No Other Baby

Paul McCartney recorded a version of The Vipers’ ‘No Other Baby’ for his 1999 album Run Devil Run.

I’ve no idea how this one got so embedded I my memory… I never had the record, still haven’t.

McCartney first recorded ‘No Other Baby’ in 1987 during the Choba B CCCP sessions.

‘No Other Baby’ was a strange track, because I didn’t have a record of it. I didn’t know who’d recorded it or who’d written it. But I knew I loved the song from late ’50s. And so that was one I pulled out my envelope, say, anyone know this. They said, no. They had really no idea. I 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 tour we used to do it. I found out lately that it was recorded by an English group who were like a skiffle group. Was before rock ‘n’ roll for us here. And they were called the Vipers. They were like a favourite 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 realised while I was talking to George, wait a minute George, you recorded the Vipers. He said, yes, I did… So it turned out we talked about coming full circle. George actually recorded the original thing.

The song was recorded at Abbey Road Studios on 5 March 1999, the same day as McCartney’s versions of ‘Brown Eyed Handsome Man’, ‘She Said Yeah’, and ‘Blue Jean Bop’.

‘No Other Baby’ was released as a single in November 1999, with the b-sides ‘Brown Eyed Handsome Man’ and a non-album cover of the Charlie Gracie song ‘Fabulous’.