Paul McCartney closed the 51st season of “Saturday Night Live” with a performance that combined a new release and classics
Paul McCartney performed on May 16, 2026, as the musical guest in the final episode of the 51st season of “Saturday Night Live”, one of the longest-running television entertainment shows in the USA. According to NBC’s announcement ahead of the broadcast, the episode was announced as the season finale, with Will Ferrell as host and McCartney as musical guest. The season finale thus gained a double nostalgic note: Ferrell returned to the show in which he was one of the most recognizable cast members, while McCartney performed in a program with which he has been connected by several decades of television and music history. The performance attracted additional attention because it took place ahead of the release of his new album “The Boys of Dungeon Lane”, which, according to Paul McCartney’s official website, was announced for May 29, 2026. In the same television edition, the former Beatle performed new material, a well-known classic from the Wings catalog and an additional song during the closing credits.
Three songs and a return after a long gap
According to Pitchfork’s report, McCartney performed in the finale of the 51st season of “SNL” as musical guest for the first time in a regular episode of the show since 2012. The central part of his performance consisted of renditions of the song “Days We Left Behind”, announced as part of the new album, and “Band on the Run”, one of the best-known titles from the period of his group Wings. At the end of the show, after the crew’s usual goodnights, McCartney returned to the stage again and performed “Coming Up”, a 1980 song that has a special place in his history with “Saturday Night Live”. According to Ultimate Classic Rock, the video for “Coming Up” in 1980 was precisely his first connection with the show, and the new performance of the song in the 2026 season finale gave the appearance a symbolic frame. Such an order of songs presented McCartney in three different periods of his career: as the author of new material, as the former frontman of Wings and as a solo performer whose catalog has been returning to popular culture for decades.
“Days We Left Behind” was performed with the participation of Chad Smith, the drummer of Red Hot Chili Peppers, who also appeared in the comedic part of the program. According to Pitchfork, Smith played drums in the performance of the new song, and his appearance continued the joke from Ferrell’s monologue, in which the long-standing resemblance between the actor and the drummer was used. Ultimate Classic Rock also states that Smith played alongside McCartney during the performance of “Band on the Run” as well. The musical segment was thus connected with the comedic part of the show, which is a frequent “Saturday Night Live” device, especially in episodes in which well-known musical guests also take part beyond the stage itself. McCartney, according to reports by American media, also appeared in one sketch segment as an auto mechanic alongside Ferrell and Marcello Hernandez.
Will Ferrell as host of the season finale
The final episode of the 51st season was hosted by Will Ferrell, a long-time former member of the “Saturday Night Live” ensemble. According to People, this was Ferrell’s sixth hosting appearance on the show, while McCartney was announced as musical guest for the fifth time. Boston.com states that Ferrell already appeared in the cold open in the role of the ghost of Jeffrey Epstein, in a sketch that satirically also included a portrayal of Donald Trump performed by James Austin Johnson. The same source reported that other guests also appeared during the episode, among them Aziz Ansari and Molly Shannon, which gave the finale the character of an episode built on the returns of familiar faces. For “SNL”, such a format in season finales is common, especially when the show relies on its own long history and recognizable former members.
Ferrell’s return was important also because his career is strongly connected with the period of “SNL” from the mid-nineties to the beginning of the two-thousands. Boston.com recalls that Ferrell joined the cast in 1995 and left the show in 2002, after which he returned several times as host and guest. In the finale of the 51st season, that return was placed alongside McCartney’s musical performance, so the show simultaneously used comic nostalgia and the musical weight of one of the best-known authors of popular music. Chad Smith fit into that concept already in the monologue, when he appeared as a kind of Ferrell double, before the real star of the evening moved into the musical part of the program. According to Pitchfork, McCartney appeared in the audience during that part and joined a conversation that ended with an invitation to Smith to sit down at the drums.
A new album in the background of the television performance
The performance on “Saturday Night Live” coincided with the promotional period for McCartney’s album “The Boys of Dungeon Lane”. According to Paul McCartney’s official website, the album comes out on May 29, 2026, and “Days We Left Behind” had already been available as one of the songs from the release. The official announcement describes the album title as a connection with the song and with McCartney’s memories of Liverpool, especially of spaces that for him symbolize the pre-fame period of life. In that sense, the performance of “Days We Left Behind” on national television had the function of presenting new material to an audience that perhaps does not follow only music announcements, but also widely watched television events. For an artist whose career has been marked by a constant return to the motifs of youth, family, Liverpool and early songwriting experiences, such a song choice was a logical introduction to the new release.
According to the official information published on McCartney’s website, “The Boys of Dungeon Lane” was presented as an album that relies on personal memories and newly written songs. The announcements emphasize that the title symbolism leads toward the time before the global fame of the Beatles, when relationships, places and motifs were formed that would later become an important part of McCartney’s creativity. Pitchfork stated in its report on the album announcement that “Days We Left Behind” was released as the lead single and that the album was produced in collaboration with Andrew Watt. Such a detail places the new release in a contemporary production framework, but it does not change its thematic core: it is material that, according to the available descriptions, reaches directly for the author’s memory and early life geography. That is why the choice of “SNL” as a stage was significant as well, because the show functions as an American institution of entertainment television, while McCartney is a figure who connects British pop history and global media culture.
“Band on the Run” and “Coming Up” as a bridge toward earlier decades
The inclusion of “Band on the Run” in the performance was expected for a television format that seeks quickly recognizable songs. It is a title from the catalog of Wings, McCartney’s most important project after the Beatles, and a song that has remained one of his best-known concert moments over the decades. According to Pitchfork, McCartney had already performed “Band on the Run” on “Saturday Night Live” in 2010, which added another connection with earlier appearances on the show to the 2026 performance. Ultimate Classic Rock states that in the season finale the song followed after “Days We Left Behind”, making the transition from new material to a classic set up as the central musical arc of the evening. For viewers who follow McCartney through different phases of his career, that choice connected the personal narrative of the new album with a catalog that is already part of broad musical memory.
The additional performance of “Coming Up” after the closing goodnights drew particular attention. Boston.com reported that McCartney returned after the goodnights part of the show, while the cast members were on stage and while the closing credits were already running. According to Ultimate Classic Rock, “Coming Up” is the opening song from the 1980 album “McCartney II”, and its connection with “SNL” reaches back to the premiere of the music video on the show that same year. In that context, the final addition was more than a passing musical surprise: it functioned as a return to the beginning of McCartney’s relationship with the show. For “Saturday Night Live”, which often builds moments on multilayered references to its own archive, such a performance had the value of a television reminder of the program’s continuity.
McCartney’s history with “Saturday Night Live”
According to Ultimate Classic Rock, McCartney’s participation in the finale of the 51st season marked his ninth appearance connected with “Saturday Night Live”, including musical guest spots and cameo appearances. Pitchfork states that this was his first regular musical guest appearance on the show since 2012, when he performed in a different context and with different musical material. Over the years, McCartney has appeared on “SNL” as a performer, a participant in sketches and a figure around whom comedic moments were built. One of the best-known remains his appearance in the sketch “The Chris Farley Show” from 1993, which is often cited among the show’s recognizable moments, although it was not part of this episode. The 2026 finale therefore felt like a new chapter in a relationship that began back in the period of early solo releases after the Beatles.
The role of “SNL” in American television culture further explains why the performance attracted media attention. The show is broadcast live from New York, and NBC announced the finale of the 51st season for May 16 in the standard late-night slot. People stated ahead of the broadcast that the episode was being shown on NBC and the Peacock platform, making the finale available both to linear viewers and to an audience that follows the program by streaming. At a time when television content is often fragmented into shorter clips on social networks, “SNL” still produces events that live both as a live broadcast and as a series of segments published afterward. McCartney’s performance fit well into that model because the individual performances and sketches immediately became separate media news items.
A season finale marked by nostalgia and generational overlap
The finale of the 51st season of “Saturday Night Live” was not only Paul McCartney’s musical return, but also an episode in which different generations of the entertainment industry met. Ferrell represents the period of “SNL” that marked American television comedy in the late nineties and early two-thousands, while McCartney brings the legacy of the Beatles, Wings and his own solo career. Chad Smith, as a member of Red Hot Chili Peppers, added another layer of pop-cultural recognizability, especially because of the long-running joke about his physical resemblance to Ferrell. According to Boston.com, the episode also included several guest appearances, which gave the finale the rhythm of a revue-style episode, but without abandoning current political satire in the cold open. Such a combination of old connections, new songs and television surprises is the main reason why the season finale received a wider resonance than an ordinary musical guest spot.
For McCartney, the performance had both a promotional and an archival function. On the one hand, “Days We Left Behind” was presented as an introduction to the album coming out at the end of May 2026, according to the official announcement by his team. On the other hand, “Band on the Run” and “Coming Up” recalled periods of his career that are already firmly placed in the history of popular music. According to the available reports, the unexpected third song was not the usual part of the standard two-song musical appearance, but an addition that remained with viewers as the closing moment of the season. In a television sense, precisely that addition closed the circle between 1980 and 2026. In a musical sense, the performance showed how McCartney, even at the age of 83, uses major television stages not only to recall the past, but also to present new original material.
Sources:
- NBC Insider – announcement of the broadcast time of the 51st season finale of “Saturday Night Live”, with Will Ferrell as host and Paul McCartney as musical guest (link)
- Pitchfork – report on McCartney’s performances in the finale of the 51st season, including “Days We Left Behind”, “Band on the Run” and “Coming Up” (link)
- PaulMcCartney.com – official information about the album “The Boys of Dungeon Lane” and the song “Days We Left Behind” (link)
- Boston.com – overview of the final episode of the 51st season of “SNL”, Ferrell’s hosting appearance, guest appearances and McCartney’s performances (link)
- Ultimate Classic Rock – report on McCartney’s three-song performance and the context of the song “Coming Up” in the show’s history (link)
- People – announcement of the season finale, information about Ferrell’s sixth hosting appearance and McCartney’s musical guest appearance (link)