As you may have heard, Paul McCartney recently announced a new Beatles record. Yes, that’s right. And the way it was announced was incredible. This seismic announcement was casually dropped into an interview promoting McCartney’s new book: Eyes of The Storm. Unbelievably, it was mentioned right at the end of the interview, almost as an afterthought!

What? What song was he referring to? When will it be released? And, how is any of this even possible, given that George Harrison passed away in 2001? So many questions. Well, the song referred is believed to be Now and Then, a demo John Lennon composed in 1979. The background to this is, of course, the Anthology Project of 1995, where the three remaining Beatles at that point completed and then released two Lennon demos recorded before his murder in 1980: Free as a Bird and Real Love.

However, there was a third demo they didn’t get round to finishing. That song is Now and Then. Rumour has it that McCartney was keen to finish it, but Harrison disliked the third demo and prevented that from happening. That, we thought, was that. Now, all of a sudden, the project is back on, with artificial intelligence apparently being used to clean up the vocals.

The announcement has met a fair bit of scepticism and surprising negativity. This is puzzling. It seems some are conflating the talk of AI with the myriad videos populating the internet these days. You know the sort of awful thing: Jimmy Hendrix singing an Elton John song etc. But that’s clearly not what this is. All we’re talking about is using technology to clean up and finish an old demo. In that sense, it’s no different to what they did in 1995.

Others seem aggrieved that Harrison’s wishes are seemingly being overridden. This objection is a little odd. The Beatles work collectively and as a democracy. In fact, unanimity is required for any project to get the green light. Therefore, all parties (that is McCartney, Starr and the Lennon/Harrison estates) are clearly on board for this project to be announced in the first place.

Paul must be taken aback by some of the scepticism. After all, he’s not used to that. Well, not in recent years anyway. I, for one, think it’s fantastic. In our fandom, experiencing the enduring nature of this remarkable band, we forget how quickly time passes. Paul, sprightly though he is, has just turned 81 and Ringo, 83. Thankfully, both men are in rude health. But time waits for no-one. There won’t be many more opportunities to do these type of things. That’s the brutal reality.

A time will come, and it’s not that far away, when we’ll look for the next big Beatles project and realise it’s too late. At that point, the wonderful projects we currently take for granted will be confined to the past. So, let’s celebrate this project and look forward to what they’re planning. Scepticism undoubtedly has its place, but let’s not tarnish our understandable excitement. With the Beatles, we must make hay while the sun shines. It’s now or never!

@rorymcgimpsey