The Beatles are still captivating our attention 55 years after they called it quits. Back in 1995, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr completed John Lennon’s demo for “Free as a Bird” for Anthology 1, ending the track with Lennon’s voice saying, “My name is John Lennon.” Now in the newly announced Anthology Collection, set for release on November 21st, the new mix swaps that line for a real cheeky “Turned out nice again,” once again keeping Beatles fans on their toes.
The updated mixes of “Free as a Bird” and “Real Love” are being called “de-mixes,” thanks to groundbreaking software developed by Peter Jackson’s company for the 2021 documentary Get Back. This technology allowed producers to isolate and enhance Lennon’s vocals from old demos, a process that proved crucial again in 2022 when McCartney and Starr revisited “Now and Then”—a third Lennon demo that had been shelved during the original Anthology project due to poor audio quality. McCartney explained how Jackson’s AI could separate Lennon’s voice from a noisy cassette, saying, “We were able to take John's voice and get it pure through this AI so that then we could mix the record as you would normally do.”
The Anthology Collection features 13 previously unreleased demos, session recordings, and rare gems. Among them are never-before-heard versions of classics like “In My Life,” “Nowhere Man,” “If I Fell,” “I’ve Just Seen a Face,” and even a rehearsal for the BBC broadcast of “All You Need Is Love.”
[Source: Premiere]
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