49 The Beatles, ‘Let It Be’And so the journey comes to an end, because all things must pass.
The slight dilemma about where to end this list of 49 songs (49 reasons) was settled in my mind as I wrote about the Velvet Underground and the Rolling Stones a few entries ago.
My love of music begins and ends with the fab four, and in terms of bookending opposites - John Lennon and Paul McCartney fit the bill.
I began in entry number one with a celebration of John Lennon’s superb ‘Don’t Let Me Down’, which was written and performed during the ill-fated Let It Be sessions. What could be more appropriate for this last entry, than a celebration of his partner – Paul, and HIS finest moment as a Beatle, also written and performed for the Get Back project that became Let It Be.
They were chalk and cheese weren’t they? Not so freakishly, they were fated to meet and work together. They were both young guys living in Liverpool who were interested in music - not hard to imagine them eventually getting together is it? All it took was a couple of mutual friends, a love of playing guitars and creating songs. This happens all over the world every second of every day – somewhere on the planet right now - two people are sitting down trying to figure out guitar chords or trying to match some poetry to an original tune.
What is freaky is that two giant talents should get together in Liverpool and by their actions totally change my world.
What often gets me is that they grew so far apart having started out like ying yang twins. Paul and John - two halves of a whole that couldn’t sustain their working arrangements. Even though they could later patch up their friendship, they couldn’t (and didn’t) ever get together in the studio, or on the stage again. No mind. They left such a fantastic body of work behind, both as a group and as solo artists. Rejoice in that.
Let It Be is, for me, the perfect end of the Beatles. The message is a good one – let it be.
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