Taylor Swift and Paul McCartney have partnered up.
The singers appear together on the cover of Rolling Stone’s Musicians On Musicians issue, which was shot by Paul’s daughter, Mary, with clothes from his other daughter Stella; the shoot took place in London last month.
In the wide-ranging interview, the blonde beauty talked about her boyfriend Joe Alwyn and finding ‘normalcy’ together as she touched on writing under the name Nils Sjöberg.
What a pair! Taylor Swift and Paul McCartney have partnered up. The singers appear together on the cover of Rolling Stone’s Musicians On Musicians issue
The Red singer admitted her song Peace is about Joe, a 29-year-old British actor best known for Boy Erased and The Favourite.
‘Peace is actually more rooted in my personal life,’ said the 30-year-old crooner.
‘I know you have done a really excellent job of this in your personal life: carving out a human life within a public life, and how scary that can be when you do fall in love and you meet someone, especially if you’ve met someone who has a very grounded, normal way of living,’ added the cover girl.
Family matters: The shoot was by Paul’s daughter, Mary, with clothes from his other daughter Stella; the session took place in London last month
Paul has been married three times: Nancy Shevell (they wed in 2011), Heather Mills (from 2002 to 2008), Linda McCartney (from 1969 until her death in 1998).
Taylor has dated Harry Styles, Jake Gyllenhaal, Joe Jonas, John Mayer and now Joe.
Swift added, ‘I, oftentimes, in my anxieties, can control how I am as a person and how normal I act and rationalize things, but I cannot control if there are 20 photographers outside in the bushes and what they do and if they follow our car and if they interrupt our lives.
She admitted her song Peace is about Joe. ‘Peace is actually more rooted in my personal life,’ said the 30-year-old. Seen in February
‘I can’t control if there’s going to be a fake weird headline about us in the news tomorrow,’ she said.
When Paul asked if Joe understands the stress she answered: ‘Oh, absolutely.’
Taylor then shared: ‘But I think that in knowing him and being in the relationship I am in now, I have definitely made decisions that have made my life feel more like a real life and less like just a storyline to be commented on in tabloids.
‘Whether that’s deciding where to live, who to hang out with, when to not take a picture — the idea of privacy feels so strange to try to explain, but it’s really just trying to find bits of normalcy.’
The Bad Blood singer then said the song Peace is about finding comfort.
‘Like, would it be enough if I could never fully achieve the normalcy that we both crave? Stella [McCartney] always tells me that she had as normal a childhood as she could ever hope for under the circumstances,’ it was also stated.
On Instagram the siren said: ‘It only took one day to confirm what I had suspected for years: Paul McCartney is the loveliest person alive.’
She wants it to be private: Taylor then shared: ‘But I think that in knowing him and being in the relationship I am in now, I have definitely made decisions that have made my life feel more like a real life and less like just a storyline to be commented on in tabloids.’ Seen in 2019
Swift spoke to Paul about writing under the pen name Nils Sjöberg.
‘I think, when a pseudonym comes in is when you still have a love for making the work and you don’t want the work to become overshadowed by this thing that’s been built around you, based on what people know about you. And that’s when it’s really fun to create fake names and write under them,’ Taylor said.
She then said she wrote under the name Nils Sjöberg because those are two of the most popular names of Swedish males.
‘I wrote this song called This Is What You Came For that Rihanna ended up singing,’ she said.
‘And nobody knew for a while. I remembered always hearing that when Prince wrote Manic Monday, they didn’t reveal it for a couple of months,’ she explained.
Fair enough: Swift spoke about writing under the pen name Nils Sjöberg. ‘I think, when a pseudonym comes in is when you still have a love for making the work and you don’t want the work to become overshadowed by this thing that’s been built around you.’
Paul then said: ‘Yeah, it also proves you can do something without the fame tag. I did something for Peter and Gordon; my girlfriend’s brother and his mate were in a band called Peter and Gordon. And I used to write under the name Bernard Webb.’
McCartney then said he wanted to play Shake It Off with Swift at Glastonbury.
The Beatles legend has revealed he wanted to duet with the pop superstar as they were both set to headline the 50th anniversary of the iconic festival, which was sadly cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Taylor said: ‘Wow, it would’ve been so fun to play Glastonbury for the 50th anniversary together.’
McCartney agreed, adding: ‘It would’ve been great, wouldn’t it?
‘And I was going to be asking you to play with me… I would’ve done Shake It Off.’
With the live music industry effectively put on hold during the pandemic, both musicians released new albums, with Taylor’s ‘folklore’ dropping in July, while McCartney III is set to drop on December 11.
Up for a duet: McCartney then said he wanted to play Shake It Off with Swift at Glastonbury. The Beatles legend has revealed he wanted to duet with the pop superstar as they were both set to headline the 50th anniversary of the iconic festival, which was sadly cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic; seen in 2017
She pondered: ‘I was wondering about the numerology element to McCartney III. McCartney I, II, and III have all come out on years with zeroes.’
Macca explained: ‘Ends of decades… This was being done in 2020, and I didn’t really think about it. I think everyone expected great things of 2020.
‘It’s gonna be great! Look at that number! 2020! Auspicious! Then suddenly Covid hit, and it was like, “That’s gonna be auspicious all right, but maybe for the wrong reasons.” Someone said to me, Well, you put out McCartney right after the Beatles broke up, and that was 1970, and then you did McCartney II in 1980.’ And I said, “Oh, I’m going to release this in 2020 just for whatever you call it, the numerology…”‘
Taylor admitted that numbers are important for her, with 1989 – the year of her birth – and 13 both holding special significance for her.
His past: The Beatles in 1967: George Harrison and Ringo Starr (background l-r) and McCartney and John Lennon (front l-r) with a cut-out of a Yellow Submarine
She said: ‘Yeah, it’s lucky for me. It’s my birthday. It’s all these weird coincidences of good things that have happened. Now, when I see it places, I look at it as a sign that things are going the way they’re supposed to. They may not be good now, they could be painful now, but things are on a track. I don’t know, I love the numerology.’
The Rolling Stone’s editor’s note by Jason Fine said: ‘When Taylor Swift walked into Paul McCartney’s MPL Studios office in London, in early October, for this issue’s cover story, she arrived without assistants or stylists or even a makeup person.
‘Appropriately, Taylor chose to wear clothes designed by Paul’s daughter Stella McCartney for the occasion.
‘For most of the day it was just Taylor and Paul, along with Paul’s daughter Mary McCartney, a photographer, in what turned out to be a revelatory meeting of megastars from across the generations.
‘Taylor came armed with questions; Paul was loose and relaxed, singing to Motown songs and sharing personal stories, like the time he made veggie burgers for Quincy Jones in his kitchen.
‘They talked about songwriting, how to keep a semblance of normal life as a celebrity, and the risk-taking albums they both made during lockdown.’