Glyn Johns’ Get Back albums
Once the recording and filming was complete, The Beatles realised they had little aptitude to sift through the hours of recordings for suitable songs.That task was given to Glyn Johns, who prepared four different versions of an album, both titled Get Back, each of which were rejected by The Beatles.
We let Glyn John remix it and we didn’t want to know, we just left it to him and said, ‘Here, do it.’ It’s the first time since the first album we didn’t have anything to… we just said, ‘Do it.’ Glyn Johns did it, none of us could be bothered going in and Paul… nobody called each other about it. The tapes were left there, and we got an acetate each, and we’d call each other and say, ‘Well, what do you think? Oh, let it out.’ We were going to let it out with a really shitty condition, disgusted. And I wanted… I didn’t care, I thought it was good to go out to show people what had happened to us. Like this is where we’re at now, we couldn’t get – we can’t get it together and don’t play together anymore. Leave us alone. Glyn Johns did a terrible job on it, ’cause he’s got no idea, etc. Never mind. But he hasn’t, really. And so the bootleg version is what it was like. Paul was probably thinking, ‘Well, I’m not going to f*****g work on it.’ It was twenty-nine hours of tape, it was like a movie. I mean just so much tape. Ten, twenty takes of everything, because we’re rehearsing and taking everything. Nobody could face looking at it.
Johns had been approached by Paul McCartney in December 1968 to work on the Get Back recordings. He was present throughout the sessions, and afterwards began the mammoth task of compiling an album from the tapes.
I originally put together an album of rehearsals, with chat and jokes and bits of general conversation in between the tracks, which was the way I wanted Let It Be to be – breakdowns, false starts. Really the idea was that at the time, they were viewed as being the be-all-and-end-all, sort of up on a pedestal, beyond touch, just Gods, completely Gods, and what I witnessed going on at these rehearsals was that, in fact, they were hysterically funny, but very ordinary people in many ways, and they were capable of playing as a band, which everybody was beginning to wonder about at that point, because they hadn’t done so for some time – everything had been prepared in advance, everything had been overdubbed and everything, and they proved in that rehearsal that they could still sing and play at the same time, and they could make records without all those weird and wonderful sounds on them.That became an obsession with me, and I got the bit between my teeth about it, and one night, I mixed a bunch of stuff that they didn’t even know I’d recorded half the time – I just whacked the recorder on for a lot of stuff that they did, and gave them an acetate the following morning of what I’d done, as a rough idea of what an album could be like, released as it was…
They came back and said they didn’t like it, or each individual bloke came in and said he didn’t like it, and that was the end of that.
The Record Producers
Johns’ first Get Back LP, intended more of a proof-of-concept than a release-ready album, was compiled in early 1969. Side one had ‘Get Back’, ‘Teddy Boy’, ‘Two Of Us’, ‘Dig A Pony’, and ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’, while side two featured ‘The Long And Winding Road’, ‘Let It Be’, ‘Don’t Let Me Down’, ‘For You Blue’, ‘Get Back’, and ‘The Walk’.
A period of time went by and I went to America to work with Steve Miller, and when I came back, I got a call from John and Paul asking me to meet them at EMI, which I duly did. They pointed to a big pile of tapes in the corner, and said, ‘Remember that idea you had about putting together an album?’ and I said, ‘Yes’. They said, ‘Well, there are the tapes – go and do it’. So I was absolutely petrified – you can imagine. I was actually being asked to put together a Beatle album on my own. So I did – I went off and locked myself away for a week or so and pieced an album together out of these rehearsed tapes, which they then all liked, really liked. This was some months after the thing had actually been recorded, and we’d actually started work on Abbey Road about the same time.
The Record Producers
Johns returned to the session tapes on 10 March 1969 at Olympic Sound Studios in London. The Beatles themselves had little involvement, having begun work on Abbey Road. Johns mixed the session tapes at Olympic from 10-13 March 1969.
At that stage, side one of the Get Back album was to have contained ‘One After 909’, ‘Rocker’, ‘Save The Last Dance For Me’, ‘Don’t Let Me Down’, ‘Dig A Pony’, ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’, and ‘Get Back’. Side two featured ‘For You Blue’, ‘Teddy Boy’, ‘Two Of Us’, ‘Maggie Mae’, ‘Dig It’, ‘Let It Be’, ‘The Long And Winding Road’, and ‘Get Back’ (Reprise).
The Beatles were unhappy with Johns’ second Get Back album, so he created a third iteration with the same running order as before. Several of the songs were remixed, and Johns’ earlier version of ‘Get Back’ was replaced with the single mix, accompanied by introductory studio dialogue. Other studio chatter was changed, and more than a minute of ‘Dig It’ was excised.
Mixing and mastering sessions took place on 7, 9, and 28 May 1969.
For the Get Back project, it was The Beatles’ intention to recreate the cover of Please Please Me, showing how they had changed visually since 1963. On 13 May 1969 the group returned to EMI House in London’s Manchester Square, and at 6pm the same photographer, Angus McBean, photographed them as they resumed their poses.
The artwork was prepared for Glyn Johns’ Get Back album, which was to bear the strapline “with Don’t Let Me Down and 12 other songs”. However, the session photographs remained unused until the 1962-1966 and 1967-1970 (the so-called Red and Blue albums) were released in 1973.
The Beatles rejected Johns’ first Get Back album, and new recording sessions for two Let It Be songs took place on 3 and 4 January 1970 – a year after the initial recordings were made.
The first of these was for George Harrison’s ‘I Me Mine’, which had briefly being performed before the cameras during the 1969 sessions. In the film, Harrison first plays the song to Ringo Starr, followed by a version performed by Harrison, Paul McCartney and Starr, during which John Lennon dances with Yoko Ono.
‘I Me Mine’, it’s called. I don’t care if you don’t want it… It’s a heavy waltz.
Let It Be
No proper studio recording of ‘I Me Mine’ existed until 3 January 1970. It featured just Harrison, McCartney and Starr, as Lennon was on holiday in Denmark. The following day, 4 January, overdubs were recorded for the song Let It Be, in the band’s final proper recording session together.
While Johns was still working on the tapes, it was decided that the album should include just songs featured in the forthcoming Let It Be film. One of these, ‘Across The Universe’, had been recorded in February 1968, prior to The Beatles’ trip to India.
On 5 January 1970, Glyn Johns began assembling a fourth and final Get Back album, with the instruction that it should tie in with the songs which appeared in the film. The tracklisting had ‘One After 909’, ‘Rocker’, ‘Save The Last Dance For Me’, ‘Don’t Let Me Down’, ‘Dig A Pony’, ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’, ‘Get Back’, and ‘Let It Be’ on side one, and ‘For You Blue’, ‘Two Of Us’, ‘Maggie Mae’, ‘Dig It’, ‘The Long And Winding Road’, ‘I Me Mine’, ‘Across The Universe’, and ‘Get Back’ (Reprise) on side two.
Like Johns’ first three attempts at compiling a Get Back LP from the tapes, this final version was rejected by The Beatles.
Despite their general antipathy towards Johns’ albums, The Beatles did commission their former press officer Tony Barrow, who had contributed liner notes to the band’s early albums, to write new words for Get Back. Barrow’s words remained unseen until the 2021 super deluxe reissue of Let It Be:
So far as Britain’s record collecting public is concerned, The Beatles broke into ear shot in October, 1962. Eighteen months before their first visit to the EMI studios in London, The Beatles had been voted Merseyside’s favourite outfit and it was inevitable that their first Parlophone record, LOVE ME DO, would go straight into the top of Liverpool’s local hit parade. The group’s chances of national chart entry seemed more remote. Shortly afterwards The Beatles proved their pop power when they by-passed the lower segments of the hit parade to scuttle straight into the nation’s Top Ten with their second single, PLEASE PLEASE ME. Just over four months after the release of their very first record The Beatles had become triumphant chart-toppers!During that early part of 1963 the group made its first U.K. concert tour with The Helen Shapiro Show, did Thank Your Lucky Stars, toured again with Tommy Roe and Chris Montez.
Meanwhile I accepted Brian Epstein’s invitation to open NEMS’ first London headquarters, initially a two-room suite above a dirty book shop in a back street between Soho and Covent Garden, an office found for Brian by Dick James and taken over from Joe ‘Mr. Piano’ Henderson whose large custom-built desk I inherited, taught myself to drive and still find use for in one of my offices today. I promotional copy of the Please Please Me album. On the sleeve back, after the headline JOHN LENNON (rhythm guitar), appears in John’s scrawled handwriting: (married). But those who saw his addition thought it was just John’s joke because up-and-coming pop stars didn’t have wives according to prevailing tradition.
They write their own lyrics, design and eventually build their own instrumental backdrops and work out their own vocal arrangements. Their music is wild, pungent, hard-hitting, uninhibited… and personal. The do-it-yourself angle ensures complete originality at all stages of the process.
Producer George Martin has never had any headaches over choice of songs for The Beatles. Their own built-in tunesmith team of John Lennon and Paul McCartney has already tucked away enough self-penned numbers to maintain a steady output of all-original singles from now until 1975!
Here we are 19 singles, 16 tours, 11 albums, 7 years, a few beards and some children later and, at last, you’re invited into a Beatles recording session. Here we are near the end of the decade with a set of Get Back tracks that give you The Beatles with their socks off.
The boys aren’t called The Boys any more. The Four Moptops and The Fab Four were finished when they sucked their last jelly babies. But here are the lads, the fellows, The Boys, getting back to some previously unexplored point that lies between Please Please Me and Sgt. Pepper. If you like you may think of the Get Back collection as your own One Night Stand. It features neither the Lonely Hearts Club Band nor the quartet which came out of The Cavern but it’s basic Beatles all through – Beatles marking time and looking back before deciding which way to head before the calendars show 1970. This isn’t a new album yet it’s not a Golden Oldies again either.
All previously issued albums from The Beatles have had clearly defined production aims. This one doesn’t pretend to have. Before, whether you heard the first or seventeenth take when a recording reached release stage, you missed the humour, the hard work, the instrumental limbering up, the off-mike dialogue of pre-take periods at The Beatles’ sessions.
Basically, the studio format hasn’t changed. It stayed through and beyond Beatlemania, through A Hard Day’s Night and Help!, through Manila and Memphis, through Magical Mystery Tour and Rishikesh into Apple.
This Get Back collection takes you into their recording sessions with and without the red lights glowing. You even hear camera clicking and clapperboards connecting for this album is the audio section of a Beatles be-in which has a film to go with it.
Between takes the tape reels and film spools kept turning while John, Paul, George and Ringo decided which number they’d tackle next. Thus both film soundtrack and LP record preserve moments of typical studio back-chat as well as minutes of solidly rehearsed music-making.
Although so many people suggest (without closer definition) that The Beatles have a trans-Atlantic style, their only real influence has been from the unique brand of Rhythm and Blues folk music which abounds on Merseyside and which The Beatles themselves have helped to pioneer since their formation in 1960.
ONE AFTER 909, written by John and Paul in 1959, is a rockin’ raver all the way, Paul grazing his throat with Long Tall Sally enthusiasm and Billy Preston becoming a Fifth Beatle for the first of several piano/organ contributions. Then comes the fragmentary link-track of Cavern-style jamming before John takes vocal lead on DON’T LET ME DOWN and DIG A PONY. Paul joins him for I’VE GOT A FEELING and stays in the vocal spotlight for the side-closer GET BACK. John’s Fender takes a South Sea vacation somewhere behind George during the romantic lilter FOR YOU BLUE. Then comes Paul singing a simple story about TEDDY BOY. Paul and John are the TWO OF US on our way home before the album’s vividly nostalgic second link-track, MAGGIE MAE! Two contrasting numbers follow, wildly DIG IT with John doing the rhythmic digging and LET IT BE with Paul in a smoothly sympathetic mood. Paul stays on piano with THE LONG AND WINDING ROAD and continues with his balladeer’s role. And finally an ultimate GET BACK fade-out.
TONY BARROW
Tony Barrow International Ltd.
London W.1.P.S.– Apart from the final paragraph, those in italic print are from the liner notes I wrote six years ago for Please Please Me. With amended song titles, the last paragraph might have appeared there too. T.B.
Let It Be, Naked or Not has two of Paul’s most long winded and nail scrapes aganst the blacboard. After seeing Anthology this past week, i forgot how he was the most annoying of the Beatles. Let It Be and Long and Winding Road could have ended a lot soone, but no, the camera’s were rolling. Let It Be was a recording of the breakup of a band and these two songs were the blueprint.
If you don’t like Paul McCartney then you don’t like the Beatles. Let it Be and Long and Winding Road are too of Paul’s masterpieces -as well as being two of the best songs on the Album. Really silly post..
Right on, Beatlesguru !!!
Agreed
I like Paul McCartney as a musician, and he’s written some great stuff, but I don’t like Let it Be or The Long and Winding Road. Not saying they’re bad songs, I just don’t like them.
An astonishing comment. Let It Be and The Long and Winding Road are both beautiful songs that showcase two of McCartney’s best vocal ballad performances. It’s true that the latter piece suffers somewhat from Phil Spector’s arrangement taking things a little too far. He should have left off the choir and harp; the other orchestral parts would have sufficed. But it’s still a great number nonetheless.
As for being long winded, both songs clock in at under four minutes, which is a very typical length for a pop/rock song.
No, Antoni’s right. Echoed my thoughts exactly. The one time in fifteen years Paul actually impresses me with songs like Two Of Us and I’ve Got A Feeling, and all everyone wants to talk about is the overrated Long & Winding Road and the even more overrated Let It Be. This isn’t even to mention that two 40 second “songs” we’re included for seemingly no reason other than to say they had more tracks, that John’s incredible Don’t Let Me Down was excluded, and no one even mentions Across the Universe, one of the best on the album. What a mess. This is why I prefer the older albums
No, Antoni is not “right”. YOU may agree, but that only means his opinion is “right” for you.
And his opinion is right for me too. The Long and Winding Road may be under 4 minutes but it feels like 10 minutes. Very overrated with a forced emotion and phony feel. Let it Be blows it away.
George Michael, a man of taste, obviously didn’t think TLAWR overrated and phony. He performed his own beautiful version of the song. He wasn’t the only one either.
Don’t Let Me Down was only “incredible” because Paul and to a lesser extent George put it together. On the Get Back tapes you can hear them putting together Don’t Let Me Down because John was too stoned to get anything together.
And Long and Winding Road and Let It Be are incredible beautiful heartfelt songs, the only problem with LWR is Spector’s ridiculous orchestrations and choir.
What you said seems to have made no sense. You literally said that, AFTER seeing Anthology, you forgot how Paul was the most annoying of the group. So then, you HAD been thinking that Paul was the most annoying UNTIL you saw Anthology, and THEN you forgot how annoying he was. Perhaps his charm won you over?
To a certain degree I agree with Antoni, I’ve always despised the Spector TLWR. I liked LIB when I was a kid, it was, and still is, considered the prototypical Beatles song here in Italy, where the general public thought that the Beatles were the gentle and melodic soul of pop, that they apparently stopped at Rubber Soul and then got it again with Let It Be and Michelle was their greatest triumph. Then, of course, I listened to 1966-1969 and, well, I simply grew up. I like the naked version of TLWR better, but it remains one of my least favoured Beatles song, and I don’t find McCartney a particurlarly enticing charachter, but this doesn’t mean that I don’t think he’s a genius and an incredible singer, and nobody can DARE say that I don’t like the Beatles.
‘The Long & Winding Road’ is the only Beatles song I’ve never liked.
‘The Long & Boring Song, that goes on & on…”
Yup!!
This is so true. In the doc, everyone in the studio (including Linda and Heather) falls asleep when Paul plays these.
Being brand spanking new to this particular Beatles site, I was just fixing a whole wear the rain gets in, when I suddenly found meself wonderin’, In 2003 there was mention that the Let It Be film was about to be released. This film was last screened on British BBC2, Television in about 1982. A Saturday, If I recall… But is it any closer to being released. Any ideas???
Engineers started remastering the film a while back but decided the film was too “controversial”. Paul and Ringo do not want it released either. I doubt it will be released any time soon, especially during Paul, Ringo, Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison’s lifetimes.
I’ve got a dvd of the movie. It’s great!
The whole album and sessions and film and all is so polemic!
Here’s why LIB doesn’t work for me – and this may be picky but here goes: because it is supposed to be the soundtrack to a movie and was intended to replicate the feel of live performances, the problem I have is this – listen through head phones and notice how many times John’s voice is on one side and his guitar is on the other side.
This completely wrecks the feel of a live performance. At least for me.
Sorry I can’t help but notice it.
Does anyone know if Paul fixed this on LIBN – I don’t have that CD.
It shouldn’t really make a difference. With multitrack recording, a live performance can be taped with simultaneously-played instruments routed to different tracks, which can then be mixed to different parts of the stereo spectrum. Of course, that’s not to say that all of the LIB performances were live – there were a number of overdubs added once they’d thrown the ‘live’ concept out of the window.
There are the overdubs done by spector onto three songs, the overdubs done by paul, ringo and george onto the song let it be and of course I Me Mine was recorded as though it were on the white album or abbey road (which was in fact a very good idea, they should have recorded the whole album in that way and it should have been produced by George Martin). Are there any other overdubs?
“marked a move away from The Beatles’ elaborate studio experimentation of 1966 and 1967, with a return to more straightforward rock and roll, and the White Album and much of the Yellow Submarine soundtrack had followed in a similar vein.”
I wouldn’t say much of the Yellow Submarine soundtrack was back to basics. There were 13 songs: 2 were repeats from previous albums/singles, 7 were George Martin’s orchestra songs, 2 were George Harrison’s songs neither of which sound back to basics, so that leaves 2 new Lennon-McCartney songs which could be called back to basics.
And certainly not all the White Albums was back to basics – Revolution 9, Wild Honey Pie.
I was referring to the ‘new’ songs on the YS soundtrack, though it probably needs clarifying. Certainly Hey Bulldog and All Together Now were a step away from their sound of 1967, though the George Harrison songs clearly aren’t.
As for the White Album, you’re right that there were some complex recordings on there, but nothing like to the same degree of Sgt Pepper or Strawberry Fields Forever. Much of it is fairly straightforward, thought with liberal doses of Beatles magic.
“And, let us not forget, even if the collection wasn’t The Beatles’ best, for many lesser bands these songs would have constituted a career peak.”
Couldn’t agree more. When fans always talk about this isn’t good or whatever, what we really mean is compared to The Beatles’ other stuff it isn’t as good, but it is still amazing.
Sorry Joe, but it does matter whether lennon’s voalcs and guitar are on the same stereo pan.
of course multitracking makes it possible to put an instrument and/or vocal anywhere in the spectrum, but that doesn’t make it “work”.
Even though the beatles abandoned the actual “live” recording technique, they still marketed and presented the album as a live experience – to go with the movie.
The intended feel of the record is to experience a live beatles performance (even if it wasn’t). So it’s an anomaly to have a musician’s voice separated from his instrument.
Of course perhaps I’m just too sensitive.
The blurb on the back of the album states “…played live for _many_ of the tracks…” so as such was not false advertising. Even though they had the original concept of a no-overdub, live, etc. album, after they were done the fraught sessions of Jan. ’69, they were just sick and tired of the whole thing and wanted it done with. They themselves no longer cared about the project or the original concept. Spector’s flourishes, whether or not you like them, were not done on the rock-oriented pieces anyway, so as such didn’t disrupt the core of tunes that we would have most benefitted from the live sound (with the exception of I Me Mine, but the additions there were not as pronounced). Now for my 2 cents on Spector – I think the worst part of the Spector songs was not LAWR, but Let It Be. Compared to the great George Martin produced single, this one had the orchestra come BLASTING in mid-song, with a raucous and blaring solo, both of which were sloppily slammed in there, but also too loud for the more reverential mood of the song.
I might add that multitrack recording does not preclude recording several things onto the same track.
A vocal and an instrument might be recorded onto a single track together, and there doesn’t have to necessarily be any rhyme or reason to it. LIB was recorded on 8-track and I would believe that there were multiple occasions of “doubling-up” (or more).
With electric instruments and microphones and amplifiers, modern live music often features “a musician’s voice separated from his instrument”; it is not anomalous.
Even though this LP features my least favorite Beatles song, I still enjoy the heck out of it – Spectorized or not. In fact, I wish all of the songs on it were recorded “live” on the roof top. It would have been very refreshing to hear a live Beatles recording without the screaming.
As an aside, I get a kick out of the Spector quote on page 5 of this article. I’m by no means a fan of his, but it’s the first time I’ve seen his defense in print. It’s actually pretty funny.
Yes, I love that quote. I used it on the Phil Spector profile as well.
Personally, I prefer Glyn John’s quote on page 4. Bitingly accurate with no punches pulled.
Spector’s defense of his orchestral arrangement for The Long and Winding Road is indeed funny. It would be even better if it were actually true.
I’ve seen McCartney perform it live a couple of times within that 25-year span that Spector mentions. I’ve never heard any choir or harp, which were the major offenders for McCartney, as I recall.
The ’76 live version has a very spare brass arrangement, minus strings, that bears no resemblance at all to Spector’s work on the Let It Be album. It actually sounds much closer to the Let It Be…Naked version than to the Let It Be album.
The later performances in the late 80s and into the 90s have a bigger orchestral background. Those performances do borrow a few phrases here and there of the Spector arrangement, take some of the brass from the ’76 version, and add in some new wrinkles—but still no harps or choir.
An example of that can be heard on Tripping the Live Fantastic (1990). The net effect is a somewhat scaled back version that is far from being a copy of the Spector arrangement. I would call it slightly reminiscent of the original but smaller and less epic sounding. In other words, it’s closer in style to George Martin than Phil Spector.
So Spector’s claim and defense sounds good, but it’s way off the mark–unless McCartney has taken lately to performing it fully Spector style, which seems unlikely.
I believe Paul made a mistake. He did allow female voices in their records. Yoko sang in The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill, and Yoko again along with Patti Harrison in Birthday. His wife Linda provided background vocals for Let It Be.
Yeah, and there was also the female choir in “Walrus” – and howbout those two Apple scruffs that Paul himself invited to sing on “Across The Universe”! He was either being wilfully obtuse, or exaggerating, or he had a terrible memory. (And the amount of dope he smoked would suggest the latter.) 🙂
Pretty sure Paul meant a female singing lead
and wasn’t there an entire choir on Good Night?
Ooh right, good catch!
LIB is both fantastic and disappointing. Eventhough substandard by usual Beatle standards, the songs are worthy and hold up against anything other artists put out at the same time (hell, for the next 40 years for that matter!). It was a disappointment in that it actually could have been far, far better. The Beatles are openly apathetic on LIB. Also, George’s growth as a songwriter could have (had he been allowed to contribute more songs)partly made-up for John’s growing indifference, dwindling song contributions and a seeming drop in the quality of his contributions. All Things Must Pass absolutely deserved to have been properly recorded and included on LIB (and NOT in place of, but in addition to, For You Blue and I Me Mine). It is no wonder why George walked out during these sessions and became hesitant to work as a Beatle ever again. What a pity (which reminds us that Harrison’s brilliant song Isn’t It A Pity was another in a list of George composed tunes rejected for Beatle records by John, Paul and/or George Martin). Thankfully, George recorded these on his own after the group’s dissoluion.
It is funny that people think of John towards end as not writing much but he was actually very creative and writing a ton. He just did not want to write for the beatles. Look at his first two solo albums Plastic Ono Band and Imagine, they are full fledged releases. Paul’s first solo albums while they are charming and having their bits (and the masterpiece ‘Maybe Im Amazed) are bit rough and incomplete.
I have always thought that “McCartney” was Paul’s attempt to complete the vision of the Get Back sessions: simple and back to basics.
There is nothing incomplete about Ram, it still sounds like a really well produced album even today. And McCartney was supposed to be “home made” and back to basics. I mean he did most of it in his living room on a 4 track. He wasn’t going for polished. He was going for rough.
Perhaps they were referring to “McCartney” and “Wild Life”, both very basic. Even Red Rose has a kind-of incomplete sound. I agree that Ram is another story altogether.
This is not a Beatle album, is just a Spector work… A Spector album, soloist, taking the tapes and the band’s name…
Adding orchestra to a quarter of an album, while not doing anything else of his typical way isn’t bad. It’s called doing what you’re asked.
I think Phil Spector is treated unfairly when it comes to LIB. He had the unenviable task of wading through hours of recordings and make something of it–all with virtually no input for the band. The only sin Spector committed was not being George Martin. Martin is tasteful and understated; Spector (on all his works) is melodramatic and over-the-top. Spector simply delivered a Spector production. Lennon was reportedly happy with it. I have little patience for McCartney’s complaints. A bit like crying over spilt milk.
Actually I don’t think Spector did wade through that many hours of tapes. Most of the selection and filtering was done by Glyn Johns prior to Spector arriving.
When Spector began work he hit the ground running, completing his work in a matter of days (he needed just seven recording and mixing sessions in March and April 1970), with George Harrison and Allen Klein apparently present for most of the sessions. Ringo Starr even played on one.
I know this question might exasperate those who know the story well, but please indulge someone who doesn’t know every detail, but is rediscovering the band that he revered as a child: Why didn’t George Martin see GB / LIB over the finish line? Given that Glyn Johns had no fewer than 4 attempts rejected, and that someone as unsuitable as Spector was brought in, I’ve read the entire article and not quite understood why George Martin wasn’t allowed to complete the production of the album. I understand he was the producer initially. Can anyone tell me what changed?
ps – absolutely love the site. Great work.
I alway wondered why george was at most (or all) of the Spector sessions, but didn’t do the guitar overdubs which were probably done by some session guitarists. Maybe it was him on guitar but then we would know it (we also know that ringo did the drum overdubs). I really wonder who these guitarists were, maybe it was someone famous like eric clapton or so. But probably it will always be a secret who did the guitar overdubs on the long and winding road (and maybe on the other two songs)
What the hell are you talking about? There were NO “session” musicians doing guitar work overdubs. It’s not even in question.
I find this album to be sort of like that lost piece that you would love to retrieve, and it should be possible, yet, you can’t grasp it. What should this album really sound like? How should I hear it? Can I ever just enjoy it for what it is (the music is not terrible)? Aren;t the Beatles even apathetic, still worthy of that mystique that John says is gone? Should I listen to which version? Was perhaps the Glyns Get Back first or second version the way it should have been? Did Paul have the chance to save some of it in Naked, yet even he didn’t quite get it right?
As to defending or attacking Spector… I like his work from the 50’s for sure. But don’t see him as a producer for the Beatles. The thing is, he did what he thought was good, and I can stomach much of it (haven;t tried the winding road lately though). But I love Across the Universe. What bothers me, is that he adds such elaborate stiff to Beatle’s songs without Paul’s approval. In fact, Paul can not even change it after complaining. As an artist, this truly bothers me. I do not like the idea of hearing Beatle’s tracks with significant changes made by outside people that some of them would not have even preferred to work with.
Yet, if the group had been more coherent and civil by then, and perhaps less lazy, they could have seen it through. But maybe mistakes are what they are for a reason. Maybe it is better that the album is what it is and tells the story it tells. Maybe seeing a group like the Beatle’s not realize something is dramatic and powerful in a sense. Maybe if John wasn’t on ‘H’ he could have been more willing to be workable. Maybe Paul forced the idea on the others way too much. Why does money and business get such a say in determining art. So what if they needed another money. I would rather violate the contract and lose money (easy for me to say) than compromise the well being of the band and make an unenthusiastic project.
So much to say about all this… now how to listen?
This album is seriously underrated. The ‘naked’ version is by far and away my favorite Beatles album
There is a great and amazing album in there, but it’s never come out – not Glyn Johns, not Spector, not Paul’s. It’s like there’s a dullness to the sound – like a mask over the sound – it’s almost muffled. The crystal quality of their earlier recordings is missing. Was it their lousy attitude, bad recording equipment and set up at Apple versus Abbey Road, George Martin’s apathy from being told by Lennon “none of your production crap” – something’s missing – Lennon was right when he called it “lifeless” and it’s a shame because there is a great magnificent album in there.
Any chance that the movie would see the light of day again? This may sound crazy, but Let It Be is one of my favorite Beatles albums; despite some studio chicanery by Phil “Capitol Murder” Spector, the songs sound fresh, as if they listened to “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and enjoyed it.
Why did Paul McCartney leave the Get Back/Let It Be session tapes sitting around for over a year? He supervised the Get Back/Don’t Let Me Down single release, why didn’t he complete the album for release? How would Beatles history have been different if the album had come out in April 1969?
Side 1 could have been the rooftop performance – Get Back/Don’t Let Me Down/Dig A Pony/I’ve Got A Feeling/One After 909/Get Back reprise. Side 2 studio performance – Let It Be/For You Blue/Across The Universe/Two Of Us/Dig It/Long and Winding Road.
i just downloaded LIB – Naked and I’ve been listening to it constantly. I have always contended that, when all is said and done, The Beatles were just a rock band. And LIB Naked lets them be a rock band. The guitars come through – it’s clean, it cooks, it’s great. Even though they were done with each other, you don’t get that from the album. Paul and John singing together on Two of Us is magic. One After 909 is pure joy. I Dig a Pony is Lennon at his cheeky best. My only criticism is Long and Winding Road, which I’ve never liked. I listened to this version with great anticipation, thinking now I would finally get to appreciate it. But no. It’s still a crappy song. Maybe with just vocal and an acoustic guitar it might work better. Sorry, Paul.
Many people are trying to “remake” this album into something else – something they wish it to be. “Let it be naked” is that album. The original is simply… what it is. It is a documentary put to music. In early ’69 the group was falling apart. Let It Be is a sad epitaph for a dying rock band. Adding or removing songs from their “Last album” is fruitless. ( Abbey Road was the last recorded with a few minor additions to Let it Be).
A better exercise would be to take the best songs from their individual albums and single releases from ’70 and ’71 and create a double album – ala “White Album”. Between the four, their is enough “Beatle” sound to compile a really good album. Much like the White album, it would reflect individual styles and still retain a familiar, distinct sound. I would stop after December ’71 due to placing a time limit of music release, and distinct drop in quality of solo material in general from the members after ’71. I would not include any thing from “Wings Wildlife” or Lennon’s other albums.
Songs could be from the following Albums:
McCartney
Ram
Plastic Ono Band
Plastic Ono Band – Live In Peace Toronto
Imagine
All Things Must Pass
Singles could include:
HI, HI, HI
Another Day
Don’t Come Easy
Back Off Bugaloo
Instant Karma
Cold Turkey (if not from Live in Peace Toronto)
Come and Get It* – sorry Bad Finger, we’ll keep this one to ourselves
Could still be a fun exercise to compile these songs into a double album and wonder “What if?”.
Just a few thoughts.
I agree. If you’re in the audience, unless you’re sitting extremely close to the group, you would not hear voice on one side, guitar on the other. It would all be in the mix. Sounding more separated than a mono recording, but definitely nowhere near hard or even medium panned.
Hi Joe, setting aside the debate that Ringo actually played the svaramandal on an early take of “Across The Universe,” the instrument is not used on the final version, and therefore doesn’t appear on the Let It Be LP. Shouldn’t it be deleted from the album credits (otherwise Lizzie Bravo and Gayleen Pease deserve credit for backing vocals?). I only mention this because students in my class visit your site regularly and this tripped a few of them up. Keep up the good work!
Are you sure it’s not in the Spector mix? I thought I heard it in a few places, particularly towards the end. Lizzie and Gayleen are included on the Across The Universe article, but they don’t feature on this album.
Despite the controversies surrounding this album I love it, having got it back in 1978 as a 12 year old.John Lennons Across The Universe is beautiful and one of his best. Let It Be is a great song and one of Paul McCartneys finest. As is The Long and Winding Road, though McCartney hated Phil Spectors production of it which is fair enough. Get Back is a great rock song and I love The Two Of Us, I Me Mine, Dig A Pony and the One After 909, which Lennon and McCartney wrote back in the early days in Liverpool.
I always wondered why the US did not release this in a box set like the UK & Canada did????
While this album contains a certain dullness of sound there are none the less some hidden, if not totally underrated classsics such as I, me, mine and don’t let me down. If you count lib…naked that is.
Lennon always so negative calling the music junk, he’s the cookie monster in the trash can!!!
Let it be was my first Beatles single and LP. I can’t really listen to it any longer as I remember spending whole nights listening to this album! I’ve got the movie too now, plus “naked” and various bootlegs from the same sessions. Stand out songs are “two of us”, “across the universe”, One after 909 and “for you blue”. I can’t be rational when it comes to this album, too much of my teen age in it!
I saw the LIB movie as an impressionable teen. It was amazing to me to see the Beatles sounding so great while looking so casual! I knew that the album was considered their worst by those who knew such things. In fact the album was out of print during the first part of the 70’s. I bought it in the late 70’s and I loved it for the same reason that I loved the movie. It struck me that, hell, if this is their worst, wow, these guys are truly an amazing band. I don’t mind the Spector enhancements. To the contrary, the violins in The Long the Winding Road are terrific. I confess, I can understand how Paul might have objected to the chorus at the end. But even that sounds magic to me, even now. I particularly like the snippets of John making cracks between songs (maybe a poke at Paul preceding the title track), the false start on Dig a Pony, and the two odd throwaways, Dig It and Maggie Mae. My only complaints: Don’t Let Me Down belongs on that album; John sounds awfully tired and hoarse in Dig a Pony – so it drags; One After Nine O Nine is filler, possibly my least favorite Beatles song. The album is flawed, but it is an integral part of the Beatles history. McCartney’s revision with “….Naked” was not an improvement in my opinion.
I think that if one leaves aside the background story behind LIB, the album, and listens to the collection of songs in it, it’s a pretty good album. Perhaps not their best, specially if we considered it was their last release, but even with Phil Spector production values, there’s great music in it. As to Spector’s production, In think he did the right thing with LIB and TLAWR with the arrengements, except for the female choir on the latter, which makes it sound cheesy. That song lends itself to that kind of treatment. Its version on LIB Naked sounds, well, a little naked, though the song LIB on LIBN sounds awsome. One can hear Billy Preston’s organ more upfront and clear. He certainly added so much in the songs he recorded with The Beatles.
Ringo said, “And Yoko jumped in, of course; she was there.” Does anyone know if there is recorded audio of this statement? Or was it a written statement on Anthology? (I haven’t seen the film and don’t have the albums.) Changing the punctuation and inflection would give it a whole new meaning. “And Yoko jumped in. _Of course_, she was there.”
Being born in 1975, I was exposed to all of the Beatles music at about the same time (the early 80s) so I don’t have any prejudice against any album or song like some appear to have against LIB. If I were to make a top 20 playlist of my favorite Beatles songs, Dig a Pony, Get Back, One after 909, I’ve Got a Feeling, and Two of Us would definitely be included. And even though it wasn’t included in the original album but is on LIB…Naked, Don’t Let Me Down would be on my list too. And I like Let it Be and Long and Winding Road too, but just not enough to be top 20.
Most of the songs on this album are just great song along songs. IMO, they had to have been doing something right to get that many great songs on an album while the band is disintegrating.
Beatles album if they didn’t split
Late 1970
All things must pass
Maybe I’m amazed
Isolation
It don’t come easy
Look at me
Backseat of my car
Apple scruffs
That would be something
I found out
Every night
Love
Man we was lonely
If not for you
Hold on
I didn’t notice any statement of this article when and why “Get Back” has turned to “Let it be”, who decided about the change of the title and the album cover. am I blind or something?
That’s because it wasn’t answered in this article. I hope these questions are answered in the upcoming 50th Anniversary releases.
The story long-told is that “Get Back” had been released as a single in the spring of ’69, about a year before the album and movie were finally released. Since “Let It Be” was being released as the initial single, nearly coinciding with both album and movie, the name was changed. Promotion. Nothing more.
As much as I like both Let It Be and the Naked version I think the Naked version was better for obvious reasons. It sounded closer to what the group originally wanted. That’s not to say the original’s bad but you can tell they’ve had enough of each other. Personally, I thought Get Back, Don’t Let Me Down and The Long and Winding Road sound better on the Naked version.
Is there any listing from which I can see which song on Let It Be was recorded where? Like… “Get Back” roof version, “Let It Be” Twickenham version, “Two Of Us” Savile Row version..
Usually, the album Let It Be is not highly rated, even by the fans of the band. But objectively judging, it is a kind of revelation. Here are some reasons:
1. As many as three songs are number one on the US charts, and two of them are also number one and two on the UK charts. Nice result.
2. As many as three songs are recordings from a live performance. A situation not found on any other album of the group. If at the time anyone thought the Beatles couldn’t rock live anymore, they were wrong.
3. The album features one of the most wonderful songs the band has ever recorded, ie Across The Universe.
4. The album features the last track recorded by the group before their breakup, ie I Me Mine. It is the band’s only song that was recorded entirely in 1970. Strong, definitely rock number.
5. One of George’s best guitar solos (Let It Be song) was recorded on this album. There is also quite a rare thing here, John’s great guitar solo (Get Back).
6. Finally here’s Two Of Us – a wonderful, charming and fresh vocal duo from John and Paul. Just like the old days.
I have to improve myself: as many as 4 (!) songs from the album Let It Be are number 1 hits on the American Billboard charts. This fourth track is obviously For You Blue, and the single with double A-side: TLAWR / FYB for two consecutive weeks was at the top of that list in June 1970: https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100/1970-06-13, https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100/1970-06-20. That fact is obvious, so omitting this track from compilation album 1 is highly unclear. In any case, as many as 4 number one hits (in US) undoubtedly indicate the uniqueness of the Let It Be album.
It would be better never to mention John Remembers interview. John himself told to Rollling Stone magazin in the last interview for them that he had told lies at that time and was not responsible because he was full of heroine. When they wanted to released that s**t in a book format John was against it for this reason. He had regretted the things he said. But as soon as he died they released it with Yoko’s approval. She even wrote something for the book in total disrespect to his late husband. If they had included his last one where he informed he told lies in the first time that could be acceptable. But they didn’t. Rolling Stone and Yoko wants his lies to prevail. And every time people reproduce it is like hitting John’s spirit.
JOHN’s spirit? Well, yes, I guess that too. Beatles spirit, mainly.
The Curse of Let it Be states that it’s content will never be released officially.
Just look at how it got delayed multiple times.
On stills of the rooftop concert, as well as in the movie, I notice there is a painting standing on the ground behind Ringo Starr on his right-hand side. The painting has kind of red stripes/flashes on a black background. Does anyone has more info about that painting? Whose painting is it? Why was it there on the roof? Who painted it? Thanks
Recorded from Feb 1968? How so?
Because that’s when Across The Universe was mostly recorded.
The first time I heard “The Long and Winding Road” was on my sister’s copy of “Wings Over America”. I thought it was a really good song.
When I heard the Phil Spector version years later, I was pretty unimpressed.
Fast forward to the release of “Let It Be Naked”. I was reminded why I thought this was a good song to begin with.
I actually have “Let It Be” playing as I’m typing this. It’s not necessarily sad that the Beatles broke up. It seems that the guys were all pretty tired of it all.
But it is pretty sad that things were so acrimonious between them for so long.
Due to my age, I got into Beatles in their later era, psychedelica and later but by ‘69 I began to collect on them, records, mags, memorabilia. I saw LIB at the theater and read that the album was a return to roots attempt, a style popular then. I had to get much older and on social media to read comments from folks downing the album and its biggest hits and hating LIB and TLAWR songs. I don’t remember this theme in music mags, reviews or my social circle.
I wonder if anyone noticed that the amazing black and white photo of a bearded John with his guitar on the back cover of the Let it Be album was taken not in January but in February 1969? Another great shot of John from the day at: https://www.facebook.com/BeatlesRecording/photos/a.1482175891902613/1965004953619702/?type=3