All you need is cash!

With Christmas approaching the current raft of available musical product to purchase and I use the term ‘product’ with great significance.

November and the run up to Christmas seems to be a time of year that bands issue albums that have no real reason other than to fulfil a contractual obligation or it is about time that they got around to releasing a greatest hits.

U2 and Oasis fall into the category of the contractual obligation and this fact has prevented me from purchasing the said albums…as yet. I must be living a parallel world as somehow Girls Aloud have enough material to justify the release of a greatest hits!!!

While doing my weekly shop at Tescos – I had the usual urge to make an impulse purchase of a CD – as I hadn’t bought one for a while. Given the limited range on offer, the purchase was always going to be The Beatles - Love album.

This is a curious album, and it is one that after repeated plays makes wonder what is the real point of its existence. I had heard a few snippets here and there on the radio and I was intrigued to hear the album in full.

I was expecting a radical presentation and reappraisal of a selection of Beatles songbook. What I found instead was a number of curious alternative versions which sound great given the remastering that has taken place, but ultimately make you long to hear the originals and their imperfections.

The concept behind the album is that the music forms the backdrop to the Cirque du Soleil's ‘Love’ show in Vegas. The show has been given the seal of approval by those with significant influence in the Beatles affairs and is currently winning rave review for the performances.

The album is given some credence given that it has been produced and remixed by Sir George Martin and his son Giles. This is part of the part of the problem for me, the Martin’s are probably a little too precious with the recordings and the fact that they had carte blanche to be a little more radical could have seen them go a little further.

Some of the mixes are quite innovative especially the splicing of Hey Bulldog with Lady Madonna – but again they don't really go far enough.

It has been branded as the first official bootleg of the Beatles – a mash-up, but for me this album is a little too safe. I was hoping that it would be more in keeping with the Danger Mouse bootleg that appeared a few years back. That took liberties with the Beatles and JayZ tunes and went under the name of the Grey album.

To me the Love album, good though it is (you can’t go to far wrong when putting together a selection of Beatles tunes, in what ever form) this is nothing more than a soundtrack album and one that is nothing more than a pointless exercise in trying eek out a little more cash from a back catalogue that has so far not been too badly exploited.

This album and the release of Let It Be Naked hopefully are the last drops that can be wrung out the Beatles back catalogue.