Watch Paul McCartney & David Gilmour Perform “No Other Baby”

The song “No Other Baby” was written by Dickie Bishop and Bob Watson and was initially released in 1957 by Bishop’s band, The Sidekicks. By 1999, it was covered by Paul McCartney for his cover album Run Devil Run. The song peaked at 42nd position on the UK singles chart.

In an interview with Laura Gross to promote the album, McCartney explained why he wanted to cover the song. “‘No Other Baby’ was a strange track, because I didn’t have a record of it,” he said. “I didn’t know who’d recorded it or who’d written it. But I knew I loved the song from late ‘50’s. And so that was one I pulled out my envelop, say, anyone know this. They said, no. They had really no idea. I’d barely knew it. But I just remembered it, and remembered the verses. It’s just a simple song. And I always wanted to do it. We used to do it at soundchecks actually on the, on the, on the tour we used to do it.”

However, the version that McCartney remembered was the 1958 rendition of the Vipers. “I found out lately that it was recorded by an English group who were like a skiffle group,” he added. “Was before rock ‘n’ roll for us here. And they were called the Vipers. They were like a favorite little skiffle group of ours. Funny though, I was talking to George Martin on the phone the other day and I said, I was telling him about No Other Baby, I said, do you know who this song is by. He said, I doubt we even did it. I’ve since found out, it was by the Vipers, you know. And I suddenly realized while I was talking to George, wait a minute George, you recorded the Vipers. He said, yes, I did. I said, well, this song’s called No Other Baby, how does it go. He said, I said, I don’t want no other, he said, oh yes, I remember it. So, it turned out we talked about, coming full circle. George actually recorded the original thing.”

This clip shown below is from the singer’s concert for PETA, which took place on September 18, 1999, and was officially released on DVD in 2001 under the title Paul McCartney and Friends- the PETA Concert. Here, we have McCartney singing the song together with Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour.