Lew: It’s rare to hear the Beatles’ final album, Let It Be, discussed without an accompanying discussion of the famously difficult sessions that went into recording
the album, or the personal conflicts that ensued and ultimately led to
the break-up of the band. As a historical component of the Beatles’
eventual dissolution, it makes sense to view the finished album, and the
sessions that created it (as detailed in the movie of the same name) as
one artifact. That said, it’s unlikely that the album gets a fair shake
when situated against the arguments of whether Paul or John was right,
or whether Yoko really broke up the band. The truth is that it’s an
interesting album on its own merits, and might have indicated a new
creative period for the band if they had continued. Paul’s idea of going
back to basics had yielded results that weren’t as predictable as one
might expect. Rather than an obvious return to the songwriting style of Beatles For Sale or Help!, Let It Be filters a large part of its simplified approach through the more ambitious work of their later output – whether in a literal or reactionary sense – striking a balance between less complex arrangements and charting new territory (“One After 909” notwithstanding) compositionally. “I’ve Got a Feeling” marries simplicity and complexity as well as any other song on Let It Be. On one hand, the musical structure is fairly basic, and the arrangement is pretty straightforward. At the same time, the song itself is a marriage between two song fragments, written by McCartney and Lennon, respectively. It’s a move that recalls the multi-part suite at the end of Abbey Road, but on a more modest scale, and I would say in a more organic way. I have to admit that it never occurred to me that the two sections of the song originated separately until I did some reading to prepare for discussing it here, which I think speaks to how well McCartney and Lennon were able to work together, even at this late date.
Aaron, there’s a lot worth discussing in “I’ve Got a Feeling,” but I guess I’m interested in starting with how you see it fitting into The Beatles’ work as a whole. Do you think it’s a new approach, or would you say that it fits in somewhere in the songs that precede it?
