On the "Let it Be" movie ...

In the least, just watch it for the rooftop concert. No one here has said THAT part is a bummer. The thought of seeing it with restored video and sound is very tasty indeed.

 

yeah it was nothing, I think most people still base it on john comments about how miserable it was when he did press in '69. but john was bitter about most everything Beatles at the time, its barely an argument, now roger and pete throwing punches in the studio, that would be something

 

Oh I've seen that, of course. Supposedly that bit was modeled
after an Airplane show from the previous year but I've not seen
that verified. Yeah, I've seen bits'n'pieces over the years but not
the entirety. It's been in libraries but even when I saw it I never
bothered to snap it up. It's never been high as a must-see.

 

The other Beatles were fully aware of John's sense of humour, but they did not like how his heroin use in this period made him unpredictable and even lazier than usual.

 

I saw it after having been in a band. It all looked pretty much as it should, I'd go so far as it having no evidence of a band on the verge of splitting.

COmpare it to the tape of an early Velvet underground session on the "Peel Slowly" box, where they already sound more irritated and snappy than The LIB Beatles.

Or the Troggs tapes. Or Arthur Lee taking to Bryan on "Your Mind" on that CD.* Or, or, or

*(OK, bad example as Bryan was pushed out just after)

 

Watched "Let It Be" over the holiday. Had never seen the whole movie. It was nice to see the faces behind the music. Paul and John were the center of attention, of course.
George did a few tunes, but seemed kind of subdued. Ringo seemed bored most of the time. The roof top performance was enjoyable. The movie is worth it for that, at least.

 

Try watching the Anthology DVDs . There is a lot of good stuff on it, and you get to see Real Love and Free As A Bird.

 

This is exactly what I say.

The movie was made. It was available at one point. People know about it because people have the internet. We have an album titled "Let It Be".

I'm not exactly sure what the hold-up is. And, hey Apple - don't give me the same guff about "technical difficulties". There was a time roughly 15 years ago that I was reading a Rolling Stone article when Let It Be...Naked was released that was getting into the entire discussion of this movie FINALLY getting its day in the sun after (at that point) nearly 30 years (and I can't count all the VHS and laser disc copies that were out in the 80s...those just seemed to be rather sub par with what SHOULD have been released). You're telling me that after 15 years we're still looking at "technical difficulties" as the answer to this never-ending query of why its not out? Someone is holding it up. Paul? Ringo? Olivia? Yoko?

Just release it already. I saw it for the first time in 1993 as a VHS dub that I got from some guy on the Prodigy message boards. I was 14. I was able to handle the "heavy" content then and I can now. They ARE just human beings after-all. I didn't need to see the moptops. That legend was long gone by 1965 anyway (if you REALLY know your Beatle history).

 

As I wrote before, if you can find the "Let It Be 35mm Widescreen Version" (mis-named -- it's an uncropped 16mm print), that's the one to watch if you want excellent stereo sound at Apple. Good fidelity mono from Twickenham (direct from the Nagra reels), clear crisp video and overall, a presentation which made me change my mind about the movie from depressing to "a very interesting inside look at the Beatles both having fun and seriously working" (besides the George "I won't play at all" episode).

As I wrote above, most of the misery of watching "Let It Be" was the horrid dark blurry transfers (I know, I have the LaserDisc), lousy sound, and the stretching and cropping etc. This version solves all of those problems and as I said, gave me a new perspective on the sessions (I have the complete Nagra Purple Chick reels as well). Until Apple decides to do their release, find this one on-line (look at my previous posts) and I think that you'll have a new perspective on the movie.

 

This looks like a copy of my VHS print. I would repost what I found but it would get blocked instantly. Already tried it a few times.

 

The live in the studio stuff is pretty cool too...have seen a few clips...talking about the rooftop alt versions, not just the oldies, Dig it, For you Blue, the two ballads and Two of Us.

 

I saw it on BBC2 television on a summers' afternoon in the early 80s and I wasn't quite in my teens... I put a tape recorder near the tv speaker (we didn't get a VCR until the end of the same year) but I can't say I was impressed. Fascinated, more like! There was little Beatle music at home in those days and what there was, didn't get heard much - I think was the only one that took any interest. It was nothing like I expected because they looked untidy - in more ways than one... The music wasn't too bad in places but I'm sure the tape got erased without me even checking to see how the sound quality was (!)

Seen it a couple or so times since - last time was just before Christmas, gone and in far better quality than when I last stumbled across it (that was on You Tube, 5 or 6 years ago.) I actually enjoyed it a lot (far more than the fairly recent viewing, for some reason) and although it's undeniable that it has a number of sections where there is little of anything really inspired occurred, I sat and wondered if these were included on purpose, to give it an 'edge' of sorts. Another poster said a similar thing, earlier in the thread. This time, it didn't feel quite 'miserable'.

Granted, the rooftop part is required viewing and Don't Let Me Down has to be about my favourite audio-visual 'Fab Fix.' If it came to it, I'd have said at the time it was in cinemas, for someone who likes their music at all, it would be a big shame to not stick around for the show. Quite amusing to see all those people out on the street and the minor mayhem they caused! I don't know if I'm too concerned about it getting an official DVD release as it stands. BUT at least with generous bonus features, or part of a box set is something I'd be unable to resist.

 

I watched the same showing, also recorded it onto a tape recorder, I had that cassette for nearly 30 years, and played it regular, at one point I knew all the dialogue etc. I was kind of amazed when I first saw it as I was expecting more of a narrative. It took me over 20 years to finally see it again, and always enjoy watching it. I find it very engrossing.

 

This was the last full pro-recorded concert! That alone for releasing.

 

There are a few Brits on here that have mentioned clearly remember seeing it at the time. Not surprisingly. Of course, I thought they would show it again maybe a year or so later. As I was just getting a bit more familiar with their music a few years later, I was expecting to buy the VHS tape in Woolworths any day now... Oh well!

 

You haven't lived until you've listened to all the Nagra audio reels of these sessions. And by lived I mean you haven't known the true misery of enduring these tapes and thus can't truly appreciate the beauty of a life spent not listening to them. The biggest problem is that amongst all the jammery, noodling and apathy there are moments of brilliance that briefly give you a glimmer of hope, only for that hope to be dashed seconds later when the Yoko starts screaming. It's a rite of passage that few brave souls pass but I'd recommend it at least once, it's a character building experience.

 

The Beatles copied the rooftop gig, right down to the police ending.
The Airplane sounds like doom and gloom here, Grace looks good and Axel Rose joins in on bass.

 

Yeah, was the last time they ever showed it on UK TV. Not that we knew at the time, up until then they used to show the Beatles films regular. I remember they showed Help! on the day John died (along with an entire evening of Beatles/John related programs), and they showed Yellow Sub a few months later, then Let It Be in 82 and that was it. I guess they had lost the rights at that point. I had a cassette of YS too, with "shh's" included when anyone started to talk while I was taping it.

 

It was a couple of years before my time but I remember the first VHS I got of the film, from a record fair a few years later, had the BBC2 logo before the start. Iirc they showed Let it Be and A Hard Days Night on the same evening and for a while it was THE version of Let it Be circulating in the UK. On a similar note I had, for years, a VHS of Yellow Submarine that I taped from a BBC showing in the early 80s and it was only years later that I realised that Hey Bulldog, which I was used to seeing in the movie, wasn't in all versions of the film.

 

For years, I thought I'd seen Help and Magical Mystery tour very shortly before the awful event of early December 1980... I believed this to to be true for years and years until I read in a book about the 1979 transmission of them and the others! How I didn't see MMT or YS, I can only guess (something my dad wanted to see on 'the other side' as we used to call it..?) Ah, but then I got to record Yellow Submarine and Compleat Beatles (BBC2 once again) around Christmas 1985 and played them over and over. I think the rules changed over time but once read that tv companies had the rights to show films a certain number of times - three sounds about right. I'm sure that's not too far off the mark. Ah, the days of having to restart the recording because someone suddenly slammed a door in another part of the house.

 

fantastic

 

I'm sure I've seen it that way - was it THE one that was on You Tube 5 or 6 years ago, I'm wondering. It does ring a bell. The '85 Christmas showing of YS definitely had Hey Bulldog... one of my favourite scenes. But strangely, I don't remember if the one about 10 years later, did. And I think they showed it again, the next year. And maybe the year after - or sooner. I suppose it's easy enough to check these things online, now. There is a load of 'historical' BBC listings on the Genome site, for anyone who might find these things interesting - that goes way, way back.

 

I'm not sure about the Youtube one but iirc (and it's been a long time) it was this ident at the start...



My YS must have been from the Chrimble '85 showing. During those years I ended up with a lot more McCartney broadcasts taped than Beatles ones, there seemed to be a lot of stuff just after Lennon's murder but by the mid 80s there was a lot more Macca than Fabs on TV in the UK. It's funny to think how ubiquitous the Beatles are now compared to back then and from what I've heard the early-mid 70s was even more Fab-free. We've got it pretty good nowadays.

 

It wasn't that he didn't care about George's songs since he was straightforward and moody in interviews yet never said he didn't like George's later songs. It was established on another thread that he played on George's songs more than people here think.

On the 2nd or 3rd day of the sessions, John and George were there before Paul and Ringo showed up and George was playing "Let It Down". John had mentioned that he wasn't used to playing some of the chords that George was using and that could be a reason why he wasn't on every single George tune. It's just an assumption he didn't like it-there's no quote where he ever mentioned it. John was the Beatle at one of the final meetings in 1969 that said that he'd be willing to let George have more songs on albums going forward.

 

"Look at The Squares! Look at The Squares!"

peering out their windowpane.

Axl Rose! Shaaame ... NEVER denigrate the good Cassidy name.

This sequence is on "Fly, Jefferson Airplane".