Were it not for WingNut Films’ machine assisted learning tech, Peter Jackson’s 2021 The Beatles: Get Back Disney Plus docuseries might not exist the way it does today, and that very same artificial intelligence that made that project possible is why the music group’s final song will soon be available to the public for the first time.

Earlier this year, Paul McCartney teased that the same tech Jackson used to de-mix and isolate all of the Beatles’ speaking voices in old footage had also made it possible to recover John Lennon’s vocals from an old cassette of “Now and Then” — an unfinished track recorded as a demo back in the 1970s. Today, the group announced that, after decades of lying in wait, “Now and Then” is finally being released as a fully produced song along with Now and Then – The Last Beatles Song, a 12-minute-long documentary about the song’s production from director Oliver Murray.

In a press release about the new track, McCartney described becoming “quite emotional” over hearing Lennon’s voice on “a genuine Beatles recording” in 2023, and Ringo Starr described the process of producing the song as “the closest we’ll ever come to having [Lennon] back in the room.”

In addition to being available to stream and download, “Now and Then” is also being released as a double A-side vinyl single with “Love Me Do,” the Beatles’ first song, in seven-inch and 12-inch variations. Now And Then – The Last Beatles Song debuts on November 1st, “Now and Then” the song drops November 2nd, and the song’s music video debuts November 3rd.



The Verge