The "new" Beatles song actually evolved from a 1977 John Lennon demo and the other 3 added their musical contributions onto it. There is a demo of "I Saw Her Standing There" (the entire 9th take). There are 2 takes of "This Boy," which feature John and Paul giggling during vocal snafu's! Finally, there is the complete musical version of the Beatles' "Christmas Time (Is Here Again)," taken from their 1967 Christmas record (with individual Christmas greetings from Paul, John, George and Ringo from the previous year). George Martin plays "Auld Lang Syne" on the organ as John recites a Christmas poem.

Included on the cover is John Lennon's unique artwork.


Don't feel ripped off   October 10, 2002
5 out of 5 found this review helpful

If you already have "Anthology 1," then you're really only getting three tracks. I was hoping that this disc would have the original demo that Lennon recorded alone, but instead, it has the Beatles version, the exact same as on the "Anthology 1" album. But the other three tracks are pretty good. There's a take of "I Saw Her Standing There," that sounds a little shaky. It's the entire take that provided the "One-two-three-four" count-in that's on "Please, Please Me." The Beatles' first album had a different take, but they used the count-in from the take presented on this disc.
There are two takes of "This Boy," which are good. I love the between-take chatter that the Anthology albums are also full of.
The best track is track four, "Christmas Time is Here Again." However, the song is mainly the four Beatles repeating the title phrase over and over, with a few little phrases by Paul, John and Ringo wedged in. There are also little greetings by each of The Beatles, no more than five seconds each, saying "Merry Christmas, we hope you have a great New Year..." etc. At the end is a strange monologue by John Lennon with wintry wind whistling back and forth from one speaker to the other.
Although you may feel a little cheated that there are only three new tracks, consider this: these tracks aren't available anywhere else...ANYWHERE. Now, that's quite worth the money, if you ask me!


FREE AS A BIRD   April 9, 2000
Paul Quintana (TX)
5 out of 5 found this review helpful

Well, I personaly think that if anybody has the right to go back and get old Lennon demo tapes and use them to make good songs it would definatly be Paul, George and Ringo. I mean just listen to "Free As A Bird" and "Real Love" they're great. I'm just sad that they didn't remake "Grow Old With Me" for 'Anthology 3' like they were suppose to.


The "new" Beatles song and three more unreleased tracks   June 5, 2003
Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

So, you thought that the remaining Beatles and producer George Martin cleaned out the vaults when they put together the alternative tracks for the three volume mulit-disc "Anthology" retrospective. Of course not. "Anthology" was filled with alternative tracks and false starts, which is why the chief attraction of this CD-Single is not the "new" Beatles single, "Free as a Bird," which opened up volume 1 of the "Anthology," but the three additional unreleased tracks. "Free as a Bird" was put together by taking a demo track recorded by John Lennon in 1977 and adding additional vocals and instrumentation by Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. It is basically an okay song; Paul McCartney gave away better songs to Peter & Gordon during the Sixties. The other tracks are Take 9 of "I Saw Her Standing There," two incomplete takes of "This Boy," and a newly edited version of the fan club-only seasonal song "Christmas Time (Is Here Again)." I am much more interested in the alternate takes, mainly because they put me in a better position to appreciate Martin's skills as a producer in picking tracks and putting hit together. Worthwhile for the Beatles fan who still has their John, Paul, George, and Ringo dolls and who knows what else from the period of Beatlemania.


Long, Long, Long   June 15, 2009
D. Dickson
Did you know that this comes from a land down under? Well, it does and I've been waiting 2 weeks for this 4 SONG single. A heafty wait for such a short cd. It seems that Amazon forgot to disclose the fact that this is so rare, you can only get it from Australia! I will give it some credit for the brilliant song, Free as a Bird, but seriously, why wait when you can get it faster from the Anthology?