The Beatles - Let It Be

The Beatles' unofficial final album before breaking up is a patchy affair, thrown together from various odds and ends. Semi-live and fairly stripped down, apart from the odd Phil Spector orchestration, it has a few decent songs, but a lot of casual arsing around. Paul's ballad "Let it Be" is nice and slushy, as is "The Long and Winding Road", but overlooked tracks include "I've Got a Feeling", "I Me Mine", and George's squeaky "For You Blue". John's smooth "Across the Universe" is a lush piece of hippy stargazing.

Fans might think it's underrated, but this is well down the list of Beatles stuff for casual listeners to check out. The recently-released "naked" version, stripped of Spector's production gloop, is by all accounts more palatable.

July 3, 2004

6 out of 10

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