6 Music - Music News

Despite playing bass in arguably the UK’s most iconic band and carving a successful solo career, Sir Paul McCartney still has the ability to be surprised by his own success.

Ahead of his European tour, which kicks off on Wednesday 2 December in Hamburg - where The Beatles honed their craft some 40 years ago - the former Beatles legend said he's staggered he managed to sell out the London, 02 Arena show in a remarkable time of four seconds.

"I was doing an interview with some guy and he said, 'I heard you sold out in four seconds'. I said, 'No. That’s four minutes, are you kidding?'," he said to Lauren Laverne on 6 Music, in an interview broadcast this morning during the first of her daytime shows on the network.

The rest of McCartney's shows in Berlin, Arnhem, Paris, Cologne and Dublin are also sold out.

He admitted that when the tickets get snapped up so quickly, it makes him feel at ease when it comes to getting up on stage.

"Now the motivation is that I know they want to come really badly because my promoter will say, 'You’ve sold out'," he explained. "I actually don’t feel like I have to chew myself up because it’s a built-in factor now.

"I think, 'I love playing to them, and they’re going to actually like hearing me, so what can I do so that we can have fun?' It’s more of a mutual motivation now."

See below for the Good Evening Europe tour dates:

Hamburg, Color Line Arena (December 2)
Berlin, O2 World (3)
Arnhem, Gelredome (9)
Paris, Bercy (10)
Cologne, Koln Arena (16)
Dublin, The O2 (20)
London, The O2 Arena (22)

Listen again to Lauren Laverne’s interview with Paul McCartney by downloading the free podcast here.

She now presents a show every day from Monday to Friday on 6 Music, from 10am-1pm GMT.