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"Now And Then," dubbed the "final" song by The Beatles has arrived on streaming platforms. The song comes with a video directed by Peter Jackson, featuring previously unseen archive footage of the band. Scroll down to hear the song now.
The timeline of "Now And Then" is a convoluted one that starts in the late 1970s when John Lennon first recorded it as a demo. It remained in the vault following Lennon's death in 1980. The newly released recording features guitar laid down by George Harrison in 1995 and freshly recorded parts from Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr.
The first iteration of "Now And Then" was handed to McCartney by Yoko Ono alongside the songs "Free As A Bird" and "Real Love." Those latter tracks were made part of the 1995 release Anthology but "insurmountable technical issues" meant that "Now and Then" could not be finished to the necessary standard. It wasn't until the making of the band's 2021 documentary Get Back that director Jackson introduced the band to AI technology that allowed them to separate Lennon's vocals from his piano and complete the song.
"Nothing has been artificially or synthetically created. It’s all real and we all play on it," McCartney said when the release of "Now And Then" was announced last month. "It was the closest we’ll ever come to having him back in the room, so it was very emotional for all of us,” Starr added. “It was like John was there, you know. It’s far out."
