mjp
Founding member
Tune In: The Beatles: All These Years by Mark Lewisohn. The first in a massive trilogy of books (this volume is 944 pages!), this one covers childhood through 1962, when The Beatles were primed and ready to blast off.
I don't usually like biographies that go too deep into the family history of someone, what great uncle Cletus did in the war, and all that, but this is the first bio I've ever read where I didn't want to immediately skip past the family background. And it starts in 1845, if you can believe it, and includes a three page description of the pre-1971 British monetary system (what the hell was a "bob" anyway?).
As for a 944 page book, I know it's a bit much, but that's why GOD invented the Kindle.
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Lewisohn says: 'We know everything there is to know about the Beatles, so what else can possibly be written?' People say that all the time – and I don't agree with it for a second. I wouldn't argue the Beatles' story has been told often, but I would argue that it can't be told again and differently. It's been related the same old way for so very long and it's also dying under the suffocating blanket of 'celebrity'. I want to start again, I want to press the Refresh button.
This is a comprehensive biography, three volumes, a sequential history in which I set out to relate everything that happened, and do so with integrity, attention to detail, accuracy and, I believe, a fair understanding of where the story needs to be told and how to tell it. I'm writing so it unfolds as if in real time – there's no hindsight cleverness, so you get a vivid sense of the forward movement. The Beatles' story always had tremendous energy, speed, vitality – and this must be tangible to the reader.
It all boils down to this. They were four war babies from Liverpool who really did change the world, and whose music and impact still lives on in so many ways, after all these years. I say, let's scrub what we know, or think we know, and start over: Who really were these people, and how did it all happen?
I don't usually like biographies that go too deep into the family history of someone, what great uncle Cletus did in the war, and all that, but this is the first bio I've ever read where I didn't want to immediately skip past the family background. And it starts in 1845, if you can believe it, and includes a three page description of the pre-1971 British monetary system (what the hell was a "bob" anyway?).
As for a 944 page book, I know it's a bit much, but that's why GOD invented the Kindle.
- - -
Lewisohn says: 'We know everything there is to know about the Beatles, so what else can possibly be written?' People say that all the time – and I don't agree with it for a second. I wouldn't argue the Beatles' story has been told often, but I would argue that it can't be told again and differently. It's been related the same old way for so very long and it's also dying under the suffocating blanket of 'celebrity'. I want to start again, I want to press the Refresh button.
This is a comprehensive biography, three volumes, a sequential history in which I set out to relate everything that happened, and do so with integrity, attention to detail, accuracy and, I believe, a fair understanding of where the story needs to be told and how to tell it. I'm writing so it unfolds as if in real time – there's no hindsight cleverness, so you get a vivid sense of the forward movement. The Beatles' story always had tremendous energy, speed, vitality – and this must be tangible to the reader.
It all boils down to this. They were four war babies from Liverpool who really did change the world, and whose music and impact still lives on in so many ways, after all these years. I say, let's scrub what we know, or think we know, and start over: Who really were these people, and how did it all happen?
