On November 2, 2023, the legendary Beatles released a new song, thanks to Artificial Intelligence. An old recording from 1970 that reproduces John Lennon’s voice served as the track for this new musical premiere. It is titled Now and Them, and tells the story of a failed love and was recorded at the legendary Apple Corps, the Beatles’ production company.
The public will be able to hear an unreleased Beatles song
The reconstruction was carried out through a demo that John made with the accompaniment of a piano. The same demo circulated as a bootleg recording of Lennon. They made several attempts to reconstruct the song, until in 2022, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney managed to make the complete recording.
This recording included chords made by the fourth member of the band, who has since passed away, George Harrison. They are guitar arpeggios that George recorded in 1995.
Although the new song does not have the sound quality that recordings have today, what is really exciting is the nostalgia. Hearing the unmistakable voices of John and Paul sing the chorus “is really powerful,” as Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone magazine says.
Release of the new Beatles album
The new song is now on sale as a vinyl single, which on the other side will have Love me Do, the first and last recorded by the Liverpool band. There will also be copies on CD, vinyl and cassettes starting November 3rd.
Peter Jackson, who directed The Lord of the Rings trilogy, will release a music video with completely unreleased images of the band. The video includes material contributed by the band’s first drummer, Pete Best, and his brother, which come from the band’s first film titled The Beatles.
The reconstructed recording that allowed this new song belonged to John Lennon. He recorded it in 1978 at his New York home, accompanying himself on his legendary white piano.
After Lennon’s death, his widow Yoko Ono gave a cassette of the song to the remaining Beatles. This same cassette included other songs, of which they have already recorded two, Free as a Bird and Real Love.
Now and Them is the title, and after several attempts by the remaining members of the group, they abandoned it because it seemed unrecoverable. However, they never gave up. When Peter Jackson made the documentary Get Back, his company developed software to isolate the band’s voices when they overlapped. They used this same technology to remaster the Revolver album.
In the new song just released, this technology served to “lift” John’s voice. In addition, it made it possible to eliminate background noises that had repeatedly prevented reconstruction.
