For me it’s a typical latish-Lennon-career formative song idea painstakingly made to sound like The Beatles. The string arrangement especially is Beatles-by-numbers ("now what can we do to make it sound real Beatlish?”). I’m not as damning as Dave and I don’t see The Beatles’ legacy tarnished by a song vainly attempting to resurrect a Lennon song idea 50 years after the band’s demise and 40 years after his passing, but the outcome is not something that would have passed Fab Four internal quality control in, say, 1969. As for Paul believing that he can out-Ringo Ringo on drums and out-George George on lead guitar, well that is hardly anything new, is it?
Between Lennon and Macca, I think Paul is the more consistent songwriter, with John on his solo albums very hit & miss, individual songs are great, but a lot of others seem underdeveloped. There is no Band on the Run (the album) in John’s post-Beatle canon. McCartney can of course be silly and banal sometimes, but there is always a certain craftsmanship.
And I agree with Michael, Lennon’s vocal track sounds weirdly un-Lennon’ish, whether that is because the original demo was just a rough sketch or because the AI messed with the tone, I dunno, but I didn’t recognize Lennon’s voice at first and wondered what had possessed Paul to sing a Lennon song aping the latter’s voice less than successfully.
All that said, the whole exercise is worthwhile to me solely for the snippet in the official vid where Ringo plays drums with his younger self and the two Ringos from different centuries smile at each other - priceless!
And there the case must rest, I don’t believe that this song will be talked about much in ten years from now nor that it will ever gain the airplay/number of clicks of even, say, Love Me Do. Nor will Free as a Bird for that matter.
What’s next, AI algorithms finishing one of Picasso’s unfinished last paintings and that then going round as Picasso’s last painting? Je suis unimpressed.
