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

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

surely, the original miserable footage was to fit the existing narrative, or to simply CREATE a narrative, one which everyone needed at the time to explain what happened to the band, but while the new happier slant is obv to boost the brand, and say something new about that period and the beatles story in general, the truth is somewhere in between. the old version was too neat. this new one will likely be also, just at the opposite end. the truth is probably just too broad, all over the place, and messy to really grapple with without much nuance, but with so much time having passed, now we prob have the distance to see it a bit more clear eyed, in less simplistic terms.

Yeah, I’m simultaneously super stoked about this movie and disappointed that it’s Jackson, who makes I dunno John Hughes look like a sophisticated & subtle storyteller. I’m sure there’s a big beautiful nuanced movie lurking in all that footage (probably enhanced with a lot of footage from the era that’s not from the LIB vault proper) but I 100% trust that it won’t be this one.

Watched LIB for the first time in many years yesterday. It’s a pretty shoddy piece of filmmaking but there’s a lot to recommend it, just seeing the physicality of each of them & (esp during the rooftop concert) how they click when they perform together well.

Paul did an "Ask Me Anything" on Reddit today, and was asked about the Peter Jackson film:

I think the main thing was that after the release of the 'Let it Be' film I was saddened with the break up of the Beatles. And the film always reminded me of that. So I was very happily surprised when Peter Jackson told me he'd been reviewing the unseen 56 hours of footage and he found it to be entertaining and upbeat. Since then I've seen clips from it and it's very joyful. I particularly like me and John jiving together. And also the birth of the song Get Back. It's pretty exciting, I must say. Crazy!

Crazy!

lol that's basically "it was a pretty shitty period and made me feel shitty and sad, but I just saw this footage and maybe it wasn't shitty and sad and I'm remembering it wrong?"

Maybe Jackson will reveal that they didn't break up after all and they can reunite and tour as state of the art Weta holograms.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9K_oYJvag4U

lol, JiC.

Doesn't Paul come across as a wanker in the original film? But now George and John are gone we can at last see the thumbs up bobbly head Macca we know and love.

... forgot raised eyebrow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGuH7Zxbr84

Actually, while I'm sure this famous fight has been a bit overblown, what I recall from the film is the band just generally being over Paul's shit. Paul is playing cheerleader but the band is just not feeling it, or is elsewhere mentally. It's been a while, but I recall a scene of them rehearsing "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" with Paul going so far as to call out the chord changes (like George or John really need them), and the guys shooting lasers at him with their eyes in response as they play the dumb song over and over again, bored.

Not Ringo, though. He's always having a blast.

Philip Norman, often wrong, said the following correct thing in '87 when Harrison was promoting Cloud Nine: "With John dead, George is the only person you can talk to about The Beatles now. Ringo can't tell you and Paul won't tell you.

I always liked the way George would talk about the Beatles like they were just some band he was in when he was younger, often exactly like that. "When I was in my old band, the Beatles ... "

I don't pay as much attention to the Beatles as most of you (LOL) but I remember the bits in the Anthology doc (was there one?) when Paul and George were together being extremely awkward.