The Beatles

Let It Be – Special Edition PARLOPHONE

The final Beatles album, peered at from yet another angle, reveals a new perspective.

Most records find their reputation improving with the passage of time, but – the last album released by The – has had a longer wait than most. The ’s original review called it “a cardboard tombstone, a sad and tatty end to a musical fusion which wiped clean and drew again the face of pop music” and while its best songs – the title track, , – have become staples of late-era Beatle playlists, as an album it’s long been considered something of a mess, ranging from Phil Spector-produced grandiosity to annoying jams. Paul McCartney even had it remixed as in 2003 (let it go, more like) while the movie of the sessions remains unavailable, instead being replaced by a Peter Jackson documentary apparently showing how happy the Beatles were at the time as they played at dawn in cold film studios on songs they loved so much that they wouldn’t release them until after they’d split up.