Review of the Beatles' Redaction: Let It Be...Naked

I was not a youth growing up in the nineteen-sixties and early seventies, so I do not view the music of the Beatles through the psycho-social filter through which their music was initially judged. I grew up with the music of the nineteen-eighties, which, generally speaking, is rather poor by comparison. In fact, I lost interest in the music of my generation and started raiding my baby-boomer auntie's record collection, and found much more satisfying music there from her generation. The 1968 session recordings which were shaped into the Beatles' last album release in 1970, entitled, Let It Be, historically and to the present day are mostly disliked by professional critics, and were so, in part, by even two of the Beatles themselves: Paul McCartney and John Lennon. I was raised by musicians, and so I have a fairly decent ear for good music. In fact, I'm something of a snob in terms of what it takes to make my ears happy. The worst I can possibly come up with in terms of the original album release in question is that it may be a little overproduced here and there, but some of that I like -- it was, after all, the final salute from the living group, and a little musical drama isn't bad. However, the McCartney-led redaction, Let It Be...Naked, I am not ashamed to say is an absolute pleasure! Once again, the critics don't like it. They must build job security by finding fussy and negative things to say. Critics also tend to idolize their predecessors and their historic pronouncements, and here we're talking about the first generation of the popular music press that emerged and developed in the sixties and seventies. As good as the music was from 1965-1975, the music critics of that era made it their business (following what sort of critical agenda I cannot decipher) to attack those musicians with any real talent and imagination, and raise up the mediocre bands with grandiloquent praise, if these critics sniffed out anything about such groups that came across as "street cred" and "rootsy authenticity". I have no vested interest in these rascally critical traditions. I do not listen with my ego, I listen for aesthetic quality. Let It Be..Naked sounds much more akin to its inarguably great predecessor, The White Album, and its historical (recording-wise) masterful successor, Abbey Road. McCartney's new redaction of what served as the group's final album has a sound, texture and spirit that makes much more sense in terms of where it fits in the evolving artistic vision of the group. That the Beatles were bickering during the sessions, and sowing the seeds of their break-up is irrelevant to the art they produced from these sessions. The members of the group may have felt miserable at the time, but they must have channeled and sublimated this misery into what I have to say are authentic emotions and very fresh and engaging lyrics and musical dynamics. This is not a "throwaway album", in either the Spector version or in this new "authenticated" version, but I have to say that I love this latest version. It certainly does feel like McCartney might have been proven right if only Lennon had gone along with it: they could have done an incredible live tour with this music. They're singing well together, their musical command of the instruments displays a relaxed facility, you can sense a good-humored camaraderie in the ensemble playing and singing, and there is absolutely nothing here that sounds forced. It sounds wonderfully, beautifully real. Without a doubt, even compared to their other work of the same career phase, it is easily some of the best rock, folk rock, blues rock, rock balladry and sixties funk that you will ever hear. So don't listen to the mounded wall of bull-crap from the paid egos. Buy this album and listen to it with the innocent ears you were born with -- and you will thank this blog for clearing your path to it.