do you mind?"
And he said "I don't mind".
No I couldn't sing with it in my mouth.
I heard your yeah, your "Let it be" on tuba,
it just never sold as well.
It was just not a big seller.
I was noticing that you've wrote
a lot of these songs on holiday.
When you go on vacation you write songs.
For your family, do they ever get annoyed?
Did they say "Dad let's go water skiing".
And you think "Water ski, water ski, that rhymes with"--
Water ski, water ski. (chuckles)
And you start writing a song about water skiing,
which ends the album and is very good by the way.
My kids are very supportive you know.
They know, that ever since they've been little,
there's been this guy in the corner
of a room going "water ski, water ski".
And so they're used to me now.
So they don't mind.
You know they normally don't mind.
And your son? Sometimes they want to
watch something on TV,
at which point I will be told to stop.
That's a little strange,
you're Paul McCartney sits down--
It's my TV! and is writing a song,
it's your TV--
I'm paying for this by songwriting,
it doesn't cut any ice or water, or whatever you call it.
They don't care, they say "Paul McCartney,
"stop playing the guitar, we're trying to watch--
No they say "Dad, stop it."
You should make them call you by your full name.
I've said "Look, I am Sir Paul McCartney,
"on your knees, say 'I beseech you,
"in the name of the royal liege, this television might be'"
They don't go for it.
Right now you could be writing a great song except if--
I am. Oh right now?
I am right now.
[Conan] Does it involve me in anyway?
No just a second--
(Conan laughing)
okay there it is, finished.
[Conan] Really? Yeah.
Can I just have half the credit 'cause I was here?
No, no. [Conan] Pfft. (laughs)
You didn't even know I was writing it.
I could see in your eyes that a song was being written.
So I thing I should get some credit.
Just 20%. (Paul humming a song)
♪ Conan, Conan ♪
It's all there.
I cannot reveal it just yet.
(Conan laughing)
But give me two more minutes and it will be finished.
Okay, my people are going to sue you.
"Michelle", you know the,
♪ Michelle, by belle ♪
Used to um--
You don't have to that with people,
"You know that song? You ever heard of that?".
There's a lotta young people,
there's these young people
these days who haven't heard it.
Yeah? But really,
you've had people, you're saying to people
"It's called 'Let it be'".
"Sorry, no" "No it goes like this:"
"You're wasting your time, please move along".
(laughs) I always do it anyway you know.
(Paul mumbles off)
But "Michelle", I used to sit around at parties,
enigmatically, in a sort of black roll neck sweater going,
(singing in French)
and hoping they would think I was a French person
and would want me to go to bed with them.
[Conan] Uh huh, it's worked with women?
No. (Conan bursts with laughter)
It never worked, that was the problem.
"He's a smelly French person we don't...
"I don't like the song either".
But many, many years later,
and this is the true bit,
John did say "You remember that smelly French song
"that you used to do, to pretend that you"
He said, "That wasn't bad".
He said "You should write some
"good words to that". So I did.
You seem like such a nice guy.
You seem like you know you're a responsible guy.
Did you ever as a rock star feel at all tempted
to trash a hotel room?
I did once, knock some scrambled egg off a plate.
"I've had it with this hotel".
I was quite a wild one in my young days so.
You know coming up here through your offices,
we saw, these different Buddy Holly pictures and everything.
And of course you're a huge fan.
I'm a huge Buddy Holly fan,
and that's kind of what, when I first could play
rudimentary guitar, it's only three chords--
That was one of the great things about playing--
You can play "Peggy Sue" in an hour.
Play 'em all, most of 'em.
"Maybe I'm amazed" uh not "Maybe I'm amazed".
That's mine. No you just admitted it,
Buddy wrote that, and you took it.
Take him away boys.
Baby! Baby!
(Conan laughs) Uh huh.
You met Elvis, was it just once?
Yeah we met him, when he was in Hollywood.
And the trouble with the anthology was
we all had different memories of it.
'Cause it was so long ago.
And you know time does things things to those old memories.
So Ringo remembered him never standing
during the whole evening.
That was Ringo's key memory.
Mine was of him meeting us at the door.
So there was the anthology--
George said you were in an amusement park.
You were all in a merry-go-round.
You can't get a straight story here.
It was a bit like that yeah.
But it was wonderful to meet him,
'cause he was such a hero to us, I mean actually meeting,
I mean I see people do it with me,
or would do it with the Beatles,
and go "wow, you know I grew up on your music".
But we grew up on Elvis' music, so he was great.
And he was in a great point in his life I think too.
He was still all there.
The Las Vegas drug doctor had not come to see him.
Although that is you know, allegedly, of course.
I do not know that this happened.
I understand that there is an allegation,
that this kind of thing happened later in Elvis' life.
I'm not stipulating, this is not--
No, no Elvis was never involved with drugs.
[Paul] Probably not. The whole,
that rumor that he ever got overweight I find upsetting.
That was probably not a rumor.
[Conan] There's no proof. Exactly.
I need just a little advice,
I don't know if you're aware
'cause you live mostly here in England.
My show's wildly popular in the United States.
One of the most popular show's in the history of television.
And I'm experiencing something right now that's
a "Conan-mania" for lack of a better term.
People will just occasionally
when I leave a hotel room or when I get out
of my apartment in the morning,
someone might recognize--
No nothing, am I boring you? Sorry, no sorry, no, no.
No really? [Paul] Sorry no.
Okay you look like you're about to nod off.
[Paul] I know, I looked like I was
yawning there for a second.
I've been recognized on occasion on the street.
I've had one or two people recognize me.
And occasionally people have even approached me to say
"Hi, your show isn't that bad".
So I know what what you went through.
Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah.
Is it going to calm down at some point?
I guess that's my question.
I'm not sure Conan, it might.
And if it does, don't be disappointed.
It may however be building--
You think?
Well if this song works out,
I'm working on as we speak--
The Conan song.
There could be something in this.
This could increase your fan level to a five or six.
Could I just have one of these before I go?
You've got all these Platinum and Gold albums and I thought
"If I could just leave with one,
"it would be proof that I was here".
Yeah okay, you know the alarms will go off
as you go out the door.
It's like the gap here,
you leave with something and an alarm goes off.
It's exactly like the gap.
That's where I got 'em.
[Conan] (laughs) You got these at the gap?
I got these at the gap, you can get everything there.
(laughs) Uh, I think that's, you know that's it.
Well I'm finished with you Conan.
(audience roars) You think?
I think that's it love.
Now, you have, people gonna escort me out here
and kind of toss me out onto the street.
They've been briefed already.
[Conan] Okay well uh-- So if uh--
I guess I'll never be seeing you again then?
Nobody may be seeing you again.
[Conan] Okay.
This may be the end of your series and career.
Really? Yeah.
But I have written a song,
♪ Conan was in London ♪
♪ He's a great chap ♪
♪ He's a terrific person ♪
♪ But he's never coming back ♪
I like that song. [Paul] It's not bad.
I don't like the end where I get killed.
Don't come back. (audience laughs)
Thanks very much for spending some time with us.
A thrill to meet you and--
Good fun to be on your show.
[Conan] Thank you, good to see you.
Okay.
It's really him, and it's really me.
Which is neat to say.
Sewers, come get him!
(audience cheering)
Run down in the,
the album is "Flaming Pie".
You should check it out.
And we also want to say our thanks
to Sir Paul McCartney for meeting with us.
Something he did not have to do obviously.
And as you saw there he was an incredibly nice
and an extremely funny guy.
And it was a real pleasure talking to him.
Paul McCartney, the album is "Flaming Pie".
We'll be right back, with Martin Short.
We'll see you in a second.