The Beatles:Let It Be--Naked

As much as I was looking forward to this release, I think its much ado about nothing. Certainly, its nice to hear stripped down versions of some of these tunes, but the most important virtue of this disc is the remastering, which is superb. But aside from the obvious improvement on 'Long And Winding Road', I've heard better versions of the songs 'Let It Be', 'Get Back', and 'Don't Bring Me Down' on the <i>Past Masters</i> release (which I own). In fact, <i>Past Masters</i> has a stringless version of Lennon's 'Across The Universe' on it and the anthology series has a stringless 'Long And Winding Road, so..., why did I buy this CD? I needed to hear this CD's sound quality to remind me that the Beatles catalog hasn't been remastered, but should. The other songs on this disc, like 'The Two Of Us', shimmer. And its the other songs that make me glad I bought this disc. This is not a raw version, but a very pollished sounding disc, so purists beware. So unless you're a completist, or maybe you don't own a version of <i>Let It Be</i>, let someone else buy it for you, or just let it be.

I agree that it would have been more of a relevation if Let It Be Naked had come out before some of the stripped down versions appeared on the Anthology discs. I think the Anthology took a lot of the wind out of the sails for the LIBN release. Although, I suspect the Anthology release paved the way for this project to happen.

I read another review that stated the new release 'fits' better between the White Album and Abbey Road - I would tend to agree with that - because it's more polished now and it seems to flow better as an album.

I agree that LIBN doesn't contain the definitive versions of some tracks - I prefer the originally released version of Don't Let Me Down and the Anthology version of Two Of Us, for example.

As a fab fan I still enjoyed hearing familiar tracks in a new light, and I understand the reasoning behind this project. However, I think it's a fine line to "redo" a 30+ year old release. I just hope that lots of others don't follow suit - I don't know... it just seems to blur history.

Don't get me wrong - I'm still anxious for the Beatles catalog to be remastered, especially after hearing the incredible Yellow Submarine Songbook. Some multichannel mixes would be welcome, too...

I'm waiting for the instrumental version of Van Morrison's Poetic Champions Compose CD. The back-up tracks are great, and I'd like to hear them without VM's vocals over top.