Editing "Let It Down"
Toward a Tighter Track
Posted by Rick Prescott on June 14, 2020
On All Things Must Pass, "Let It Down" runs right around five minutes, which is a long time for a pop song, even a deep album cut (which this is). On the one hand, the song has two distinct sections and tones, each of which is inherently interesting and must be allowed to reach its potential. On the other, there is a fine line between just the right length and too long (or short).
Many of the Beatles' early hits ran right around two minutes, and the typical pop song eventually stretched to three or four, which remains the standard today. This likely results from the same attention span issues which inform the length of album sides (as discussed in chapter 6). Longer songs aren't inherently a problem, unless shorter would be better. "Let It Down" is obviously bigger than two minutes, but feels stretched into five.
The Assembler would have flagged three "dead zones," totaling about a minute in length, which are extraneous. The parts in question precede the verses, and are comprised of a simple two-chord figure, repeated twice, without vocal. Two of three are faintly adorned with minimal slide guitar figures.
To tighten side four of Dream, these segments would have certainly been excised.
The first argument to leave these sections alone might be that since George put them there, they must be kept. Our Assembler rejects this argument quickly because the Beatles were not always their own best critics when recording solo, and it is his job to locate things exactly like this. Such edits are incredibly routine, and were used by the Beatles many times. In a famous example, this type of editing led to the various "versions" of "I Am the Walrus," in which some short segments are repeated more or less than other versions.
The second argument to keep them would be that they offer a "reset" of sorts between the monstrous main riff, which also accompanies the chorus, and the decidedly more tranquil verses. This argument actually has some merit, requiring that the listening be the ultimate arbiter. If removing these sections reduces the effectiveness of the shift in tone, then they must stay.
But this does not turn out to be the case. There appears to be no penalty to the overall structure of the song or the perception of its verses by removing these rather long interludes. Indeed, by reducing the dead space, the tone shift is accentuated and therefore even more effective.
On a triple album, a third argument can be made for leaving such material in the tracks – namely that there is a lot of space to fill. "Let It Down" is on side two of the album, which runs about 19 minutes, meaning there would be not much penalty there for the trim. The side is still long enough. The likelihood is, however, that it didn't occur to Phil Spector or anyone else that tightening this record might actually have improved it.
Had the track been used as a single, which would have been an unconventional but inspired choice, such edits would certainly have been made, a sure sign that they are warranted and welcome. On side four of Dream, removing a full minute from this track does not blunt its impact in any way, but takes a great song and nudges it toward succinctness, compactness, and clarity – all of which are welcome.
Many of the Beatles' early hits ran right around two minutes, and the typical pop song eventually stretched to three or four, which remains the standard today. This likely results from the same attention span issues which inform the length of album sides (as discussed in chapter 6). Longer songs aren't inherently a problem, unless shorter would be better. "Let It Down" is obviously bigger than two minutes, but feels stretched into five.
The Assembler would have flagged three "dead zones," totaling about a minute in length, which are extraneous. The parts in question precede the verses, and are comprised of a simple two-chord figure, repeated twice, without vocal. Two of three are faintly adorned with minimal slide guitar figures.
To tighten side four of Dream, these segments would have certainly been excised.
The first argument to leave these sections alone might be that since George put them there, they must be kept. Our Assembler rejects this argument quickly because the Beatles were not always their own best critics when recording solo, and it is his job to locate things exactly like this. Such edits are incredibly routine, and were used by the Beatles many times. In a famous example, this type of editing led to the various "versions" of "I Am the Walrus," in which some short segments are repeated more or less than other versions.
The second argument to keep them would be that they offer a "reset" of sorts between the monstrous main riff, which also accompanies the chorus, and the decidedly more tranquil verses. This argument actually has some merit, requiring that the listening be the ultimate arbiter. If removing these sections reduces the effectiveness of the shift in tone, then they must stay.
But this does not turn out to be the case. There appears to be no penalty to the overall structure of the song or the perception of its verses by removing these rather long interludes. Indeed, by reducing the dead space, the tone shift is accentuated and therefore even more effective.
On a triple album, a third argument can be made for leaving such material in the tracks – namely that there is a lot of space to fill. "Let It Down" is on side two of the album, which runs about 19 minutes, meaning there would be not much penalty there for the trim. The side is still long enough. The likelihood is, however, that it didn't occur to Phil Spector or anyone else that tightening this record might actually have improved it.
Had the track been used as a single, which would have been an unconventional but inspired choice, such edits would certainly have been made, a sure sign that they are warranted and welcome. On side four of Dream, removing a full minute from this track does not blunt its impact in any way, but takes a great song and nudges it toward succinctness, compactness, and clarity – all of which are welcome.
Comments
Posted by Rod Switzer on September 8, 2020
I was not able to duplicate these edits. The edit prior to the first verse was easy. There's that slide part before the second verse and the note is held over the vocal. Also the drums & bass really don't come in clean. It's even worse prior to the third verse. In addition to the slide guitar, there are now horns. The bass comes in slightly early too. I'm using Audacity for the edit. I'd be interested in hearing a successful attempt at this.
Posted by Rick Prescott on September 9, 2020
Rod,
I will put together a more detailed edit description with visuals, if possible. Also, I'll see if I can duplicate this in Audacity (which is not my go-to editor, but I do have available). If I can, I'll be happy to share the finished edits. Stay tuned.
I will put together a more detailed edit description with visuals, if possible. Also, I'll see if I can duplicate this in Audacity (which is not my go-to editor, but I do have available). If I can, I'll be happy to share the finished edits. Stay tuned.
Posted by Rick Prescott on September 9, 2020
Just added an image of my edits to the end of the post. You may need to download it and zoom in to see the actual details.
Posted by Rick Prescott on September 16, 2020
Here is a version of these edits created specifically in Audacity:
H01-08 Let It Down (edit).zip
Unfortunately, Audacity's tools aren't quite as intuitive or flexible as those in Vegas and Audition, but I think this came out pretty well.
As you will see, I left the sections on separate tracks to make very clear where the edits happen (though it will play seamlessly). At each break is a short, manual crossfade. In other words, rather than using Audacity's "Crossfade" effect, which is clunky, I manually created a fade out on the first segment, and matched it as needed to a fade in on the following segment. It took a little playing around to get it close enough to sound seamless.
In Vegas, splicing and crossfades are significantly easier to create, with multiple very good crossfade templates to choose from. And though ProTools is the industry standard, I find it sort of arbitrarily quirky compared to Vegas, which has been my go-to editor for things like this since version 2.0 – which I started using in 2000!
H01-08 Let It Down (edit).zip
Unfortunately, Audacity's tools aren't quite as intuitive or flexible as those in Vegas and Audition, but I think this came out pretty well.
As you will see, I left the sections on separate tracks to make very clear where the edits happen (though it will play seamlessly). At each break is a short, manual crossfade. In other words, rather than using Audacity's "Crossfade" effect, which is clunky, I manually created a fade out on the first segment, and matched it as needed to a fade in on the following segment. It took a little playing around to get it close enough to sound seamless.
In Vegas, splicing and crossfades are significantly easier to create, with multiple very good crossfade templates to choose from. And though ProTools is the industry standard, I find it sort of arbitrarily quirky compared to Vegas, which has been my go-to editor for things like this since version 2.0 – which I started using in 2000!
Posted by Rod Switzer on September 21, 2020
Nicely done! Thanks for sharing. Thanks also for the software tips, it's nice to have more flexible options.
A thought about this song in the assembly. It really blasts in after some pretty mellow songs. I may take your edit and replace the intense intro with the few bars that were edited out prior to George's first vocal. Fading in those first couple bars prior to George's vocal.
Are you familiar with "Let's Put The Beatles Back Together Again 1970-2010" by Jeff Walker? He has quite a few suggested edits to solo songs. Many of which I like (but not all)
I'm trying to keep this first assembled album under CD max length (i.e. 80 minutes)
A thought about this song in the assembly. It really blasts in after some pretty mellow songs. I may take your edit and replace the intense intro with the few bars that were edited out prior to George's first vocal. Fading in those first couple bars prior to George's vocal.
Are you familiar with "Let's Put The Beatles Back Together Again 1970-2010" by Jeff Walker? He has quite a few suggested edits to solo songs. Many of which I like (but not all)
I'm trying to keep this first assembled album under CD max length (i.e. 80 minutes)
Posted by Rick Prescott on September 21, 2020
One thing I didn't talk about in the book (which will become a blog entry soon) is that tracks like "I'm a Fool to Care" and "Let It Down" were mastered at completely different volumes. I had to remaster almost all tracks to get the volumes to match, and the albums sound right. It was a pretty elaborate and time-consuming process.
So Ringo's track, which you often find ripped from vinyl, needs to be brought up in overall volume in order not to be blasted out by "Let It Down" – which is pushed up to the absolute max in all of its digital versions. Likewise, everything on side four – which, you're right, contains some pretty mellow stuff – needs to be considered in terms of relative volume.
With the volumes normalized in this way, the effect is more of George Martin's "change of color" than a blasting out, and I think it works quite well. (I'm finalizing the podcast now, and expect to drop half of it this week and half next week. You'll be able to hear the results better there.)
As to the Walker book, before I started writing, I just assumed that somebody had already done this, and other than about a billion blog entries and YouTube playlists, that's the only actual book I could find which directly addressed the challenge. (I found a couple of others which had sections, or at least touched on the idea.) At first I thought, "Great. Now I don't have to do this!" But then I read it...
Despite starting with a very similar idea, he goes some very weird directions, and doesn't create "albums" per se, but more like big box sets. It misses the point of care in the assembly.
I didn't spend too much time with his track edits because I have a lot of experience doing that professionally, and figured I'd just apply my own knowledge as necessary.
So Ringo's track, which you often find ripped from vinyl, needs to be brought up in overall volume in order not to be blasted out by "Let It Down" – which is pushed up to the absolute max in all of its digital versions. Likewise, everything on side four – which, you're right, contains some pretty mellow stuff – needs to be considered in terms of relative volume.
With the volumes normalized in this way, the effect is more of George Martin's "change of color" than a blasting out, and I think it works quite well. (I'm finalizing the podcast now, and expect to drop half of it this week and half next week. You'll be able to hear the results better there.)
As to the Walker book, before I started writing, I just assumed that somebody had already done this, and other than about a billion blog entries and YouTube playlists, that's the only actual book I could find which directly addressed the challenge. (I found a couple of others which had sections, or at least touched on the idea.) At first I thought, "Great. Now I don't have to do this!" But then I read it...
Despite starting with a very similar idea, he goes some very weird directions, and doesn't create "albums" per se, but more like big box sets. It misses the point of care in the assembly.
I didn't spend too much time with his track edits because I have a lot of experience doing that professionally, and figured I'd just apply my own knowledge as necessary.
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