The Beatles 1967-1970 ‘The Blue Album’
Right from the first play of Strawberry Fields, the reverse instrumentation sounds as though it is leaving the speakers and floating into the air.
On With a Little Help From My Friends, the backing vocals are more distinctive and brighter. The backward top line and melody on I Am The Walrus soars.
During Hello Goodbye every glorious nuance shines through the spinning blue vinyl record. Paul McCartney’s melancholic masterpiece The Fool On The Hill sounds particularly evocative with those enhanced wistful flutes. Magical Mystery Tour is one of those Beatles tracks that suggest a blue-print for Oasis with that brilliantly raspy vocal and up-tempo rock melody.
The track list has been expanded which might take a bit of getting used to for some. New life is breathed into the work which has been mixed in stereo and Dolby Atmos by Giles Martin at Abbey Road studios. The most significant addition is the recent single Now And Then which was originally a John Lennon demo recorded in 1977 at the Dakota building in New York. Yoko Ono gifted the track to the remaining Beatles back in 1994 along with Free As A Bird and Real Love.
Undoubtedly this is the strongest cut of the three and thankfully Lennon’s track has been realised thanks to cutting-edge modern technology the creative flourish of his former bandmates and some lush orchestration.
It’s a haunting track that fits well into the collection, strangely, it’s as if it’s always been there.
