'Abbey Road': How the Beatles Made Magic on the Verge of a Breakup

In the midst of the conflicts that would define their final days, the Beatles pulled it together for one last, magnificent collaboration. It was the culmination of their seven-year partnership: four men who had grown up together and who were now growing apart, collecting the fragments of their unfinished work and arranging them into a shining monument.

At one point, it was going to be called Everest, and it’s one of the peaks of their career. Following the rancor of the White Album and the disastrous sessions that would eventually be pieced into their last album, Let It Be, in 1970, the Beatles needed a return to the familiar. On the verge of breaking up, they returned to their longtime producer, George Martin, and studios, EMI’s Abbey Road complex, to create a true final statement. “Let’s do it the way we used to,” Paul McCartney is said to have told Martin.

Source: Douglas Wolk/rollingstone.com

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