Berlin, April 20 (Reuters): Paul McCartney has no plans to quit even “When I’m 64” — and said he’ll keep singing in small-town taverns if that’s the only place anyone will have him once his concert-playing days are over.
“And, if the day comes when they even throw me out of the pubs, I’ll keep on singing outside the door,” McCartney said in an interview in Germany’s Bild am Sonntag newspaper. “I’m always going to be a musician.”
“It’s strange — I’m approaching the age when people officially go into retirement. But sorry, I don’t feel like that at all. Retiring is not something I’m thinking about.”
The former Beatle, who turns 61 in June, said he couldn’t imagine becoming a pensioner because he feels fitter now than he did a decade ago — thanks in part to his new wife Heather.
The author of the 1967 pop hit “When I’m 64” isn’t at all worried about “losing his hair” or any of the lyrics in his song on the Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album.
McCartney told the German Sunday newspaper that applause from crowds is a fountain of youth for him. McCartney said his new wife Heather, 34, also keeps him young.
“I love my job, the public loves me and the band,” he said. “I feel like a boxer — when you’re winning, the punches don’t hurt. Only when you lose is it hard and difficult. My body has learned to cope. I’m used to working hard up on the stage.”
Speaking ahead of a concert tour starting in Cologne on April 27 and ending in Hamburg in late May, McCartney said he had had a lot of good fortune in his life. “Perhaps it’s just luck?” he said when asked how he had managed to remain so vital at 60. “Another reason is my wife Heather. For her I watch what I put on and what I look like. Love is a wonderful thing. It keeps you young.”
McCartney is on a 16-nation world tour from the US to Japan. He grossed $70 million in the US, breaking box-office records in 21 cities, won Billboard’s Tour of the Year and is the highest-earning celebrity ever.
McCartney has been performing 22 Beatles songs at each of his world tour dates, almost twice as many as the pioneering 1960s-era band ever played during its own British shows.
“It’s just magic,” he said of the crowd’s reaction to his music. “It’s a great feeling, every artist does it to get the applause. It sounds so simple but that’s the whole story.”
