Beatles’ Let It Be returns with special edition
With the release of new music by Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr and remastered solo recordings from former bandmates John Lennon and George Harrison the last two years has seen an abundance of riches for Beatles fans. And it’s not over yet.
In a matter of days you will see the release of a remastered and expanded special edition of Let It Be, the Beatles’ final recording together.
Originally released in 1970, Let It Be has been given what amounts to the royal treatment, with new mixes in stereo, 5.1 surround sound, and Dolby Atmos.
For this release the album has also been expanded to include previously unreleased session recordings as well as rehearsals and studio jams.
New mixes for tracks like Across The Universe, The Long And Winding Road, Let It Be, One After 909, the first rooftop performance of
Don’t Let Me Down and I Me Mine have been playing in rotation for several days now on this end and the mixes are extraordinarily good, bordering on brilliant. These offerings just beg to be played on an upscale audio system but even on a middle of the road system they’ll knock your socks off.
The album has been newly mixed by producer Giles Martin and engineer Sam Okell and follows universally acclaimed remixed and expanded anniversary editions of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (2017), The Beatles (“White Album”) (2018), and Abbey Road (2019).
All of the Let It Be Special Edition releases — and there are several — feature the new stereo mix of the album as guided by the original “reproduced for disc” version by Phil Spector and are sourced directly from the original session and rooftop performance tapes.
The physical and digital Super Deluxe releases also feature 27 previously unreleased session recordings, a four-track Let It Be EP, and the never before released 14track Get Back stereo LP mix compiled by engineer Glyn Johns in May 1969.
Let It Be was recorded during a critical period in the band’s history.
That period is now also the subject of The Beatles: Get Back, the hotly anticipated documentary series directed by three-time Oscar-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson, and a beautiful new hardcover book also entitled The Beatles: Get Back.
The making of Let It Be was the subject of a 1970 British documentary film directed by Michael Lindsay-Hoggraw but that film was far less uplifting than Jackson’s film is said to be.
“I had always thought the original film Let It Be was pretty sad as it dealt with the break-up of our band, but the new film shows the camaraderie and love the four of us had between us,” Paul McCartney writes in his foreword for the Let It Be Special Edition book. “It also shows the wonderful times we had together, and combined with the newly remastered Let It Be album, stands as a powerful reminder of this time. It’s how I want to remember The Beatles.”
With Christmas little more than two months away any of the newly minted Let It Be Special Edition sets would make any Beatles fan you have on your list very happy.
(Rating 5 out of 5 stars)