The Beatles' final gig, on the rooftop at Apple Corps, January 30th 1969.

The teaser was fun. It's telling that most of the fun footage comes from the Apple Studio sessions. If you listen only to the Twickenham sessions, everything negative about the Get Back sessions seems to be true, but the change in scenery helped immensely - getting the hell of the Twickenham was the first thing they agreed on when they got their shit back together.

Right. Maybe that's why he went through all those contortions- not a trailer, not an excerpt, etc.

God, that green suit of Ringo's at 5:26..."If I had a million dollars (if I had a million dollars), well I'd buy you a green suit (but not a real green suit, that's cruel)"--actually, it looks pretty great.

Billy Preston is a very suave presence.

Love Ringo's red polka dot shirt, too!

And George's pink stripy outfit.

That was my personal favorite.

I was talking to my Beatles-nut friends about the decision to literally put a smiling face on those sessions. Everyone seems so happy and friendly and fun, basically the opposite of "Let It Be." My friend theorized that "Let It Be," released in the wake of their breakup, sort of intentionally reflected, even exaggerated, the prevailing mood, but his first reaction was that he still thought these new scenes (at least as presented) exhibited some conscious historical revisionism. I mean, George called the sessions "the low of all-time" and John called them "hell ... the most miserable sessions on earth." Now to be fair, George and John were the most unhappy at that point and have been known for their own historical revisionism, but it can't be a coincidence that Paul et al. have kept "Let It Be" from being released again.

Then again, as noted on the pretty thorough wiki page, a few days after threatening to quit "Harrison invited keyboardist Billy Preston to the studio to play electric piano and organ. Harrison recalled that when Preston joined them, "straight away there was 100% improvement in the vibe in the room. Having this fifth person was just enough to cut the ice that we'd created among ourselves." So maybe things did get better and more amiable? Certainly given what's on the wiki, esp. about the history of Paul and Ringo suppressing the original film, this sounds like it's intended as a replacement. "The intention of the documentary is to provide a new level of insight into the band's dynamics during the album's creation, and is being made with the cooperation of McCartney, Starr, Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison." In other words, white-washed for the sake of the brand. Personally, I prefer Lewisohn's warts and all approach, which he conspicuously has been constructing without input from the band, which he finds canned and unreliable at this point.

Sure, but if the received wisdom is sustained misery, then surely some happy moments, with or without Preston, help? I find it hard to believe Harrison and Lennon loathed every minute.

Well, if Harrison actually threatened to quit at a certain point, and Lennon was pretty strung out, the math might add up.

imo, at least from the cut of let it be i watched, the idea that it was an atmosphere of total misery is an overstatement

Hopefully someone does a 4 hour supercut to give a balanced view

The terrible editing and shoddy look of the images -- the film looks as if it were washed in nicotine -- didn't help.

The Let It Be I saw looked pretty miserable, iirc. Ringo was the only one who seemed happy and carefree, goofing with everyone. John and George were shooting daggers at Paul. There's a quote from Martin on the wiki about Abbey Road (the real miracle): "Martin stated that he was surprised when McCartney asked him to produce another album, as the Get Back sessions had been "a miserable experience" and he had "thought it was the end of the road for all of us." And I mean, they did break up shortly afterwards, anyway so clearly they *were* unhappy.

No one's saying they weren't! But, again, it couldn't have been 24/7. Like in a disintegrating marriage, there will be pockets of sunshine.

I've heard all of the non-music bits from the Jan '69 tapes that involve speech/dialogue/whatever, they've been knocking around for years in crystal clear quality, it's about 17 hours worth of just talk, so about a third of the overall taped footage. It's good-natured, sometimes boring, there's much aimless spitballing, technical talk, a lot of tense 'going round in circles' about the future and plenty of larks, japery, gossip etc. Comes as no shock that you could easily sift an hour-or-two of upbeat stuff from it, nor that you could alternatively make it look mostly a bit grim. The truth will end up being somewhere betwen the 2 films i guess.

The last people I would expect to paint the most accurate picture, however, are the surviving Beatles and their estates, though.

Something felt a bit off as I watched the trailer, a bit forced, but the reality falling somewhere in the middle makes sense.

Editing involves choices. Accuracy really has nothing to do with it. The footage extant for 50 years is a distillation too.

Josh, I'm not sure why you're being stubborn about this.

Yeah, it's been told by all that these were tedious and gloomy sessions for them but indeed apparently it wasn't ALL bad and also, the fact that there were still some great times might be indicative of how GOOD their sessions were prior to these (although by the white album it was already pretty tensed by all accounts).

“Washed in nicotine” was a good one, Alfred.

Personally, I prefer Lewisohn's warts and all approach, which he conspicuously has been constructing without input from the band, which he finds canned and unreliable at this point.

To be fair, "without input from the band" was not Lewisohn's choice. He would like to speak to them in order to tie up loose ends and/or confirm a few things. I believe George's estate refuses to cooperate, going back to a misunderstanding about a New Yorker piece published around the time of the Anthology, and Paul has kept Lewisohn at a distance. Ringo's attitude is, "oh, someone else is writing a book, fuck that" -- he doesn't see Lewisohn's project as any different from all the incorrect and exploitative Beatles books published over the years.

Lewisohn had some contact with George Martin, but when he asked for further insight into the real story of how the Beatles got signed, he was immediately frozen out (understandably, from Martin's viewpoint, since Martin's account of how they got signed was thoroughly fictitious, and had never been challenged or questioned for 50 years).

The Let It Be sessions were the point at which at least some of the Beatles could see themselves leaving the group permanently. The mood might have lifted in the latter part of the sessions because the interpersonal difficulties had an end in sight. This was the spirit in which they started work on Abbey Road, a final statement.

Right, they had, um, "accepted" their demise.

I could have sworn Lewisohn made a conscious decision *not* to work with the band for Tune In? Certainly either way his approach bore fruits, as one of the many pleasures of that great book is how much was fresh and under (or never) reported, given all the new sources and research.

And Alfred, I'm not trying to be stubborn. It's right there on film, they're *clearly* having a blast. I'm just saying that this new film/footage is I suspect going to supplant the previously released counterpart. "The footage extant for 50 years" has been suppressed by Paul et al. Let It Be is unquestionably one of the most iconic movies that afaict you can't rent, buy, watch (legally). Though given its status it is, of course, not that hard to find.

It's true that Lewisohn didn't want an "officially authorized" book, as his earlier Beatles projects had been, nor did he want the band as primary sources. But I believe he wanted access to them to clear up certain details, e.g., "So-and-so in Liverpool said this happened in 1959; did it?"

But I agree, Tune In is incredible, and I can't imagine that Paul and Ringo opening up to Lewisohn would have improved it; if anything, it might have just muddied the waters. Every third sentence would be, "Paul does not recall this happening."

Lol at this last. Of course

Like that one book of interviews with Luis Buñuel Alfred, I think, and I like where he takes issue with everything they ask him. Although that book is actually pretty good.

Peter Jackson did say this wasn't a trailer or even an excerpt of the movie. Maybe he just cut all the fun bits together for Christmas.

yeah but he also said it's to give people an idea of the 'vibe' they're going for

Someone should rush out a Christmay, feel-good distillation of Gimme Shelter.

Like that one book of interviews with Luis Buñuel Alfred, I think, and I like where he takes issue with everything they ask him. Although that book is actually pretty good.

― Whamagideon Time (James Redd and the Blecchs)

It's a terrific book with many insights. He's prickly on occasion, though. Like this exchange after hearing an interpretation that repulsed him: "Very good. That is your Belle de Jour, not mine. If you direct it, let me know so I can watch it and pepper you with questions like you two are."

Ha, that is the one I always remember.

I guess it is a useful comparison in that on the one hand he doesn't want to let them put words in his mouth but on the other hand it's not like he is trying to whitewash or sugarcoat anything.

So, lemme summise what we know..

Ringo quit during the White Album
George quit during Let It Be
Paul quit during Revolver
John, well he wasn't around for the "I me mine" session, but..

When I first saw "Let it be" as a kid, I saw a band being serious about what they were doing. Not being hugely pally, just getting on with things.

Reading the Lewison "Sessions" book, there were loads of times they got on each others wick. Ringo avoided it as he was usually in reception, reading etc unless he was called in to drum or owt, during the 'multitrack' years.

Compare to the Velvet Underground rehearsal tape, pre the first album, where Lou was more snippy than Paul&John put together...

Having been thru a separation, if someone had asked me how to edit footage of the last year of my marriage while it was ending I would have chosen the material which showed the reasons for separation. As a grieving and justification process.

You would want the public to see you and your partner at your worst?

"whitewashing" doesn't really seem the right term to describe a movie that whose producers/subjects (or director-fan) opt not to be shown always fighting. It would be weird to expect otherwise, esp. if they feel the prevailing "bummer" narrative around these sessions has been a little exaggerated

Like why wouldn't they want to be remembered (and remember themselves) for the good times they had?

Seems a lot to ask for anything else from what in the end is just a band

Fair enough.

For example: that clip of John teasing George with real affection over the drug bust, reading the headlines in a reporter's voice. I loved that!

it's nice to see

I thought it was implied that Jackson chose to show the happy bits in his teaser because he wanted to bring some cheer at a time when the world was going to shit over the pandemic.

I posted about this in another thread, but it's telling that the happy footage generally came from Apple's studios. It's been repeated many times (especially in Anthology) that everything about Twickenham was awful. For starters, they couldn't work their usual hours of late in the evening going into early morning, instead it was more or less regular business hours, something they were NEVER accustomed to. (Coincidentally, I just saw an "Old Grey Whistle Test" DVD where they mentioned how that show started work in the morning which was tough because rock stars in general HATED those hours.) It was also cold and resembled a dim, shitty-looking air hangar. When things fell apart and they tried to work it out, the first thing they all agreed to was to vacate Twickenham for the confines of their own company's space. That alone probably made a huge difference - I'm certain it was a great help in "resetting" the sessions. As mentioned Preston coming in helped things even more. If you dive into those 40 discs of bootlegs that were produced from the Nagra tapes, you can hear that divide. The Apple sessions were a LOT more relaxed and amicable. The horrible shit is mainly in the Twickenham part, particularly the January 13th "session" (where there's actually no real music, just frank talk) and it'll be interesting to see how much of it makes the film.

Jackson started this long before the pandemic and said back then, too, that he felt people had the wrong (or exaggerated) impression of these sessions

I mean to say that I wouldn't be surprised if this is largely representative of the end product

can we go back to that green suit though??

Lol

would very much wear, to be clear

I didn't expect to get 'cited about this at all but that's quite something to see.

Really weird how whatever they've done in the restoration makes it look like a recreation that's graded to look like footage from the period. It looks hyper real and unreal.

Just like The Hobbit.

Having never seen any genuine unrestored footage from Middle Earth I wouldn't know.

https://s27363.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Hobbiton-New-Zealand.jpg.optimal.jpg