Although any newly discovered Beatles recording is always cause for excitement, John Lennon’s “Little Girl” – which appears on the upcoming Rubber Soul special edition release coming Oct. 2 – is not receiving the same kind of posthumous overhaul as “Now and Then” did in 2023 or “Free As a Bird” and “Real Love” did back in the mid ‘90s on the Beatles’ Anthology series.

“Little Girl” was discovered in the Beatles’ vault, along with an early version of the “Day Tripper”/”We Can Work It Out” single that was released concurrent with the Rubber Soul album, in 1965. “It was found during the process,” Giles Martin, son of the late Beatles producer George Martin, tells Billboard via Zoom from Abbey Road Studios in London. Martin, who worked with his father on the impressionistic soundtrack for the Cirque du Soleil Beatles show Love in 2006, has become the main steward of Beatles’ archival projects, including audio portions of Peter Jackson’s Get Back documentary and deluxe reissue packages for Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles (aka The White Album), Let It Be, Abbey Road, Revolver and more.

“When we do these projects we cast a net over a period of time and really look for everything,” Martin explains. “’Little Girl’ comes from the same area as ‘Day Tripper,’” he adds. “The boys having their own reel-to-reel tapes and recording home demos. It’s just a little ditty; don’t expect ‘Strawberry Fields’ or ‘In My Life’ from it.”

The recording is just as Martin describes – strong in fidelity but clearly unfinished and light on lyrics, with plenty of la-la’s as placeholders. “John was playing around with the word ‘girl’ quite a lot,” Martin notes. “’You can run for your life if you can, little girl’; obviously ‘Girl’ was on the record; ‘Little Girl’…You know, he liked words. He was obsessed with Dylan Thomas, etc. So it’s a valid sketch of the songwriting of the period.” He adds that there was never a notion of doing more with “Little Girl” than including it amid the wealth of rarities, outtakes, alternative versions and studio chatter included on the Rubber Soul packages.

“’Now and Then’ was very different. I wasn’t really aware of ‘Now and Then’ until Paul (McCartney) actually came into the room next door that I was in and played me what he’d been doing and said, ‘Would you like to come and finish it?’” Martin remembers. “And ‘Now and Then’ has a strange poignancy to it; it’s a very appropriate last record. The Beatles are very lucky like that, in a way; I know you make your own luck, but it’s a weird thing with the Beatles – like ‘The End’ being one of the last things they recorded [for Abbey Road in 1969], and ‘Now and Then’ being a thing that reappears 50 years later. It’s just weird how they managed to get away with it.”

Knocked out in less than a month, Rubber Soul was a turning-point album for the Beatles, with more sophisticated songwriting and instrumentation, incorporating influences the group had picked up from touring, especially in America. During an interview for The Beatles Anthology, George Harrison described it as “my favorite album, even at that time…We did spend a bit more time on it and tried new things. It was certainly a heady time.” In a newly written introduction for the new Rubber Soul project, McCartney recalls that “our recordings were becoming stronger and more sophisticated than our earlier efforts. Rubber Soul was a very exciting record to make. The music we were listening to and the new fashions in clothes, art and literature, helped give us ideas which we could put in our music.”

Rubber Soul was released on Dec. 3, 1965 and became the Beatles’ sixth consecutive No. 1 album in the U.K. and its seventh atop the Billboard 200 in the U.S., where different albums were released until 1966. It’s been certified six-times platinum. The remixed Rubber Soul comes in single-disc CD and LP reissues as well as expanded sets – including the five-CD Special Edition Super Deluxe, four-CD and five-LP Super Deluxe editions and two-CD and double-LP Special Editions. A Blu-ray issue features a Dolby Atmos mix, high-resolution stereo audio and videos for “Day Tripper” and “We Can Work It Out.” The set is preceded by “Day Tripper (Songwriting Work Tape),” “Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) (Second Version – Take 2)” and “Michelle (Take 1).”

During our discussion Martin filled us in on some other details about this latest addition to his burgeoning Beatles résumé.

Do you have any kind of process when you start preparing to do one of these Beatles immersions?

Well, it’s funny. People don’t realize I do a lot of stuff when I’m not doing these things. And so I go back into it and…I feel like I have to learn all this stuff again. I wasn’t around at the time and because of that my knowledge of the Beatles is really backwards. I learn what the album is, and where it came from…pretending in a way that I haven’t listened to any of the stuff that went on after it, because that’s fair. What I mean by that is, “How do we push technology? How do we do things? What are they trying to say? What are their influences?” All that stuff. It’s the same thing, but different. And so every album feels different to me.

What distinguishes Rubber Soul from the others?

I feel like I’m in 1965: they’ve been in America, they’ve come back and this is the sound they want to get. How do I get that sound?

What is that American influence you hear?

Interestingly enough, I think it’s that there’s a folk element to it. Without question there’s a (Bob) Dylan influence with “Norwegian Wood.” And a Byrds influence with “If I Needed Someone.” There are almost Stax/Motown influences with, like, “Drive My Car” and “Day Tripper” kind of thing. Of course there’s going back to skiffle with “I’m Looking Through You,” for example – that would be a late-early Beatles song…. They didn’t want to be a pop band anymore, so they gave themselves permission to start writing songs that weren’t necessarily just about “I love you” and “she loves me.”

The growth really was considerable.

As George said, they were forced rhubarb. They were doing 30, 40 songs in a year, something crazy. It’s in a remarkably short amount of time. That’s the beauty of it. It’s the thing about the Beatles which is so unusual – they wrote so many great songs in such a short amount of time that each album is like a calendar, a temperature gauge to what they were feeling at the time. So, therefore, (Rubber Soul) has a different feeling for me than Revolver or Sgt. Pepper’s does.

Did you hear it as a transition point as you were working on it?

This album is still coming off the road, playing live, and then going back and playing live again. But the weird thing about it is they were doing songs that they weren’t doing live. You know, like “Girl,” most of the songs on this album were never intended to be sung in front of a bunch of screaming fans. It’s like, “You know, the quieter we play, maybe the screams will stop.”

It’s noted in one of the accompanying booklet essays that they also didn’t hang on to many of the rehearsal or working tapes once they had a final version, which must have made it interesting to assemble this particular package.

I think also that they didn’t spend that much time recording as well, compared to the White Album or Sgt. Pepper’s – that’s another thing to bear in mind. (Rubber Soul) was recorded in an amazingly short amount of time. So it wasn’t just the fact that they wiped stuff; it was more the fact that they recorded things very quickly. They rehearsed and worked out what it was and then they’d record it.

How much was left on the proverbial cutting-room floor as you were deciding what to include?

That’s actually a good question – for me, nothing; for other people, probably loads. [Laughs] Obviously my sensibilities are different from other people, and I might get hated for it…Sometimes (other engineers) might go, like, “The down mix of this song has a different fade,” or whatever it is. And I just go, “So what? Do I have to get through the song before I find that out?” See, I don’t think that music is meant to be collected; I think music is meant to be listened to – same as guitars and instruments and people who hang them on their wall. Some people…they’ll never have enough. And I think everyone should have everything, but there is a limit; I know that George Harrison or my dad, or Paul or Ringo, would think it was a terrible idea, so I have to respect their wishes. And I swear, hand on heart, I’m not holding things back for a next release. I’m not like Gollum – “You can’t have it because it’s mine.”

What particularly excited you as you were digging into the vaults?

I quite like the progression of “Norwegian Wood” take two, it’s so sitar-heavy. And you can hear what Ringo’s doing on his drum parts – it isn’t right, but it’s so nearly right. Most drummers start out playing time and then try to work out how to make it more interesting. (Starr) plays weird stuff and then goes to time, if necessary. That’s the way the Beatles worked. So all of it kind of excites me in its own way, because you can see the pencil drawing around the paintings that get made.

And it’s always fun to hear them talking to each other during the process.

People always look for what the magic is. What’s the magic? What is it? Is it my dad? Is it John? Paul? George? Was it Ringo? Is it the studies? Is it Brian Epstein? And when you hear them talk about what they’re doing, and then you hear them perform, or even if you hear them order a sandwich or drink a cup of tea and put it down, then perform a song that’s still touching people 60 years later, that’s the thing. When I approach these mixes, that’s what I’m trying to do. People go, “Oh, it’s so much cleaner” or whatever, but I’m actually trying to do as little as possible to make you feel like you’re in Abbey Road with me, listening to the Beatles.

What’s it like hearing your father on these tapes?

I suppose I’m used to it. I’m not worn down by it, but it’s nice to be with him is the answer. I remember doing Get Back and realizing that I was older than my dad was on screen. And the other weird thing about Get Back, as I was watching, is that over that period of time, on one of those days, I was conceived. It’s like, “When does he have a smile on his face?”

Do you feel like the Beatles are in your DNA, in a way?

It’s nice to be part of it. I understand why people are satisfied with me doing it. I have to step up to the hopes of people that I could do a good job of this. Maybe there’s a bunch of people who’d be able to do a better job, but I have to give my best and throw myself into this. Because I know that I sound like my dad, and I act like my dad. There was a time when I was doing Get Back, and I did a screenshot and showed it to my daughter, and she goes, “Is that you?” and I’m going, “No, that is your grandfather.”

Do you ever hear him giving a direction or a suggestion and realize that if you were there you would probably say the same thing?

You know, what my father would say to them isn’t recorded on tape, so I don’t know what he was saying to them. But I can guess what he was saying to them, because I know what he would have done, because I do the same thing as him. Funny enough, Paul says that, “the thing about the Martins is they have very good bedside manner.” My father always had a good time, you know, when he was working. I speak to Gerry Beckley from America, and he goes, “It was the happiest time we had, with your dad,” or I remember talking to Jeff Beck about it. Something I learned from him is there’s no point recording someone and then going back that night and singing in the shower much better. So it’s a privilege. And you have to be a fan as well. Neither me nor my dad are ones to light loads of candles and go, “Let’s just see what happens.”

What’s next on the Beatles docket?

Well, I’m working on four very small films with Sam Mendes at the moment [chuckles], so that’s next. It’s hard work, but they’re gonna be very good. I think they’ll trigger a new wave of Beatlemania, to be honest with you. I’m not working on any other Beatles (project), like Help! or Beatles For Sale at the moment, I know that much. Someone else might be – I never take this for granted. But I know what I’m doing, and I’m not doing that.