Paul McCartney admitted he and Michael Jackson "drifted apart" after Jackson acquired the publishing rights to the Beatles song catalogue.

"It was no big bust-up, but we kind of drifted apart after that," McCartney said on The Late Show with David Letterman on Wednesday. "But (Jackson) was a lovely man, massively talented, and we miss him."

McCartney got to know Jackson in the early 1980s when they made a few records together. McCartney recalled telling Jackson to think about getting into music publishing, and Jackson replied, "I'm gonna get yours."

McCartney thought Jackson was kidding, but it turned out to be true.

"Then I started to ring him up, because I thought, 'Here's the guy, historically placed, to give (John) Lennon-McCartney a good deal at last,'" McCartney told Letterman.

"(Jackson) kind of blanked me on it. He kept saying, 'That's just business, Paul.' So I went, 'Yeah, it is,' and waited for a reply. We never kind of got to it, so we kind of drifted apart."