Ideas for a Let It Be anniversary reissue | Page 2 | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

J Alesait said

meanmistermustard said
Re. the ‘Anthology’ edits themselves, compare them to the unedited bootlegs and most are significantly inferior. You can argue for cutting down ‘Helter Skelter ‘ (12 minutes to 4 and a half minutes), ‘Los Paranoias’ (a crap joke that is even more annoying unfunny in its full length) and ’12-Bar Original (uncut it last’ 6 minutes plus)  but it was sheer laziness to use the ghastly edit of ‘Not Guilty ‘ which is unlistenable and pathetic to shorten ‘Shout’. They cut out a chunk of ‘Honey Pie ‘ when it lasted 2 minutes in total as it was yet extended ‘WMGGW’ by the use of a totally pointless looped ending so it has to fade!

It’s a matter of preferences. I see no point in releasing a former bootleg recording without modifying it, since we (obsessed fans) will always have bootlegs if we want to hear it untouched. I prefer the shortened version of Shout (even though they failed at editing it and left two consecutive bars with the same chord!). I like the fade on WMGGW, and we can assume George approved. Just think about a casual listener who has never heard the bootleg versions.

At times the upgrade in the source makes it more than valuable a release but if its an edit or a duplicate i’ll take a duplicate. George or anyone approving doesn’t mean they got it right: George personally edited ‘You Know My Name’ on ‘Anthology 2 ‘ stupidly fading John’s nonsensical ending.

Personally, I don’t see the point of changing the background, editing etc. Give me it as the Beatles did it at the time and let me judge if it’s unlistenable unwatchable s**t. I’d rather pay for that and ignore. We have three different lengths for ‘It’s All Too Much ‘; 6:25 on ‘Yellow Submarine ‘, 2:31 used in the ‘Yellow Submarine ‘ film and 8:21 on the bootlegs. I don’t think it’s a great song, i’m happy not to hear it for long periods of time but if I do listen to the song I choose the 8:21 as at least it’s everything and i’m going all in. Even tho they are outtakes the same goes for ’12-Bar Original’, even tho it’s an overlong rambling mess, and yes even ‘Los Paranoias’ (and have mercy on my soul). 

It’s All To Much is a good example. It’s a pretty much ad-libbed performance which, after recorded, has to be edited down to its best parts, in order to make it better. If you are a musician, and you’re officially releasing an album, you want to make sure the most embarrassing moments are removed. If you get a wrong note on the guitar, or sing out of key, you’d want that edited out. That’s part of the producer’s work.  

‘IATM’ was officially released as the definitive version that was to be the ultimate go-to and what he wanted the end result to be, it’s only natural to want to make it as good as he could; outtakes 30+ years down the road are completely different and should be treated as so. Few fans/critics are going to get as irked at a superfluous chorus or pointless couple of bars in an outtake as they are in the actual end result.

Why try for a new Beatles track, no matter what is done it will never be anywhere as good as what they created in the 60’s. If Apple went down the road of such Frankenstein creations then I am without any hesitation out – but I doubt they ever will due to the outcry from the fans. There was talk of Paul and Ringo working on ‘Now And Then ‘ to get it released a few years back and it’s not for me. Other bands have done it and I couldn’t care less.

As for 4 discs of outtakes I cannot see Apple ever going for it. Twickenham is viewed as miserable rehearsals culminating in George walking out, none of them will want too much from then out for the world to hear (the less said of the ‘fly on the Wall’ disc the better). I’d love to see it happen but Apple’s collective egos wouldn’t ever get that far before exploding.

The big sign for if there is anything is what Apple does for the upcoming ‘White Album ‘ anniversary. If it’s ignored or as pointless as the 30th (CD replica of the original LP and a £200 pen – a box set of outtakes and radio special were rumoured but Apple bottled then shelved them) then you can forget anything to do with ‘Let It Be ‘.

Old Soak said
Just thought of another possibility: All Things Must Pass – and not the solo version from Anthology 3 . The demo version found on George’s Early Takes Volume 1 features Ringo on drums and it should be simple to isolate their performances as a basis of the track. There are run-throughs within the Get Back sessions featuring John separately playing guitar and Lowrey organ (he shouts ‘yeah!’ at one point) which could be isolated using Pro Tools for his contribution. Additionally Paul sang both lead vocal and played bass on the track during The Concert For George; and given Led Zeppelin could get rid of enough ambient noise to put two live tracks on Coda without anyone initially suspecting it should be possible to ‘fly-in’ Paul’s performance to see him either harmonise with George or alternate vocals. I’d love Giles Martin to have a go at that! It would certainly be different to the Spector version.  

They could piece random lyrics together from random words sang between 1962 and the present day to create a totally new lyric that is then placed over a newly created backing track from whenever and wherever, call it Beatles and pretend it’s genuine.

Do this every 10 years and every generation until the world ends gets a brand new shiny Beatles track. 

We don’t want people of the future to think of the Beatles this way. Crikey!