Former Nirvana member Krist Novoselic has revealed that he feared playing bass for Beatles member Paul McCartney.
During a recent interview with Bass Player, Novoselic explained, "I said, ‘Dude, I’ll walk there from Washington if I have to.' So I flew down and we were standing around figuring out what to do, and I kept thinking, ‘Please don’t make me play bass guitar; please don’t make me play bass. That’s like being asked to do karate with Bruce Lee – you’re going to get your ass kicked. ‘Yep, I’m going boxing.’ ‘Who’s your sparring partner?’ ‘Muhammad Ali.’ ‘Good luck with that!’ … So of course he asked me to play bass."
Apparently, McCartney was playing a cigar-box guitar, Pat Smear was on a standard guitar while Dave Grohl played the drums, but Novoselic said the sound “wasn’t working for us. … Then I realized we were playing in D, so I did the old grunge trick and I drop-tuned my bass to D. I played some riffs and boom! Paul got into it, Pat was feeling it, and Dave laid down some serious grooves. Then Paul shot me a riff and I shot him a riff, and everything started clicking perfectly.”
Grohl suggested the collab as part of his Sound City documentary following Nirvana's 2012 song, "Cut Me Some Slack," with McCartney.