A Beatles mash-up made with 'Love'
Not so long ago, tampering with a beloved cultural icon's legacy was tantamount to blasphemy. It was fine to turn ABBA tunes into a musical, but God forbid anyone lay a finger on the Beatles. When
But in 2004 a little-known DJ named Danger Mouse blended "The Beatles" (a.k.a. "The White Album") with Jay-Z's "The Black Album," and "The Grey Album" became an Internet phenomenon. It turns out modern music fans' taste for creativity outpaced the need to keep pop music's bible of a back catalog under glass.
Even more surprising is that at the very same moment, none other than Sir George Martin, the legendary Beatles producer, was doing some splicing and dicing of his own.
Today marks the release of "Love," the soundtrack to the Las Vegas-based Cirque du Soleil production of the same name. It's a whimsical, reverent, occasionally radical set of remixes assembled by the only person with the credibility to earn the blessing of surviving Beatles Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr as well as the families of John Lennon and George Harrison.
Martin, with his son and collaborator Giles, didn't just dust off old master tapes. The pair spent three years combing the group's archives for connective threads: common tempos, lyrical bonds, matching moods. Those were the launch pads for a project that cobbles song parts large and small into 26 mash-ups, most of which sparkle with wit and insight.
Whether by design or by accident, Ringo gets his due on this CD. The drums from "Why Don't We Do It in the Road?" fuel "Lady Madonna," which has been retrofitted nearly to the point of disorientation with Billy Preston's organ from "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" and Eric Clapton's solo on "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." Ringo's vocal on "Octopus's Garden" is accompanied by the lush strings from "Good Night" and transformed from perky novelty to a dreamer's refrain.
Martin occasionally stumbles. He's arranged for the guitar intro from "Blackbird" to lead into "Yesterday" for no better reason than it works out on the music staff. It's a surprise, but one without the poetry and synchronicity that make this collection so meaningful, and such an unexpected delight.
Hearing "Strawberry Fields Forever" unfold is to appreciate Martin's deep and intimate history with the Beatles. The song begins with Lennon's ragged voice-guitar demo and is fleshed out piece by piece, until the full-blown masterpiece materializes. It's ornamented, illogically and gorgeously, with the vocal coda from "Hello Goodbye" and the harpsichord from "Piggies." It's as if a world-famous architect had returned to his renowned building, original drawings in hand, and reassembled the thing from the ground up. For fun, or because at the age of 80 he's still a great artist, the designer has added a cupola from an earlier landmark and grafted a cornice from a castle in another country. Magically, the pieces fit together.
