For those of you who don’t know me personally, let me warn you. I’m a big Beatles fan. No, strike that, a huge Beatles fan. I’m not one of those fans that wears nothing but tie-died t-shirts that say “Imagine” or someone who has Beatle versions of everything from toothbrush holders to salt & pepper shakers to underwear. (I’ve met those kinds of people before and they’re craaazy.)

No, I’m the kind of Beatles fan that tries to collect as much of their music that I can. Since high school I’ve collected at least 100 CDs of various bootlegs. For that reason I’ve been paying a lot of attention to the news that the Beatles are finally releasing the original version of their Let It Be album (as I mentioned in this post). Seeing Kevin Drum’s post on this makes me realize that I’ve been meaning to post something on this subject for a while now. In short, this release, like just about everything they’ve done over the last 30+ years, is a complete screwup.

In the 33 years since Let It Be was released, there have been numerous bootlegs of the original” version of the album. As Apple’s official press release notes, the upcoming release is an attempt to release the album “as nature intended” :

When The Beatles first set out to make the album in 1969, they intended to record an album that would be a return to live performance of just the bare necessities of the band, no studio effects or overdubbing of voices or instruments would be allowed. However, caught in the turmoil of the break-up of the band, the album was re-produced by Phil Spector and never released as The Beatles had originally meant it to sound. Until now.

Let It Be?Naked?s track listing differs from the 1970 release; background dialog, ?Dig It? and ?Maggie Mae? have been taken off the album and ?Don?t Let Me Down? has been added to the running order, which now is as follows: Get Back, Dig A Pony, For You Blue, The Long And Winding Road, Two Of Us, I?ve Got A Feeling, One After 909, Don?t Let Me Down, I Me Mine, Across The Universe, Let It Be.

Let It Be?Naked will be issued together with a bonus fly-on-the-wall disc that features extracts from tapes of The Beatles at the time of first making the Let It Be album and movie in the Sixties.

The 20-minute bonus disc is a unique insight into of The Beatles at work in rehearsal and in the studios in January 1969.

Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, yes and no. Any new release by the Beatles is cool, but like so much that they’ve released since their breakup, this is a pretty half-assed effort.

There have been a few different mixes of the Get Back album that have laid claim to being the official de-Spectorized version. Of the many versions that have circulated, this is the most common tracklisting :

1. The One After 909 (Lennon/McCartney) 3:06
2. Rocker (Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey) 0:46
3. Save The Last Dance For Me (Pomus/Shuman) 1:19
4. Don’t Let Me Down (Lennon/McCartney) 4:26
5. Dig A Pony (Lennon/McCartney) 3:45
6. I’ve Got A Feeling (Lennon/McCartney) 2:52
7. Get Back (Lennon/McCartney) 3:08
8. For You Blue (Harrison) 2:46
9. Teddy Boy (McCartney) 3:41
10. Two Of Us (Lennon/McCartney) 3:29
11. Maggie Mae (Traditional) 0:41
12. Dig It (Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey) 4:21
13. Let It Be (Lennon/McCartney) 3:55
14. The Long And Winding Road (Lennon/McCartney) 3:40
15. Get Back Reprise (Lennon/McCartney) 0:42

Notice anything different from the tracklisting in the press release? Where’s Teddy Boy, Rocker, and Save The Last Dance For Me?

What’s even worse is there’s only twenty minutes of bonus material on the second disc? Are they crazy? The Beatles spent a whole month having everything they did recorded and they could only scrape together twenty minutes of bonus material? There are more than fifty two-disc bootlegs of the raw session tapes circulating in the bootleg community. Granted, those collections are 95% shit, but there’s at least another disc worth of good material there.

If I had my way, I’d release the Get Back album in two versions. The one disc version would simply contain the tracklisting mentioned above with the original artwork (that was later used for the Beatles Red/Blue albums). A more expensive “deluxe” version would be a three disc collection that contains the original album, the complete rooftop concert, and a third disc full of outtakes and alternate versions.

So why the skimping? There have been whole books written about this subject alone, but the simple answer is that the Beatles (1) still can’t get along and (2) care more about their “legacy” than making a lot of money. In the effort to get everything done “just right”, the Beatles have squandered many, many opportunities to make a ton of money and release some of the stuff that’s been circulating as bootlegs for years.

Among the releases that fans have been begging for, here’s a few that are no-brainers :

Remastering Their Entire Catalog - Did you realize that the only versions of the Beatles albums that are available commercially are the ones that were hastily mixed and dumped on CD in 1987? While every other popular band from the era has had multiple remixed and remastered versions of their albums released, Beatles fans are still waiting for Apple to correct the mistakes they made back in 1987.

The Mono/Stereo Versions - Did you know that there were stereo and mono versions of all of their albums released during the sixties, often with different takes and overdubs. While the Zombies and the Beach Boys have done the right thing by releasing CDs with both versions of their classic albums, the Beatles still haven’t released the mono version of Sgt. Pepper on CD (despite the fact that their mono version was the “true” version in their minds).

Complete Ed Sullivan Performances - For many Americans, the first time they ever heard the Beatles was on the Ed Sullivan show. Despite this, these performances have never been issued on CD (okay, never officially released).

Live at the Hollywood Bowl - This already came out in the seventies. Where’s the CD?

The Decca Audition - Prior to being signed to EMI, the Beatles performed a great audition for Decca records that contains the only recordings of some of the songs they often played live.

Songs They Gave Away - Did you know that some big hits from the 60’s were given away by the Beatles to other artists? Bad to Me, Come and Get It, and World Without Love were all written by Paul or John. Why hasn’t this stuff been collected?

I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but I wish the Beatles were as money obsessed as the rest of the music industry.

And now back to our regularly-scheduled Bush bashing…