Mellow Yellow Paul McCartney can be heard as one of the background revellers on this track, but the "quite rightly" whispering answering lines in the chorus is not McCartney but rather Donovan himself. Donovan had a small part in coming up with the lyrics for "Yellow Submarine", and McCartney played bass guitar (uncredited) on portions of Donovan's "Mellow Yellow" album. In 2005, the track was remastered by EMI Records for the "Mellow Yellow" album re-issue. "Mellow Yellow" was covered in 1967 by soul singer Big Maybelle on her album "Got a Brand New Bag". It was also covered in 1968 by British
Yellow (Coldplay song) from there with the band collaborating. Bassist Guy Berryman came up with the opening line "Look at the stars". That night, having quickly composed the song, the band recorded it. A much different origin of the song was told on "The Howard Stern Show" in November 2011. Chris Martin explained to Stern that he was impersonating Neil Young while entertaining guests when he came across the first chord of the song, which stuck with him for a bit; then in a Neil Young voice he sang "look at the stars". Martin went on to further explain that the word "yellow"