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REVIEW: The Beatles remastered 1967-70
Part 2 of our expert guide to the box sets
Joe Bosso, Tue 8 Sep 2009, 1:10 pm UTC
A stupendous way to close their career (and the '60s), Abbey Road is not without irony, for the album that was supposed to represent The Beatles as a unit, making a record 'like they used to,' sounds more like the work of solo artists than anything in their illustrious canon.
But this might be quibbling bordering on nerdism ad nauseam. It's a corker, without a minute wasted. Separately or as part of the boxed set, buy it already.
Get Back to the future?
Let It Be began as a film project spearheaded by McCartney as yet another way of rallying the troops and 'getting back' to being a proper band again.
Disgruntled and resentful of Paul's increased leadership role (which bordered on bullying), The Beatles sulked into Twickenham Studios to write and rehearse songs that McCartney hoped to perform live in concert. It was to be a "warts and all" recording. The Beatles live with no overdubs. To some extent, that was the case, but it was hell getting there.
Making music on the spot in a cold film studio at 8am in front of director Michael-Lindsay Hogg's crew didn't sit well with the other Beatles - tempers flared, and so the project was quickly moved to the new Apple Studio the group was having built. Using two four-track boards borrowed from EMI, George Martin, assisted by engineer Glyn Johns and Alan Parsons, attempted to make sense of what was a chaotic, combative situation.
A new face appeared on the scene, Billy Preston, a keyboardist with Ray Charles. Harrison all but dragged the gregarious Preston to the Apple sessions, hoping his presence would ease tensions within The Beatles.
Preston's spunky and soulful playing helped to make The Beatles' last-ever public performance (on the Apple rooftop, 30 January 1969) a lively affair, but once the band returned downstairs to finish out the recording, the mood turned sour once again.
At times, it became unclear who, if anybody, was guiding the ship. George Martin took a humiliating backseat role in the process, with engineers Johns and Parsons carrying out The Beatles' wishes.
The project sat on a shelf for a year until the tapes were eventually turned over to Phil Spector to compile. McCartney hated the choir and harp the 'Wall Of Sound'-smith added to The Long And Winding Road, but his demands to halt the album's release were unsuccessful - both Let It Be the film and the accompanying LP were issued on 9 May 1970. None of The Beatles attended the premiere - McCartney announced their breakup a month earlier.
