Paul McCartney Debuts ‘Last’ Beatles Song ‘Now and Then’ During Uruguay Show

The song pieced together from a home demo made by John Lennon using AI premiered in 2023.

On Tuesday, October 1, Paul McCartney opened the South American leg of his Got Back tour with a marathon performance of “Now and Then,” which is regarded as the “final” Beatles song. The performance took place in Montevideo, Uruguay. The 82-year-old McCartney crooned the melancholic ballad whose wistful chorus saw him singing, “Now and then/ I miss you/ Oh, now and then/ I want you to be there for me/ Always to return to me,” while seated at a piano while the AI-assisted Peter Jackson-directed music video unrolled behind him.

The group’s historic 35th top 10 entry, “Now and Then,” made its debut on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in November 2023, peaked at No. 7. The song was advertised as the group’s final song before they broke up in 1970. The song was first recorded as a demo in 1977 by the late singer/guitarist John Lennon. Because of the low quality of the original recording, it was originally intended to be included on one of the band’s Anthology series volumes.

After Lennon’s original vocals could no longer be extracted thanks to new technology, McCartney and drummer Ringo Starr brought the song back to life. They coupled the guitar parts from the initial shot at finishing the track in 1995 with the late guitarist and singer George Harrison. Using AI technologies that Jackson had deployed, producers enhanced Lennon’s vocals for the 2021 documentary The Beatles: Get Back.

In Jackson’s accompanying video, which featured footage of all four band members performing the song together as well as a modern-day McCartney recording vocals and seemingly staring at a ghostly Lennon image, the band was digitally “reunited” through the use of technology.

Setlist.fm reports that McCartney’s extensive nearly three-hour, 37-song setlist at Estadio Centenario on Tuesday featured a variety of Beatles hits, such as “A Hard Day’s Night.”

Night,” “Getting Better,” “Blackbird,” “Something,” “Helter Skelter”) and Wings songs (“Junior’s Farm,” “Let Me Roll It,” “Let ‘Em In,” “Jet”).