Get Back

[Robin L]

Watching "Get Back" on Disney +. Very strange, and very much of our time. This is the 8 CD/12 LP, 1 Blu-Ray [but long] deep dig into the sessions for what was going to be "Get Back" but turned into that bummer of bummers, "Let it Be":

I recall seeing the VHS of "Let it Be" many years ago, feeling unimpressed. And the album itself is up there with "Beatles for Sale" as a Contractual Obligation slog.

But because this extended version of this slog shows so much of the process, it feels a bit like the experience of rehearsing for just about anyone with just about any musical aggregation. Being in the midst of the process always is more fun [or valuable] than simply witnessing the process. I'm less than an hour in, nothing has exploded so far, but the low-level irritation and sniping is already in the mix. Being the sort of obsessive completist this show was designed for, have little doubt that I will make it all the way to the end.

I wonder what your impressions are like.

https://www.disneyplus.com/video/19a0749f-29de-493d-aafb-2a79169d2d65

 

[Jimbob54]

Watching "Get Back" on Disney +. Very strange, and very much of our time. This is the 8 CD/12 LP, 1 Blu-Ray [but long] deep dig into the sessions for what was going to be "Get Back" but turned into that bummer of bummers, "Let it Be":

View attachment 168179

I recall seeing the VHS of "Let it Be" many years ago, feeling unimpressed. And the album itself is up there with "Beatles for Sale" as a Contractual Obligation slog.

But because this extended version of this slog shows so much of the process, it feels a bit like the experience of rehearsing for just about anyone with just about any musical aggregation. Being in the midst of the process always is more fun [or valuable] than simply witnessing the process. I'm less than an hour in, nothing has exploded so far, but the low-level irritation and sniping is already in the mix. Being the sort of obsessive completist this show was designed for, have little doubt that I will make it all the way to the end.

I wonder what your impressions are like.

https://www.disneyplus.com/video/19a0749f-29de-493d-aafb-2a79169d2d65

I always struggle with Lennon and McCartney as personalities so I imagine I will find it intensely irritating but I've got the itch to watch it anyway. Might dabble this weekend.

 

[Doodski]

I appreciate the genius of The Beatles and their mastery of the 2 minute and forty second song success but after a while they grate on my head. I wonder what could have been if they had stayed together.

 

[Robin L]

I always struggle with Lennon and McCartney as personalities so I imagine I will find it intensely irritating but I've got the itch to watch it anyway. Might dabble this weekend.

Paul is genuinely irritating, John is mostly not there, George is getting pissed, Ringo's happy to get paid, as always.

Michael Lindsay-Hogg looks a bit and sounds a bit like Orson Welles He also appears clueless.

 

[Robin L]

I appreciate the genius of The Beatles and their mastery of the 2 minute and forty second song success but after a while they grate on my head. I wonder what could have been if they had stayed together.

 

[Doodski]

Paul is genuinely irritating, John is mostly not there, George is getting pissed, Ringo's happy to get paid, as always.

Michael Lindsay-Hogg looks a bit and sounds a bit like Orson Welles He also appears clueless.

hehe. I placed all the surnames of the Beatles easily. That's testament to the historical importance of the band in most peoples' memory.

 

[Robin L]

Best giggle so far: Paul is improvising "Commonwealth", after some Enoch Powell headlines in the papers, John squaws "Yeah" like a parrot. About 5 minutes shy of two hours in. Nobody's threatened to quit, so far, and this movie is already longer than "Let it Be".

 

[Robin L]

Best moment so far: Episode 3, first ten minutes. Linda Eastman [not yet McCartney] and daughter Heather [just turned six years old] show up at Apple. Heather does her version of Yoko, with the band playing behind her. Impossibly cute.

 

[anmpr1]

LOL with Let it Rot. It was the best of the Beatle lampoons, right up there with Frank's We're Only In It For the Money album cover. As a long time Bonzo fan, I naturally followed Neil Innes' career with fondness. He was always adept at mimicking the Fab Four's sound, long before the Ruts were ever imagined.

And they had a history. The Bonzo presence on the ridiculous Mystery Tour was the highlight... maybe the film's only highlight.

Also, can't forget Viv Stanshall (a tragic character for sure), Roger Spear (playing 'electric shirt collar'), with 'Legs' Larry Smith. And Sam Spoons on spoons. All very funny.

 

[Robin L]

LOL with Let it Rot. It was the best of the Beatle lampoons, right up there with Frank's We're Only In It For the Money album cover. As a long time Bonzo fan, I naturally followed Neil Innes' career with fondness. He was always adept at mimicking the Fab Four's sound, long before the Ruts were ever imagined.

And they had a history. The Bonzo presence on the ridiculous Mystery Tour was the highlight... maybe the film's only highlight.

Also, can't forget Viv Stanshall (a tragic character for sure), Roger Spear (playing 'electric shirt collar'), with 'Legs' Larry Smith. And Sam Spoons on spoons. All very funny.

The lawsuit of a lifetime:

Can't say John didn't warn Neil.

 

[Amplifier dude]

The video recorder they used must have been high end at the time. Blown away with the resolution. Makes it really feel like it wasn’t 52 years ago watching in Dolby vision on my 4K TV.

 

[Robin L]

The longer I watch this, the more I like it. I find it really striking that this documentary is the work of the man who came up with Heavenly Creatures, one of the all-time great weird movies, and one based on a true story:

I'm 1:01:50 into the last episode:

" . . .You gotta be sneaky with the Beatles, otherwise we'll go on forever in a circle, you know . . . "

. . . which is a very "on" a comment for "Get Back", this 8-hour slog through the creation of an album. For those of us who engage in musical enterprises, it's remarkable how hard these musicians work [mostly thanks to head slave driver Macca], and how much the process of creating music depends on repetition, rehearsal, screwing around, finding a groove, settling into a song until it feels like home.

 

[Jimbob54]

I'm about an hour into #1 and I have two overwhelming thoughts:

1. Its fascinating
2. Why is Yoko there? It would be akin to my wife coming into my office and sitting in on meetings.

 

[Robin L]

The video recorder they used must have been high end at the time. Blown away with the resolution. Makes it really feel like it wasn’t 52 years ago watching in Dolby vision on my 4K TV.

This was shot on 16-millimeter film. The original idea was for a television special capped off by a live performance in a spectacular looking venue. Of course, what we finally got was this. The work Peter Jackson did in upgrading World War One footage was applied to the 16-mm films of The Beatles:

 

[Tom C]

The video recorder they used must have been high end at the time. Blown away with the resolution. Makes it really feel like it wasn’t 52 years ago watching in Dolby vision on my 4K TV.

Wasn’t it 35mm film?

 

[Amplifier dude]

Wasn’t it 35mm film?

Probably

 

[Robin L]

I'm about an hour into #1 and I have two overwhelming thoughts:

1. Its fascinating
2. Why is Yoko there? It would be akin to my wife coming into my office and sitting in on meetings.

Wait until you get to Heather's Yoko Ono impression with accompaniment from the band. Priceless.

 

[Amplifier dude]

I'm about an hour into #1 and I have two overwhelming thoughts:

1. Its fascinating
2. Why is Yoko there? It would be akin to my wife coming into my office and sitting in on meetings.

Yoko was in the studio for a long time before that. She was present for all the White Album recording sessions in 1968 as well.

 

[Robin L]

Probably

Nope.
See above.
In the darker corners of the interwebs you'll find an upload of the original "Let it Be' probably from a VHS tape, and I suspect it's only a matter of time before the original reappears in a legitimate form. It doesn't look anything like Peter Jackson's "Get Back", much grainer, not as focused

 

[Inner Space]

I noticed McCartney's six-string acoustic - an upside-down Martin, with flipped strings, but the bridge hadn't been moved ... the intonation was therefore way off, but it sounded pleasant nonetheless.