This surprises me a bit [from Billboard]:
The Beatles enter at No. 5 with "Let It Be ... Naked" (Apple/Capitol), a remixed version of the album that removes the orchestral overdubs added by producer Phil Spector. The new edition sells 280,000 copies, less than half of the 595,000 copies the group's hits set "1" sold when it debuted at the top in 2000.
So this big Let It Be...Naked just ain't quite setting the woods on fire as we might have expected it to. This seems a bit odd to me in that unlike the "1" album, this has almost sort of new material. I would think that a few million people would pretty much automatically snap up any new product with the word "Beatle" on it.
Article comments
1 - BB
"Let It Be Nackered", OR "Beatles-In-The-Buff", OR
2 - eddie
Let it Be Naked is a valuable addition to the beatles catalogue and I'm sure in time all true Beatles fans will buy it, it's obvious it would not sell as much as the 1 album due to the fact it does'nt have the widespread appeal of the 1 album.
3 - Al Barger
Doesn't have the widespread appeal of the 1 album? It's not like this baby ain't full of hits- "Get Back" and "Let It Be" and "The Long and Winding Road" for starters. And they're re-produced and remixed and whatnot. Unlike the 1 album, these songs are at least somewhat different than the recordings that everyone has bought at least two or three times.
4 - Eric Olsen
Yes, but "alternative version" is hardly a mass selling point, whereas "all their No. 1 hits" has appeal from many different angles, even for people who have the songs in other configurations.
This is part of why I think the album still has a future: people like to have some of their work done for them.