Paul McCartney’s opinion on Bob Dylan

Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan are among the most successful and influential songwriters of all time and music would not have been the same over the past six decades without them.

They first got to know each other in the early years of their careers, and although Dylan became a closer friend of the late George Harrison, McCartney still had the chance to spend time with Bob and see him perform multiple times. Over the years, the British musician has shared his opinion on Dylan as a musician and spoken about his work.

What is Paul McCartney’s opinion on Bob Dylan

“I always like what he does. Sometimes I wish I was a bit more like Bob. He’s legendary… and doesn’t give a shit! But I’m not like that. His new album (Rough And Rowdy Ways)? I thought it was really good. He writes really well. I love his singing. He came through the standards albums like a total crooner. But, yeah, I like his new stuff,” Paul McCartney told NME in 2020. They met back in the ’60s and had a lot of fun together, marking the first time The Beatles smoked weed.

“It was a great honor to meet him. We had a crazy party the night we met, I thought I’d got the meaning to life that night. I went around trying to find our roadie (saying to him) ‘Mal, Mal get a pencil and a peper, I got it!’ Mal was a bit out (of himself) and he couldn’t find a pencil and paper anywhere.”

“Eventually in the end of the evening he found it and I wrote down my message for the universe, you know. I said (to the roadie), ‘Keep that in the pocket’. The next morning he said ‘Paul, do you wanna see?’. I said ‘What?’, he said ‘That bit of paper’ and I said ‘Oh yeah!’ I had written ‘There are seven levels’,” Paul McCartney said in an interview for the Beatles Anthology released in 1995 (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).

The Bob Dylan song Paul McCartney said is his favorite

Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan are two of the most covered songwriters in the history of music, and the Beatle was once asked which song by the American artist he would pick to cover if the opportunity arose. He said there were many songs to choose from, but he felt it would be difficult because many of Bob’s songs are so closely connected to his style and voice. The first song mentioned by him was the one he said is his favorite one: “Mr. Tambourine Man”.

“I know it’s corny, but I heard him do it at the Albert Hall (May 9, 1965), and I was aching for him to do it and knowing Dylan I thought he might not do it. Just to be awkward, just to be perverse. It was the infamous show where all the folkies thought he’d sold out.”

He continued:

“How crap is that? It was fantastic. First half is folky, and then the second half was electric with The Band – it was the all-time concert. But then of course, somebody starts going, ‘He’s deserted the folk world!’ Yeah, no wonder, look at you mate. So he did it there, the first time I’d ever heard it live. A really good song, very much of the period. Totally nailed that year. I was lucky to be there,” Paul McCartney told Mojo in 2026.

Over the years, there were rumors about a possible collaboration between them, but it never happened. Dylan has covered a couple of McCartney’s songs during his career. He recorded a version of “Yesterday” with George Harrison in 1970, performed “The Long and Winding Road” during a show in 1978, and, on the 2014 tribute album “The Art of McCartney”, he recorded a version of “Things We Said Today”. Bob was one of The Beatles’ main influences in the early ’60s, as he showed it was possible to write about topics other than love.

Bob Dylan said Paul McCartney can do it all and has a gift for music

Although, throughout his life, Bob has always been a close friend of George Harrison, with whom he collaborated frequently, even as bandmates in the supergroup Traveling Wilburys, he is also a fan of Paul McCartney.

The musician said he has always been in awe of Paul and that he really has a gift for music. “(Lennon) and McCartney both, really, they were fantastic singers. Lennon, to this day, it’s hard to find a better singer than Lennon was, or than McCartney was and still is. I’m in awe of McCartney.”

“He’s about the only one that I am in awe of. He can do it all. And he’s never let up. He’s got the gift for melody, he’s got the rhythm, he can play any instrument. He can scream and shout as good as anybody, and he can sing a ballad as good as anybody. And his melodies are effortless, that’s what you have to be in awe of. . . . He’s just so damn effortless. I just wish he’d quit [laughs]. Everything that comes out of his mouth is just framed in melody,” Bob Dylan said in an interview with Rolling Stone in 2007.