Paul McCartney and John Lennon in December 1963.Photo:Val Wilmer/Redferns
Val Wilmer/Redferns
Paul McCartneyis clarifyinghis recent revelationabout an upcoming “final"Beatlesrecord.
After McCartney, 81, revealed in an interview withBBC Radio 4’sBest of Todaylast week that AI was used to “extricate” late bandmateJohn Lennon’s voice from an old demo, he’s now making it clear that all four original Beatles are indeed playing on the upcoming song.
“Been great to see such an exciting response to our forthcoming Beatles project. No one is more excited than us to be sharing something with you later in the year,” McCartney wrote to Twitter.“We’ve seen some confusion and speculation about it. Seems to be a lot of guess work out there,” he continued. “Can’t say too much at this stage but to be clear, nothing has been artificially or synthetically created.”
“It’s all real and we all play on it. We cleaned up some existing recordings — a process which has gone on for years.”
Paul McCartney in 2016.Pierre Suu/Getty
McCartney’s latest statement about the upcoming project comes a week after he revealed it would be “released this year.” As he explained at the time, AI was used to “extricate” Lennon’s voice, decades after the singer-songwriter wasshot and killed in December 1980at the age of 40.
“It was a demo that John had that we worked on,” McCartney said. “We were able to take John’s voice and get it pure through this AI. Then we could mix the record, as you would normally do. So it gives you some sort of leeway.”
Oscar-winning directorPeter Jacksondid something similar in the 2021 documentary seriesThe Beatles: Get Back,McCartney explained. The project covered the making of the pivotal 1970 albumLet It Be.
“We were able to use that kind of thing when Peter Jackson did,” McCartney said. “He could separate them with AI. He could tell the machine, ‘This is a voice, this is a guitar, lose the guitar.’ And he did that. So it has great uses.”
The BBC reportedthe song to be a 1978 track Lennon wrote called “Now and Then,” which he recorded on a boombox shortly before his death and whichYoko Ono, Lennon’s widow, famously gave to McCartney on a cassette labeled, “For Paul.”
The Beatles attempted to record the song in 1995 for their Anthology series, butGeorge Harrison, whodied in 2001at age 58, complained the sound quality was “rubbish.”
“It didn’t have a very good title, it needed a bit of reworking, but it had a beautiful verse and it had John singing it,” McCartney toldQ Magazinein 1997. “[But] George didn’t like it. The Beatles being a democracy, we didn’t do it.”
McCartney’s clarification arrives as AI-generated music has taken over TikTok and social media, and as the Recording Academy released a statement outlining its stance on the matter.
“Only human creators are eligible to be submitted for consideration for, nominated for, or win a Grammy Award,” the academy shared in astatement. “A work that contains no human authorship is not eligible in any categories.”
source: people.com
