On Monday night, a lengthy interview with Sir Paul and Stephen Colbert aired on the Late Show on CBS. During the conversation, which was primarily geared around the recent release of Paul’s new children’s book, Hey, Grandude!, McCartney covered a number of topics, revealing some personal insight that makes for a very engaging conversation.

The interview was so detailed, it was broken up into four parts. In the first, McCartney talks about Korean boy band BTS singing “Hey Jude,” among other topics:

In the second part, Sir Paul discusses his burgeoning love of Elvis Presley in his formative years as an aspiring musician and the impact that had on his songwriting:

In a particularly fascinating segment, Paul said that he often dreams of his longtime friend and band mate John Lennon — as the impression Lennon left on his friend is still very strong today, decades after his untimely and premature death in 1980.

Going off the concept of loss and how, at age 14, McCartney lost his mother, he then spoke about how that helped forge an indelible bond between himself and Lennon, who had also lost his own mother.
McCartney tells a story about how somebody suggested the Beatles song “Yesterday,” with its lyrics of “Why she had to go/ I don’t know she wouldn’t say,” was inspired by his mother. He hadn’t realized that, and conveys that the revelation pretty much blew his mind in a way he hadn’t considered.

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