Thread by @beatlesbible

Get Back is magnificent. Bravo Peter Jackson. Christmas came early this year to Beatlemaniacs 💝

#TheBeatlesGetBack

*Spoilers ahead* - skip this thread if you haven't yet seen it.

We're very lucky to have these all dropping on consecutive days. Disney could easily scheduled them weekly, it even months apart, so to have them in (almost) one go really is a treat.

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Some thoughts and SPOILERS after watching part one. Consider yourself forewarned.

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Obviously Peter Jackson doesn't do brevity, but the 11-minute recap of the Beatles' career might be overkill. Did we really need to get back to 1956? (NB Lennon and McCartney first met in 1957, but the film doesn't make that clear. An error?)

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January 1969, then. Capturing it on film means it still looks brilliant after all these years. It's astounding that this footage remained in the vaults for so long.
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Although probably not their best idea, the unused harmonies in Don't Let Me Down ("Love for the first time in my life..." 🎵) were lovely. Their voices were so good together.
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By day three Paul McCartney was effectively producing and arranging the Beatles, suggesting ideas and giving directions to each member in Don't Let Me Down. It's easy to see why the others pushed back.
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Day 4. The moment that Get Back emerged during the Threetles jam session - just wow. McCartney really could just pluck classic melodies out of thin air.
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I would watch all of this. Every minute of every rehearsal. Watching the Beatles at work will always be compelling, whatever they were doing.
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Imagine if they'd filmed the making of other albums. Oh to have been a fly on the wall back then.
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Mal Evans was some kind of magician. Paul: "Mal, we should get a hammer. And an anvil." Mal sources both during the Beatles' lunch break. 👍🏻
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Not sure about cutting footage from 1966 into the 1969 version of Rock And Roll Music, or the yawning montage in I'm So Tired. It seems a bit unnecessary and unsubtle. Also interesting to note that the 1966 footage hasn't yet been restored.
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Day 5. George, I Me Mine, and the BBC 2 schedule the night before. There must be many background stories to songs that we still have no idea about.
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The theatre in Sabratha, Libya, looks breathtaking. It's such a shame the Beatles never played there (although probably for the best given its age and condition).
whc.unesco.org/en/list/184/

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Day 7 is the big one, where George Harrison walks out. If you know it's coming you can see his disengagement and unhappiness clearly all morning in his expressions and body language. What a way to end episode one, though...
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Part two. At nearly three hours it's the longest Get Back episode.

Days 8-16, 13-27 January 1969.

SPOILERS AHEAD. Skip this thread if you're yet to watch the show.
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Interesting to note that the improvised 'I Bought A Piano The Other Day' gets a Lennon-McCartney-Starkey credit, even though John is nowhere to be seen. It was originally copyrighted as 'Jazz Piano Song', incidentally.
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Paul is asked about songwriting. "In fact, I had one this morning." Plays 'The Back Seat Of My Car' ♥️
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Paul telling John to "wake up", and John talking about mistreating his body and joking about needles, really is saddening. Paul looks distraught. "Is there any need to do this in public, Mr Lennon?" 😢
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Heroin is the elephant in the room here. The 'Two Junkies' interview took place earlier on this day (Lennon mentions CBS, but it was for CBC) but isn't shown. Unusually there is no caption providing context for the discussions, but Lennon's habit is clearly an issue to Paul.

The 'Two Junkies' interview, 14 January 1969. It is not easy to watch. Trigger warning: John and Yoko high on heroin.


Additional obligatory plug for my book, Riding So High: the Beatles and Drugs, because why not?

geni.us/ridingsohigh

Paul's demo of Oh! Darling ♥️
"When you told me you didn't need me anymore, well you know I nearly broke down and cried," as the Twickenham set is dismantled around him. So much pathos in this scene.
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Into the basement at Apple, and you can see how everyone's mood has lifted. The change was clearly the right one for everyone, especially John and George.
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Paul has definitely changed tack, and is noticeably less bossy towards the other three Beatles. It's a shame we don't know precisely what was agreed at the band meetings prior to the Apple sessions.
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Magic Alex's prototype bass and rhythm guitar with a revolving neck looks amazing. "Let's give him half a million quid" 😂
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George's rosewood Telecaster makes its first appearance. At the end of 1968, Fender gave the Beatles the Tele, six-string and Jazz bass guitars, Rhodes electric pianos, Twin combos, PA and amp stacks, all of which were used in January 1969.
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Later in 1969, George Harrison gave the Rosewood Telecaster to Delaney Bramlett of Delaney & Bonnie, who sold it at auction in 2003 for $434,750. It was bought by an intermediary for Harrison's widow, Olivia.
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Almost everything on the Let It Be album was recorded at Apple, either in the basement or on the roof. The only thing from Twickenham was Lennon's "Queen says no to pot-smoking FBI members," heard just before For You Blue.
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Ringo Starr is left-handed, but picks up Paul McCartney's Hofner bass right-handed.
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Day 13. The Beatles are joined by photographer Ethan Russell, whose photos can be seen in the 1970 and 2021 Get Back books, on the Let It Be cover and elsewhere.
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And Billy Preston! John casually invites him to play on the Beatles' album, and Billy is totally unfazed.
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Yoko is reading The Beatles Complete Works by Thomas Rap.

abebooks.co.uk/Beatles-Comple…

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Day 14 begins with 'Freakout Jam', credited to Lennon/McCartney/Ono.
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Get Back. In the discussion about the solos, nobody suggests George having one. It's unclear why he was kept on rhythm guitar when they were considering having three solos - two on guitar and one on electric piano.
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Day 15. The Beatles discuss putting out a book of the film, designed by John Kosh, also creative director on Abbey Road, plus various Plastic Ono Band and Ringo Starr releases, and much more.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Kosh

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George Harrison: "If I asked Dylan to join the Beatles, and he would as well, you know..."
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Day 16. Paul's footage from India. Is this the first time it's been seen? It looks fascinating.
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That look on Paul's face when Glyn Johns suggests going up on the Apple roof for the film finale.
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That second episode started out so dark but ended up a thing of beauty. You could tell how much the Beatles were all enjoying playing together again at Apple.
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Considering how much attention the Beatles paid to newspaper reports about themselves, they'd have been glued to smartphones and social media throughout this film had those existed back then. Another reason to be thankful.
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Dig It was recorded on 26 January 1969, but wasn't included in part two of Get Back. Also missing from the cut was Linda McCartney’s six-year-old daughter Heather, although she did appear in the trailer as Ringo's Mini-Me.
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Part three of Get Back, the shortest at just over two hours. But it's the big one - we get to see the full Apple rooftop show for the first time ever.

SPOILERS AHEAD. You might want to skip this thread if you haven't seen the show.

Day 17. An early Octopus's Garden, a song inspired by the holiday in Sardinia that @ringostarrmusic took after he temporarily quit the Beatles in August 1968, during the White Album sessions.
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"Somewhere out in Weybridge lives the cat whose name is Babaji. Singing words of wisdom, let it be, h, i, j, k." 😂
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Sri Mahavatara Babaji was one of the spiritual gurus who appeared on the Sgt Pepper cover at George Harrison's behest. Anyone know if John Lennon actually had a cat called Babaji?

Is there a point anywhere in this film where Billy Preston doesn't look absolutely overjoyed to be at Apple? His passion is so delightful.
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Dig It. Mea culpa, I was wrong about this (and Heather Eastman) being missing from part two. I was thrown by John and Ringo wearing basically the same clothes for two consecutive days 😅
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Paul explains the syncopated chords in The Long And Winding Road. John Lennon did something very similar on How? on the Imagine album.
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Monday 27 January 1969, day 18.

The Beatles could easily have done a rock n roll covers album art the same time as Let It Be, releasing them as a double album with the original songs, or separately. They clearly had so much fun playing those oldies.
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George Harrison wrote Old Brown Shoe ("happy and a rocker"), the b-side of The Ballad of John and Yoko, on 26 January 1969. He demoed it at Abbey Road on his birthday, 25 February, and the Beatles recorded it properly in April.
beatlesbible.com/songs/old-brow…

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The E chord with an added C: E augmented (or, as Billy Preston puts it, "E with a raised, yeah, E with a C...")
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Paul plays George's Telecaster - he could switch from left- to right-handed strung guitars without any problem. Brings to mind this Bob Dylan quotation:
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There's a very real joy in seeing the Beatles record the actual takes that appeared on the Let It Be album. They could have put out a video for Get Back in 1969, but instead sat on the footage for 52 years.
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28 January, day 19. George plays Something. "Do you know now, Mr Joe?" Oh yes I do. 🙂
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"Something in the way she moves, attracts me like a moth to candlelight"
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John Lennon and George Harrison discuss the idea of raising money for war-torn Biafra. Could this be a seed that led to the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971?
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John Lennon: "I've had some wine, you know? Remember Bob Wooler? Fucking right. Peace on Earth." This was likely a reference to Lennon beating up the Cavern Club DJ at Paul McCartney's 21st birthday party in 1963.

beatlesbible.com/1963/06/18/pau…

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29 January, day 20. Paul McCartney: "This TV show was supposed to be a TV show of the last album, but when we came to do it we said, 'We'll write new songs'."

Time to make a fantasy setlist of White Album songs they might have performed...

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Decision time.

George Harrison: "I'll do it if we've got to go on the roof. But I don't wanna go on the roof. Of course I don't wanna go on the roof."

Ringo Starr: "I would like to go on the roof."

John Lennon: "Yes, I'd like to go on the roof."

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John and George discuss the Beatles recording a whole album of George's songs. Such a shame that never happened.
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30 January, day 21. The Apple rooftop concert.

Ten cameras, five on the roof, one across the street, three on the ground, and one inside reception. A cynic might wonder if Michael Lindsay-Hogg tipped off the police to ensure a great finish.
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At 1hr 27: my good friend @dylandawes's mum in the red coat. He's a huge Beatles fan, but had no idea she was in Let It Be until Anthology came out in the 90s.
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.@dylandawes: "She was so laid-back about when I told her I'd seen it (she never had), typical west Wales attitude ('oh that's nice dear, yes I think I do remember it, I think. Very cold day.')"
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Would love to know what PC Ray Dagg and PC Ray Shayler made of their pivotal role in the Beatles' final film and live performance. Have they ever been interviewed?
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"We don't appreciate this, mate. The noise you're making out on the street. We've had about 30 complaints in the space of half an hour. It's got to come down. It's a breach of the peace, all right? You can be taken in for that offence." 😂
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The Apple rooftop show is just beautiful. It's so wonderful to see it after all this time. And the editing here is perfect. But I hope any Blu-ray release has the option to turn off the police and voxpops and just leave the Beatles' music.
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PC Dagg: "I'm not going to be difficult about this... It's got to go down, otherwise there will be some arrests. I'm not threatening you..." 🤔
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"Everybody had a hard year
Everybody had a head dream
Everybody saw the sun shine
Everybody gotten obscene"
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Paul looks delighted that the police are on the roof. George looks absolutely livid when Mal Evans switches off the guitar amps.
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31 January, day 22. Two Of Us, Let It Be, and the Let It Be... Naked version of The Long And Winding Road were among the songs recorded on this day. There's a lot more from this day in the Let It Be film, incidentally.
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Well that was just brilliant. It's shone a whole new light on the sessions and the Let It Be album, giving us a whole new understanding of the project. We're really incredibly lucky to have it, thanks to Peter Jackson, the Beatles and Apple.
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While Michael Lindsay-Hogg clearly had plenty of good ideas about storytelling and resolution, it's a mystery why his Let It Be film was so dour, when he had access to so much great footage. What was he thinking?
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@threadreaderapp unroll please.

Blu-ray wishes (1):

- The Beatles' entire Apple rooftop performances without the police dialogue and voxpops.
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Blu-ray wishes (2):

- The full Let It Be album, with sound and vision, showing the actual footage of those takes being recorded in full (albeit with the I Me Mine rehearsal, since it was recorded in 1970).
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Blu-ray wishes (3):

- A director's cut containing everything that didn't make the initial edit. Yep, all of it.
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Blu-ray wishes (4):

- Let It Tea. A compilation of every shot and scene containing tea drinking, mugs or teacups, to make @Teatlemania explode with joy.
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Blu-ray wishes (5):

- Interviews with Peter Jackson, Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Glyn Johns.
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