Let It Be on YouTube

O happy me. For years now, I've been patiently (no, impatiently, very impatiently) waiting for the Apple/EMI people to release Let It Be on DVD. This of course was the movie that The Beatles made, reluctantly and grumpily and almost disastrously, to document the recording of what would become the album of the same name. Not a one of them was happy with any part of the process, leading Paul to eventually release what he considers to be a superior recording (i.e., one with all of Phil Spector's production gimmicks stripped away) a couple years ago. (In the process, by also stripping away the little interstitial stuff, the bits of conversation and whatnot, Let It Be... Naked ended up feeling lifeless compared to the original.) During the course of production, George Harrison quit the group altogether for a few days, bringing the whole enterprise very nearly to a halt--and potentially denying the world both the Let It Be and Abbey Road albums.

The first time I saw the movie of Let It Be, I was probably five years old. Mom and some friends took me along to see it at a drive-through, and all I can really remember is lying on the hood of the car, enjoying some Road Runner cartoons that came before the movie and then being really bored by the movie itself. I saw it again in early 1981, when it was rereleased following John Lennon's murder, at which point I was still so shell-shocked that I just couldn't absorb any of it.

Since then, it's been hidden away. Paul McCartney hates it, Neil Aspinall hated it, and basically the movie simply disappeared after '81. There were a few expensive, poor-quality VHS tapes floating around, and that was it. I've been wanting to see it, really see it, for all these years. And the other day, it finally occurred to me to check on YouTube.

Sure enough, there it is. (The movie is broken down into nine parts; the link brings you to Part 1, then just follow with Parts 2, etc. via the links to the right.)

I won't say much about it--if you're interested, you're interested and will go check it out. If you're not interested, then you don't much care what I have to say about it. Really, as a movie it's lousy--dismal sound quality, you can almost never hear what anyone is saying because they're miked so badly, nothing ever develops, there's no through-line at all, it's just a mess. But--

But it's really the only footage of The Beatles in the recording studio, and so it is precious. Plus, after about fifty minutes of meandering, not terribly musical nonsense, The Beatles got up onto that rooftop, and suddenly it's all magical. Suddenly the jaw drops, and I find myself desperately wishing that I had been in the right part of London that particular day. (Plus, you know, not a toddler.)

So if you're a Beatles fanatic like I am (and if you are, you know you are), it's probably worth noting that these YouTube clips must be in gross violation of copyright, so I would suggest you hie yourself thither with all due despatch. And no matter how dreary it is, just remember that eventually they're going to emerge onto a rooftop and bring joy one last time.