Ringo Starr spoke about the "emotional experience" of creating the Beatles ' "last song ," "Now and Then."
The drummer reunited with former bandmate Paul McCartney to record one last song with the Liverpool quartet, with the help of artificial intelligence. The song will be released this Thursday, the 2nd.
“He called me and said he’d like to work on ‘Now And Then’,” Ringo recalled (via Music News ). “‘What do you think?’,” he quoted Macca as saying. “‘I think it’s great.’”
Starr continued: “Then he put on the bass and sent me the files. I put on the drums. That was the closest we got to having him [ John Lennon ] back in the room, so it was very emotional for all of us.”
The drummer also said that "it was as if John was there" with them in the recording studio.
McCartney previously explained that Lennon's voice is "crystal clear" on 'Now And Then', adding: "It's quite moving."
He said: “And we all played on it, it’s a genuine Beatles recording. In 2023, to still be working on Beatles music and about to release a new song that the public hasn’t heard yet, I think that’s an exciting thing.”
John Lennon wrote the song and recorded a piano demo in the late 1970s. In 1994, his widow Yoko Ono gave the recording to McCartney, George Harrison , and Starr. The surviving members, along with producer Jeff Lynne, recorded new parts and completed a version of "Now and Then".
Now, thanks to artificial intelligence, McCartney and Starr have managed to isolate and process John Lennon's voice. The result will be remembered as "the last Beatles song".
