More than 53 years after their breakup, the Beatles return with a new song recorded and mixed thanks to artificial intelligence that brought the four trendy boys together.
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The two surviving members of the legendary Liverpool band, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, officially announced on Thursday that “Now and Then” will be released on November 2nd.
The song originated from a demo recorded by John Lennon in his New York apartment in the 1970s. After his murder in 1980, his widow Yoko Ono gave the vocal and piano tape to the other members of the group in 1994.
The latter had revised and completed it, but were never able to release it because the techniques available at the time did not allow John Lennon’s voice to be extracted in sufficient quality.
This is now the case. The trigger was the documentary series “Get Back” produced by Peter Jackson in 2021. The Lord of the Rings trilogy director then extracted Lennon’s voice from a cassette tape by separating it from the piano using new technology.
“In the end we had John’s voice, crystal clear,” explained Paul McCartney, quoted in the press release announcing the release of this track. “It’s very moving and we all play on it, it’s a real Beatles recording,” the 81-year-old musician continued.
Electric and acoustic guitar recordings by George Harrison from 1995, before his death in 2001, were added to the original demo. The song was completed last year in Los Angeles studios and mixed drums from Ringo Starr, piano and bass from Paul McCartney and vocals from the two living Beatles.
“It was very emotional for all of us. It’s like John is among us,” said Ringo Starr, 83.
“Last recording”
In April 1970, six months after the release of the album Abbey Road and one month before that of Let It Be, the Beatles announced their separation. The ten years of life together between Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr produced 14 best-selling albums, sold almost a billion records and led to the filming of several films.
Despite the deaths of Lennon in 1980 and Harrison in 2001, “Beatlemania” remains alive around the world and the possibilities offered by artificial intelligence (AI) have already inspired fans to try to bring them together or the latest works of Paul McCartney to look at again in his youthful voice.
When McCartney was interviewed by the BBC about these developments last June, he revealed the preparations for this new song.
“We came to make the last Beatles recording. It was a model from John that we worked from,” Macca explained. “We were able to take John’s voice and clean it up using AI to mix the recording.”
He hadn’t given the song a name, but everything pointed to it being called “Now and Then.” The existence of the model was known and Paul McCartney had made no secret of his desire to give the piece a new life. But he had always stated that the project was not successful due to opposition from George Harrison, who did not like it.
The song goes on sale from 1pm GMT on November 2nd.
The day before, a 12-minute documentary appeared on the Beatles’ YouTube channel.
On November 10th, two compilations of their albums will be released, supplemented by additional tracks.