Back in the 1960s, anyone hoping to make it in the British music industry eventually had to go to London, especially to record singles and albums. As a result, nearly every major British musician of the era passed through the city at some point. The Rolling Stones, led for the past six decades by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, were formed in London, so they were pretty much at home.
But bands like the Beatles, who came from Liverpool, recorded virtually all of their music there. Because of that, the members of both bands frequently crossed paths on the London music scene, saw each other perform live and eventually became good friends. Over the years Keith Richards talked about many of his peers from that era giving his opinion on them, including Paul McCartney.
What is Keith Richards’ opinion on Paul McCartney
Although Paul McCartney is the Beatle Keith Richards knows the least and never had as close a friendship with as he did with the others, especially John Lennon, he has always been a fan of both McCartney’s music and him as a person. It took decades for the two to get to know each other better and spend time together. That finally happened in 2005, when McCartney visited a Caribbean island where Richards owned a house.
“(In 2005), while I was walking along the beach, climbing rocks, along the shore came Paul McCartney, just before he played the Super Bowl that year. It was certainly the strangest place for us to meet after all the years, but certainly the best. Because we both had time to talk, maybe for the first time since those earliest days when they were flogging songs before we were writing them. He just turned up, said he’d found out where I lived from my neighbor Bruce Willis.”
Richards continued:
“He said, “Oh, I just came down. I hope it’s OK. Sorry I didn’t ring.” And since I don’t answer the phone anyway, it was the only way he could do it. I sensed with Paul that he really was looking for some time off. That beach is long, and of course these things come in hindsight: there was something wrong there already. His breakup with Heather Mills, who was with him on that trip, was not long coming. Paul started to turn up every day, when his kid was sleeping.”
“I’d never known Paul that well. John and I knew each other quite well, and George and Ringo. But Paul and I had never spent much time together. We were really pleased to see each other. We fell straight in, talking about the past, talking about songwriting. (…) He told me that because he was left-handed, he and John could play the guitars like mirrors opposite each other, watching each other’s hands. So we started playing like that.”
Keith Richards continued:
“We even started composing a song together, a McCartney/Richards number whose lyrics were pinned on the wall for many weeks. I dared him to play ‘Please Please Me’ at the Super Bowl, but he said they needed weeks of warning. I remembered his hilarious takeoff of Roy Orbison singing it. So we started singing that,” he said in his autobiography “Life”. Paul McCartney later said he loved to hang out with Keith those days and that they had a lot of fun.
Keith Richards said Paul McCartney is a lovely bass player
After a misunderstanding in recent years, when Paul McCartney called the Rolling Stones “a Blues cover band,” a remark he later said had been taken out of context. He apologized to Keith Richards and explained what he meant. Both showed they were on good terms when The Rolling Stones invited McCartney to play on their latest studio albums.
That collaboration happened when they were working with the same producer Andrew Watt. McCartney played bass guitar in “Bite My Head Off”, which was released on their 2023 album “Hackney Diamonds”. He also appears in “Covered in You”, which was recorded during those same sessions but was only released on their most recent record “Foreign Tongues” (2026).
Richards talked about that collaboration in an interview with Apple Music and said that Paul is a lovely player. “I’ve realized that Paul really misses being in a band,” he tells Zane Lowe for Apple Music. “His joy of just being in that context is great. So if there’s any more songs to do, I’ll let you know, Paul.”
He continued:
“I know Paul basically since The Beatles started. But I mean, only on the periphery, John and Paul did a couple of backup vocals for us way back then. “We Love You” and “Dandelion”, I think, way back in like ’67 or something like that. It’s great to have someone in (our record) from your own era to play. (He’s a) lovely player, I’d like to do more with him,” he said.
Both songs mentioned by Keith Richards were released as a single in 1967. “We Love You” being the a-side and “Dandelion” the b-side. Recorded at Olympic studios in London, the track had Lennon and McCartney as guests, having recorded backing vocals. One interesting fact about those recordings is that the legendary producer Eddie Kramer was the assistant engineer.
The biggest difference between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones according to Keith
After both bands achieved fame, the press began promoting a supposed rivalry between them, as they were the two biggest British rock bands of their era. During the 1960s in particular, the Rolling Stones were often inspired by what the Beatles were releasing and occasionally explored similar ideas. For example, after the Beatles released Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, the Stones responded with Their Satanic Majesties Request, the most psychedelic album of their career.
However, the members of both bands have always said they were good friends and that the supposed rivalry existed only in the press and among fans. According to Keith Richards, one of the biggest differences between the two groups was that the Beatles effectively had four singers, while the Rolling Stones had only one. So it’s something he believes gave the Liverpool band an advantage.
Keith’s opinion was told by McCartney in an interview with BBC in 2011, recalling a conversation they had. “I talked to Keith Richards recently… well, a couple of years ago. His take on it was: ‘Man, you were lucky. You guys, you had four lead singers,’ whereas the Rolling Stones only had one.’ I could sing, John could sing, George could sing and Ringo did numbers that he could sing. So, it wasn’t just the front man and the back-up band. We were an entity. Mick used to call us the Four-Headed Monster. We would show up at places all dressed the same,” he said.
The business ideas Paul and Keith had together
One funny moment from the time they spent together at the beach was an unusual business idea they came up with during their conversation: inflatable dog kennels.
“We got into discussions about inflatable dog kennels designed like the dogs inside them. Spotted ones for Dalmatians and so on. Then we went off on one about a special project we were going to develop, sun-dried celebrity turds, purified with rainwater. Get celebrities to donate them, coat them with shellac and get a major artist to decorate them.”
“Elton would do it; he’s a great guy. George Michael, he’ll go for it. What about Madonna? So we just had a good laugh. We had a good time together,” Keith Richards said in his autobiography “Life”.