![]() ![]() The more we read the more we incorporate our memories into the prevailing "story of the Beatles."This book is less a narrative than a collection of, well, glimpses. I mention all this to make a point, namely that as time has passed, it has been hard to separate how I thought of their career at the time and how it now seems like such a coherent narrative. I was lucky enough to have met 2 of them, though it was little more than an introduction and only memorable to me. I had all of their albums, both US and UK releases (benefit of being in a military family) and as the years went on I read all of the major publications about them and most of the minor, often horrible, publications. I can remember hearing the news of what most of us had guessed, the break up of the Beatles, when I was 12 and trying to hide my tears. ![]() If you're of a certain age (which I am, and which most people simply call old) you grew up watching and listening to the Beatles. Read moreġ50 Glimpses of the Beatles by Craig Brown is probably one of the most fun books I've read about the Fab Four. The final chapter, moving backward from Brian Epstein's funeral to his first meeting with the Beatles, is a nice wrap up. It's a side note, not prurient in the writing, and most of the book is concerned with the group and their doings. And while it does discuss and in drug use, it isn't done in a manner that is the usual turn off for someone who doesn't find that stuff interesting. The format makes it easy, too, since it's broken into small chapters (150 of them), and you can put it down to turn off the light without having to slog forward for pages and pages to find a stopping point. The author writes well, in an engaging manner, and it is an easy read, even though quite long. I was wrong about this book less autobiography than tidbits of trivia and other things of more importance, working it's way through the evolutionary path that led to the creation of the Fab Four, and wound further on to their break up. Read moreįor someone who doesn't read celebrity autobiographies, I worried this book was going to be a slog.and I have learned that there are things you're better off not knowing about stars you enjoy. Part anthropology and part memoir, and enriched by the recollections of everyone from Tom Hanks to Bruce Springsteen, this book is a humorous, elegiac, and at times madcap take on the Beatles’ role in the making of the sixties and of music as we know it. Or what about the Baptist preacher who claimed that the Beatles synchronized their songs with the rhythm of an infant’s heartbeat so as to induce a hypnotic state in listeners? And just how many people have employed the services of a Canadian dentist who bought John Lennon’s tooth at auction, extracted its DNA, and now offers paternity tests to those hoping to sue his estate?ġ50 Glimpses of the Beatles is, above all, a distinctively kaleidoscopic examination of the Beatles’ effect on the world around them and the world they helped bring into being. One journalist, mistaken for Paul McCartney as he trailed the band in his car, found himself nearly crushed to death as fans climbed atop the vehicle and pressed their bodies against the windshield. ![]() When actress Eleanor Bron touched down at Heathrow with the Beatles, she thought that a flock of starlings had alighted on the roof of the terminal-only to discover that the birds were in fact young women screaming at the top of their lungs. Who better, then, to capture the Beatles phenomenon than Craig Brown-the inimitable author of Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret and master chronicler of the foibles and foppishness of British high society? This wide-ranging portrait of the four lads from Liverpool rivals the unique spectacle of the band itself by delving into a vast catalog of heretofore unexamined lore. When they appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, fresh off the plane from England, they provoked an epidemic of hoarse-throated fandom that continues to this day. Their influence extends far beyond music and into realms as diverse as fashion and fine art, sexual politics and religion. Though fifty years have passed since the breakup of the Beatles, the fab four continue to occupy an utterly unique place in popular culture. "If you want to know what it was like to live those extraordinary Beatles years in real time, read this book." -Alan Johnson, The Spectator Winner of the 2020 Baillie Gifford Prize for Non- FictionĪ distinctive portrait of the Fab Four by one of the sharpest and wittiest writers of our time
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