The Beatles refuse to let it be

Released late in 2003, Let It Be…Naked is the latest album to cash in on the unfading popularity of the Beatles. We got the singles collection 1 in 2002 and it has already sold millions of copies. This new album is supposed to be the real version of the Let It Be album released in 1969, the last one that John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr recorded together. The first one was reworked and completed by the famous American producer Phil Spector.

So the Beatles legend has it that the Let It Be we got more than three decades ago was not at all what the Beatles intended it should be. Spector, who invented the legendary Wall of Sound with lots of booming horns and strings, added his trademark lush overdubs to the recording. Originally titled Get Back, it was meant to signal the group’s return to basic rock and roll and a departure from the complexities that layering process that characterized like Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and The White Album.

I grant that despite goodies like Get Back, Two of Us, The Long and Winding Road and Don’t Let Me Down, Let It Be was not one of the Beatles great albums. You have to go back to their early recordings for their best. Besides, it was produced during the Beatles’ worst period when John, George and Ringo were all threatening to quit the group and it was only Paul who was holding it together. Still, it was a Beatles album and who cared if it was finished by Spector, there was no way those guys could go wrong in 1969. The fans wanted Beatles music and they got and loved that Let It Be, which also came with a movie. And that was the Let It Be many of us grew up with.

So getting this new or I should say "old" version is like being told you were fed a lie as a kid and there is now an effort to right that wrong. Commendable, in a way but you cannot just erase what has been imbedded for thirty years! Besides, Let It Be…Naked is not really as naked as it should be. It has been digitalized, when an analog version would have been more true to the concept and there are also overdubs and editings. Worst of all is the fact that they have gotten rid of those candid remarks in between cuts that Spector left untouched in the first version.

But it is still a Beatles album. And just as Presley fans keep on buying every new collection that comes along although they have already heard all the songs, nobody who loves Beatles music should be without Let It Be…Naked. I recommend though that those who have only recently discovered the foursome from Liverpool, also make it a point to listen to Let It Be. It may not be what the Beatles wanted at that time but you have to admit that Spector did do a good job on the album, his way.

Before I forget, also sure to delight all Beatles fans and anybody interested in the history of popular music is the bonus disc that provides an insight into the Beatles at work. Titled Fly in the Wall, and shot shortly before the break-up that shook the world, it shows the Fabulous Four, take note, just in case you have forgotten, those guys were the original F4, during rehearsal and in the recording studio.

Isn’t it great that this bit of film has been preserved and is now available free for anybody who gets a copy of the Let It Be …Naked CD? In a way, this package which contains the original Let It Be recording, the Fly in the Wall film and the booklet with the well-written notes by Kevin Howlett, rare photographs and transcripts of the Beatles conversation while at work is additional proof that the prediction made by Derek Taylor in 1964 has indeed come true.

Taylor wrote in his liner notes for the album Beatles for Sales. "The kids of 2000 AD will understand what it was all about and draw from the music much the same sense of well being and warmth as we do today. For the magic of the Beatles is timeless and ageless."

Spector made his contribution to that so I still say, bless him for Let It Be and enjoy Naked for whatever it’s worth.