More than 50 years after the Beatles broke up, John, Paul, George and Ringo are back together, reunited for one final track that was released Thursday, officially closing the final chapter in the band’s musical output and legacy.
The song, titled “Now and Then,” was played on BBC radio just after 2 p.m. local time (10 a.m. ET) and simultaneously released on streaming platforms. With the help of digital technology, it features both John Lennon, who was shot dead in 1980, and George Harrison, who died from lung cancer in 2001.
With new contributions from Paul McCartney, 81, and Ringo Starr, 83, the song will be the final music released by possibly the most influential and bestselling musical group of the 20th century.
Such is the enduring popularity of the band that some listeners complained on social media that the song appeared to glitch or stop entirely when played on the Spotify streaming platform.
“We listened to the track and there’s John in his apartment in New York City, banging away at his piano, doing a little demo,” McCartney said in a short BBC documentary film released Wednesday to mark the new song.
McCartney revealed in the film that he had second thoughts about using Lennon’s voice.
“Every time I thought like that I thought, wait a minute — let’s say I had the chance to ask John, ‘Hey John, would you like us to finish that last song of yours?’ I’m telling you, I know what the answer would have been ‘Yeah!’ He would have loved it,” he said.
McCartney delighted fans in June by announcing the final track was on the way, revealing that he was working with movie director Peter Jackson to isolate and enhance a low-quality cassette tape of John Lennon singing and playing piano in his New York apartment in the late 1970s.
The tape was passed on to the surviving Beatles members in 1994 by Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono, and featured the songs “Free as a Bird” and “Real Love,” which were both reworked by the surviving members, produced by Jeff…
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