Let It Be | Page 13 | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

Al Packer said 

i don’t think Spector ruined it at all.

It has a lot of great songs on it and despite the band friction at the time they sound pretty darn good.

Agreed, to quote John Lennon himself, “He was given the shittiest load of badly recorded s**t with a lousy feeling to it ever, and he made something of it… When I heard it, I didn’t puke.”  John, George, Ringo & Allen (Klein) got it right by employing Phil Spector, as evidenced by the second-rate ‘Naked” version later released, the Spector version even won a Grammy Award which Paul was quite happy to personally receive.  His criticisms of Spector’s arrangement for ‘The Long And Winding Road ‘ are a joke and wreak of sour grapes about something that has absolutely nothing to do with the final mix.  His negative comments about hearing “female voices on a Beatles’ record” are especially appalling, wasn’t that Patti Harrison & Yoko Ono doing backing vocals on ‘Birthday ‘?  or, Yoko’s voice on ‘The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill ‘ & ‘Revolution #9′?  I’m pretty sure that I hear “female voices” amongst the choir providing backing to ‘Good Night ‘ which has a similar arrangement, or what about Linda’s vocals heard on his own album released at the same time?  Phil Spector (Murder Rap aside) did a bang up job on the ‘Let It Be ‘ album, John & George thought so and thus hired him to produce their next solo works.  Had Paul not opened his mouth about it, nobody else would’ve criticised the work at all and we would never had even had these conversations, by the way, didn’t ‘The Long And Winding Road ‘ (Spector’s version) make it to Number One as a single?

Paul’s announcement about leaving the group (was there still even a group to leave?) and attempted smearing of Spector’s work wreak of PR shenanigans to plug his own album, nothing more nothing less.  Paul used Spector’s arrangement for his own live shows later on (listen to ‘Tripping The Live Fantastic &#39 and you know what they say, imitation is the highest form of flattery.  Had John Lennon still been with us in 2003, I highly doubt that we would have gotten a ‘Naked’ album and rightfully so…:-) 

meanmistermustard said
You could argue that The Long And Winding Road went to number one due to the recent announcement that the Beatles had split up (only about 11 days before)? Its common for fans to rush out and make more of an effort to buy the last album/single that is released by whatever band is splitting (why? i don’t know but then i don’t get it when folk rush out and buy every album of an artist as soon as they die). 
 

I have a hard time with that one, albums maybe, but people buy/play singles because they like the A-Side and not many are in the habit of buying a single before actually hearing the song first.  Granted some will buy one because of a rare B-Side but this wasn’t the case here for both songs (same versions) are on the ‘Let It Be ‘ album (‘For You Blue ‘ was on the flipside).  Singles don’t go to number one unless radio stations play them with high regularity and they sell a significant number of units, and it doesn’t happen at all if the public doesn’t like what they are hearing.

meanmistermustard said 

I haven’t heard Paul’s  most recent tour version of TLAWR but it wouldn’t surprise me if it is the same arrangement as Spector’s (maybe without the choir) – but then you could argue that that is down to the people-pleasing side of Paul, the same reason why he continues to perform certain songs night after night, tour after tour (Paul, please give some of the songs a rest or do something like Kylie did with her ‘Anti Tour’ where she performed b-sides and rare tracks). 
 

I haven’t heard the more recent renditions either, but the ‘Tripping The Live Fantastic ‘ version features atleast one “female voice” (Linda’s).  I have heard the more recent performances of ‘Birthday ‘ and I have to say that Patti Harrison & Yoko Ono did a much better job on the backing vocals than his current bandmates do, and they don’t get the same “71 Year-Old Senior Citizen’ pass that Paul gets for subpar vocal performances.

meanmistermustard said 

Or you could say Paul was complaining due to the circumstances of the times back in 1970 and that it wasn’t the work of Spector that pissed him off but that he wasn’t consulted before it was carried out. He then had a sulk and a strop over it – lets not forget Paul’s response was “i don’t like like what you did, now don’t do it again”. If he really hated Spector’s work surely he would have blocked its release.

This is part of it, but one of the biggest problems Paul had at the time was the ‘Let It Be ‘ release date which he felt was a deliberate attempt by the others to sabotage his own album which was slated for release the same week.  This issue created quite a “pissing contest” for neither party (Allen Klein was certainly a factor) was willing to budge.  This was actually the reason Ringo drove out to see Paul during that now famous Spring Day where Paul shouted and pointed his finger in Ringo’s face vowing, “I’ll finish you!  I’ll finish you all!!”  Ringo & George, in fact, recommended that the ‘Let It Be ‘ album release be pushed back after this incident “if it means so much to him”, but by then too many wheels were apparently in motion to delay it any further.  Maybe it didn’t “mean so much” to him and was simply the boiling point of everything in the pot, if you like, but Ringo trying to personally resolve the issue (he was always the most “neutral”) was an act of good faith by the others.

It’s really difficult for me to sympathize at all with Paul on any of this.  For starters, the ‘McCartney’ album was one made in complete solace, it was one of the best kept secrets in recording history.  Only Paul, Linda and a handful of engineers, who were sworn to secrecy, had first hand knowledge of the album in progress, Paul worked intensely hard on the project for he knew that his first real solo album (1966’s ‘The Family Way ‘ Soundtrack aside) would be thoroughly judged by the masses, not to mention that he played all of the instruments himself.  He had locked himself away in seclusion at his Scottish Farm for many months, putting some distance between him and The Beatles’ affairs, but “the show had to go on” if Klein’s strategies to fix the rotting apple were to be effective at all, and the ‘Let It Be ‘ project was a big part of Apple generating some much needed capital to avoid John’s well publicized words voicing fear of going “broke in six months” from only a year earlier becoming reality.

John, George, Ringo, Allen Klein & Phil Spector were actively involved and consulting one another on the ‘Let It Be ‘ project and had set the release date before even knowing about Paul’s ‘McCartney’ album’s existence.  They likely even telephoned Paul on several occasions for inclusion on consultations for ‘Let It Be ‘ and got no response, not only were there no cell phones in those days, but no answering machines either.  He chose to hideout until his own album was ready and wanted to make a grand splash (which he did anyway) and expected everyone to just step aside for Sir Paul, and when it didn’t quite go to his liking he pouted and sulked like, well, Yoko would’ve.  I’m sure that Paul himself would do things differently if he had the opportunity to do it all over, but why bother reopening this old can of worms for a ‘Naked’ album?  Spector’s work had long stood the test of time and he just made himself look rather silly all over again, in my opinion…:-)