Why didnt George Martin produce the Let it Be album?
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Martin always produced the Beatles. Why did they suddenly change the formula? They were still on good terms as Martin produced Abbey Road. Also, Martin was involved in the LIB sessions. Martin could have produced the album either in the Spring 1969 or Fall !969. Why did Glyn Johns and then Spector get involved in the 1st place??
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I'm pretty certain that Martin produced the sessions at the beginning of 1969, and Glyn Johns was also invited to participate. The album was shelved because they weren't happy with it, and then they wanted to release it in conjunction with the film. Eventually Abbey Road was recorded and released, while Let It Be sat unreleased. The timing of this also coincided with the whole Allen Klein affair. I believe Klein was involved in getting Phil Spector to come in and go through the hours of tape and try to make a coherent album out of the sessions. By the time Spector got involved, Paul was staying away from Apple. Between his new life with Linda and his dislike of Klein, he retreated. In the meantime, Spector completed the album, with some of his work (most notably The Long And Winding Road) much to Paul's dislike. That's my recollection at least from all I've read. Hopefully I have the details generally correct.
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Glyn Johns was the Engineer on the Get Back sessions. George Martin produced the sessions, but neither Martin nor the Beatles wanted to go through the hundreds of hours of tape to find the perfect take to issue. That task was given to Glyn Johns by McCartney, who 'produced' two compilations which were rejected by the Beatles. Spector was brought in by Lennon and Harrison to salvage the record. He used the same takes that Glyn Johns used but edited and overdubbed them. EMI didn't credit Martin because he didn't produce the tracks on Let it Be. Martin's reaction was that the credits should appear as follows: ?Produced by George Martin, overproduced by Phil Spector.?
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I'm not sure how much Klein was involved in getting Phil Spector involved. John for sure said he gave the tapes to Spector. I am not sure but George Martin may of walked away from the project. However while the album was re-produced by Spector both the Get Back and Let It Be single versions were produced by George Martin.
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I have heard that the tapes were given to Martin to at least listen to and he got back to the Beatles and said I can't do anything with this junk. So Lennon recommended Spector for the job for better or worse. I'm not sure if they had to fix anything up in the studio with the Beatles. Reason tells me that they had to, but I'm not sure whether they did or not. In retrospect I think Spector did a reasonable job with what he was given to work with
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JoeySmith:
Martin always produced the Beatles. Why did they suddenly change the formula? They were still on good terms as Martin produced Abbey Road. Also, Martin was involved in the LIB sessions. Martin could have produced the album either in the Spring 1969 or Fall !969. Why did Glyn Johns and then Spector get involved in the 1st place??
Martin got fed up with how they were bickering and really not getting much accomplished. It was a completely different way of recording an album than he was used to, and he didn't want to be a part of it....after a time. He did produce the singles.."Get Back/Don't Let me Down." And "Let It Be". He agreed to do "Abbey Road" once he was reassured, by Paul, that they would record it the way they done albums in the past...and that John was in agreement with that. John was, as he didn't want "Let It Be" to stand as the Beatles' final "comment". Or at least that's what I have read here and there. (The Beatles didn't like the Glyn John's raw album...and Phil Spector was called in to rescue the whole mess. He was willing to listen to hours and hours of tape...but then he overproduced several cuts.....e.g., "Long and Winding Road".
