What was the problem with Let it Be from The Beatles?

Answer 1

If you're referring to the album, and not just the song of the same name, my understanding is that it was an abandoned project. The session tapes had been recorded in early 1969, before Abbey Road. Paul McCartney had retained both George Martin and Glyn Johns as producers, but neither had a clear idea of their role in the project. The concept was a live album, but this was a band that had not played a live concert for over two years before the sessions started.

Glyn Johns twice assembled the recordings into a finished form, an album which was to be called Get Back, but the result was rather raw and unpolished (which was not surprising, considering the recordings he had to work with). The first attempt was delayed for the film production, then shelved in favor of Abbey Road. By that time, the band had broken apart and none of The Beatles were interested in putting any more time into the Get Back album. The next year (in 1970), Glyn Johns made a second attempt to compile an album, but the result was again rejected by the band.

It was probably an impossible objective to make an album that would sound like a live performance and also live up to the expectations of a band that had redefined the limits of recording studio technique.

Lennon and Harrison recruited Phil Spector to make something that would serve as the soundtrack for the documentary film, Let It Be. Spector, knowing that this was going to be the last Beatles album ever released went for more grandiose arrangements and heavily-produced sound than was intended for the original project. McCartney was not pleased with the result.

Answer 2

The movie was meant to show the band working together on a new album; instead it captured their collapse as a group. Arguments, disagreements and musical breakdowns were carefully edited out, but rough edges still showed in the final cut.

The album release was held up more than a year, because the Beatles did not want to work on the recordings, or even think about them, anymore. Financial reasons forced them to allow an album and movie to come out.