CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Joining the family business has certainly worked for Giles Martin -- and for those he works with.
The son of the legendary Beatles producer George Martin, Giles was discouraged from going into music by his father but did so anyway. The younger Martin has played and written songs, but he’s made his mark primarily behind the recording console. Since 2006′s “LOVE” he has become the primary arbiter for the Beatles’ vault projects, including deluxe reissues of “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” “The Beatles” (aka “The White Album”) and “Abbey Road.”
“Giles is so great,” Ringo Starr says. “With his dad he did a great job and by himself he does a great job with our tracks. He’s part of the family, you know?”
Most recently Martin’s energies have been devoted to “Let It Be.” Martin has created several special archival packages, due out Friday, Oct. 15, for the Beatles’ last-released album (and film soundtrack), remixing and unearthing a treasure trove of unreleased material, including studio chats, jams and early versions of songs that would appear on Abbey Road and John Lennon and George Harrison solo albums.
Alongside that, Martin has been producing and mixing the soundtrack for “The Beatles: Get Back,” Peter Jackson’s three-part, six-hour documentary about the “Let It Be” sessions that premiere Nov. 25-27 on Disney+.
It’s a magical mystery tour of the audio variety, surely the envy of Beatlemaniacs the world over. Does Martin love it? Well, yeah, yeah, yeah...
So how much fun has this one been?
Martin: It was a lot of fun, actually. It’s a lot of fun doing the film as well. It’s fun having such visual references. When you’re working on “Sgt. Pepper,” there’s photographs but with this you have every idea where they are when they’re recording a track, so that’s kind of fun. When I’m working on these projects, I feel like I’m there anyway because you’re so close to it. You get sort of trapped in time. It’s very strange -- I’m trapped in January 1969 for about three months, and then I come out of it again.
There’s a lot of legend and myth around “Let It Be.” What’s the chicken and egg of events here? Was the Peter Jackson film first or were the reissues in mind already?
Martin: We were talking about the film for a long time; The footage had been discovered for a while. Then Peter Jackson came up to do the film and he became the obvious choice, and a great choice. Not only is he an enormous Beatles fan, but his documentaries are incredibly detailed, and also his technological achievements as well. Once that was decided, then to fit in with the program we’d done so far with “Sgt. Pepper’s” and “The White Album” and “Abbey Road,” it made sense to work on the (“Let It Be”) album, too. So, we’ve sort of worked together -- we’re still working on the film now.
There’s a lot of legend surrounding these sessions. What kind of myth vs. reality perspective did you get from immersing in the tapes and footage?
Martin: I think the legend is warped -- funnily enough, I think the Beatles told the wrong story themselves. Of course, it’s a bit more contentious than the others. It’s the only Beatles album that was not really approved by the Beatles. It’s a Beatles album that was made out of a bunch of ideas. The Beatles weren’t completely sure whether they were doing a live album to be recorded later or rehearsing for an album or actually recording an album itself. So, the discipline’s not quite there. It’s too ambitious what they were trying to do. And then the album’s taken by Phil Spector later and changed into something very different from what they thought they were doing.
Conventional wisdom has been that it’s a document of the Beatles breaking up.
Martin: Not at all. We have to remember that “Let It Be” came out (in May of 1970) when the Beatles were at their worst break-up scenario and they were suing each other. However, the album wasn’t made at that time. When the Beatles were actually working on “Let It Be” they were aware of their impending divorce, if you like, ‘cause they’re all going their separate ways -- and the talk about it. It’s a bit like a marriage which is becoming a bit tired, and they’re trying to go back to their date nights by playing live. And it didn’t really work.
What is the story that’s being told here, then?
Martin: I think it’s an incredible document of how the Beatles work together. That’s what it is. It’s not a document of how the Beatles broke up, because they didn’t. They went off, they played the rooftop concert, then they recorded “Within You, Without You” in about 10 days’ time and then did “Abbey Road.” It wasn’t over. Yet.
What were the surprises or “grails” that you found in doing this?
Martin: I suppose on the outtakes there’s like the conversation about “Gimme Some Truth” -- or, as John calls it, “The Hypocrite Song.” Then there’s the delineation for George to a certain degree. He’s off writing these masterpieces, but he doesn’t’ want them to be part for the “Let It Be Project” because I don’t think he believed in it. That’s why he walked out of Twickingham. But I suppose the biggest revelation for me is the quality of the playing on the rooftop. It’s just so hard to believe that’s them on a windy rooftop. “Dig A Pony,” I think, is just great.
Did you consider including more of the rooftop concert on the boxed sets?
Martin: Yeah, we completely considered it. But it’s in the film, the whole thing. Nothing makes audio sound better than picture. I can do all the work I want, but the fact is people will experience the entire rooftop concert in length, but they’ll be able to SEE the Beatles as well. So just doing an audio-only version didn’t really make sense.
What kind of input did you get from Paul and Ringo and the John and George estates for the remix?
Martin: We don’t really discuss a plan on any of these projects because it is what it is. Paul famously wasn’t happy with Phil Spector’s production work, and I met him at Abbey Road (studios) and I said, “Listen, it really doesn’t make sense to change history. I know we did ‘Let It Be...Naked’ but we should probably not do anything drastic with this. And he said, “Yeah, I agree. Can you just take the harp (volume) down on ‘The Long and Winding Road?’ I don’t like it every much.” I think Dhani (Harrison) wanted the strings quieter on “I Me Mine.” Ringo’s really happy. Generally, we all seemed to pull in the right direction. There are very few egos, which I think people find surprising, and there’s a trust that goes on.
“Let It Be” is, famously, the Beatles album your father did NOT produce. How do you feel it would be different if he had?
Martin: It think it’d been a very different album -- it does lack direction, there’s no doubt about it. It’s an album made up of three different producers. Glyn Johns was very much involved in the recording of the “Get Back” sessions, and my father would come in and out and offer his sensibilities. Then Phil Spector came in a year later or so. Glyn Johns was an instinctive producer, reactive, brilliant capturing a band’s performance. My dad was a blueprint producer. He liked everyting to be in place. He liked the efficiency of the work. He like the design of the album, the ambition. My biggest argument with him was once when I didn’t properly measure Pimm’s, which is a drink, with a measuring thing. I feel proud, and he’s like, “You have to measure stuff!” and that’s how he was. So, I think “Let It Be” probably would have sounded a bit more like “Abbey Road,” if you can imagine, but have “Let It Be” songs on it.
“Let It Be” has been pretty consuming, but is there a sense of what will be next?
Martin: Well, I think we have to get this out the door first. There’s always lots of talk about things. The main thing is whatever we do, we have to do it right. The great thing about the Beatles is that we’re a very small team. They’ve given me the freedom to push boundaries and experiment with technology. That’s how we started with “Pepper;” “Why are we gonna make ‘Sgt. Pepper?’ It’s a great sounding record. What’s the point?” Then we did a few tracks, and everyone was inspired and goes, “‘This actually sounds good...” That’s always the best reason to do something, is you want to hear it.
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