Let It Be [CASSETTE]

Reviewing the Beatles may seem like a waste of time as everything that could have been written about them has been - but the continuing interest with the anthologies, the tribute bands and the consistent sales still make them probably the most listened to band that will ever be. LET IT BE was first released in 1970, a patchwork album of material originally scheduled to be released as GET BACK a year earlier and recorded before the more famous ABBEY ROAD. Rejected by a disillusioned band and producer George Martin - it was put together by Phil Spector who under the circumstances does a pretty fair job. Although far from their finest, LET IT BE contains a few gems for fans and for the casual listener, after all any album that contains 3 (USA) number ones, Get Back, The Long And Winding Road and the title track can't be all bad. Add to that the simple "Two of Us", the irritatingly catchy "Dig A Pony", the basic "One After 909" - one of the first Lennon-McCartney compositions ever. The CD quality sounds better than the earlier albums like PLEASE PLEASE ME and this is an interesting historical document. Hard to believe that these guys could still make good music even when they were in turmoil. Rediscover this one now. Well worth a listen

Listen to Let it Be on L.P if you can. I remember the first time I did, hunched up in the loft watching the apple slowly begin to revolve on the turntable.

I had heard lots of Beatles before. By some happy accident, my parent's had been big fans in the sixties and already had a small store of records which they kept in the loft, but rarely played. My experience of the band was from cassette tapes of Rubber Soul, Help! and Sgt. Pepper.

So, when I first placed Let it Be on to listen to, I was shocked. This sounded nothing like the Beatles. The production (though I was too young to know what this was) sounded really different, their voices sounded strange and as I stared at the beardy faces on the cover I almost felt that the Beatles had recorded the whole record in a loft themselves (Without, maybe, considering where the orchestra came from!).

I'm now 29, and it's been pretty hard to NOT know the real story of how Let it Be came to light, and why it sounds like such a hotchpotch. For a long time I have regarded it as a record that maybe I like only because it is by the Beatles, but not as one to take to my desert island.

And then I listened to the new remaster, on a night drive in my car. Where my head was at, I just don't know, but for some reason I was taken back all the way to being a 9 year old, listening to the record in the loft. I forgot all the history. Forgot all I knew about the squabbles, and forgot even that this was a Beatles record. I just listened to it.

You know what? I really, really liked it. Really! Two of Us sounded relaxed, ushering me in to the album in a covert way, much as it had done on my very first listen. Dig a Pony sounded more than just the filler it had been in my mind, it sounded raw, edgy. I started to tap along to the guitars, I forgot to listen to the lyrics. I loved it.

Then Across the Universe swept and swirled it's way over my mind like a tropical storm and blew I Me Mine with it. Again, it was the music, the guitar sound and drumming which really seemed to infect me. Dig It, a track which seems like a throwaway if you listen to it on an Ipod, was just good fun and with Let It Be to follow it I was almost blown away. Even Maggie May reminded me of what I felt when listening to the record - another weird snippet of something which stopped the album feeling too serious or conventional. I began to love that wilful unconventionality.

I've Got a Feeling assaulted me. That's all I can say. It sounded amazing and by the last songs I was a gonner. One After 909 finally sounded as wacky and trivial as it had on first listen, The Long and Winding Road made me cry (!), For You Blue sounded like the grooviest thing I have ever heard and by the time the thing was finished with Get Back I was thinking that Let it Be might well be my favourite Beatles Album.

Now, either it was because the spirits of Halloween had got the better of me, or because I completely lost my marbles last night, but I think it was just brilliant.

Try it yourself. Listen with a clear head. Let the spikey guitars and the devil-may-care attitude take you for a ride. You might just love it.

For most of their recording career, The Beatles did very little that could be described as just 'okay'. The overwhelming majority of their recordings are fantastic and a small percentage are either atrocious or, at best, mediocre. So when they made an album containing songs that didn't stand out from the crowd, perhaps breaking up wasn't such a bad move.

'Let It Be' does, nevertheless, contain two of the most famous songs of all time, the title track and 'Get Back'. Both the peace-vibe of 'Across The Universe' and the touching 'The Long And Winding Road' are of a high standard too, though Phil Spector's embellishments do them no favours. Beyond this, greatness is in short supply. The chirpy, acoustic 'Two Of Us' sounds more like a Wings moment, good but no classic. Similarly, 'One After 909', a ten-year-old rock and roll song dusted down is decent, a fun track. George Harrison's 'I Me Mine' sounds like a cross between a French chanson and a boogie workout. It's an imaginative effort but the production makes it sound timid. His 'For You Blue' has a wonderful, chopping rhythm, but his reference to Elmore James gives away its derivation. The other three tracks are worthless.

The sleeve boasts of live performances, but it's doubtful whether the album benefits from such a feature. For me, it results in a fairly ordinary production, made worse by Spector's grand ideas. 'Get Back' is suited to the live approach, so had The Beatles gone back to rock and roll for the rest of the album, it might have worked better. As it is, it's only poor relative to their other releases, but it's one of those albums best heard before you decide whether to buy.