EVOLVER:63 – Mark Lewisohn & Guests

Another trip to The Bloomsbury Theatre on Gordon Street to listen to eminent Beatles-scholar Mark Lewisohn, this time in the company of BBC arts journalist (and Beatle fan since the age of five) Samira Ahmed, as he stages another afternoon of Fab Four curios. Samira was instrumental in unearthing a recording of The Beatles’ performance at Stowe School in Buckinghamshire on April 4, 1963, subsequently the subject of a Radio 4 Front Row programme she presented in April, in which Mark took part. Other guests on this series of Mark’s talks are Kevin Eldon, Harry Hill and Johnny Marr. 

        Of all the many concerts performed by The Beatles during 1963, the year of their UK breakthrough, this show at a public school was probably the most unusual. About 150 posh schoolboys paid five old shillings each to watch in relative silence as The Beatles went through their 60-minute set in the school’s Roxburgh Hall, and afterwards John, Paul, George and Ringo had their pictures taken enjoying a chicken and chips supper laid on by the master in charge of the school’s tuck shop. 

        The show came about after a Stowe pupil called Dave Moores wrote to Brian Epstein requesting the group play at his school. Moores was related to John Moores, the Liverpool retail and football pools magnate, and it’s likely Epstein’s awareness of this swayed his decision to book the date for £100 – “just under their going rate,” according to Lewisohn. 

Mark & Samira on stage in front a pic of The Beatles taken at Stowe school’s music room.

        Unbeknownst to The Beatles, the show was recorded by a 15-year-old pupil called John Bloomfield, who stuck a microphone onto a stand on the floor at the front of the stage, and extracts were played on the Radio 4 show, beginning with ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ which segues seamlessly into ‘Too Much Monkey Business’. Interviewed by Samira on the show, Bloomfield, who kept his tape for years but forgot he had it, admits that seeing the show “changed my life completely” and it’s clear from the cheers between numbers that all the boys loved what they saw. As Mark points out, they were hearing something they’d never heard before, a group of four musicians accompanying themselves on electric guitars and drums while they sang, with everything delivered at top volume too. Naturally, he regards the Stowe tape as being of similar historical importance to the lost treasures of Tutankhamun, the only complete recorded performance by The Beatles on the cusp of becoming the greatest pop group the world has ever seen. 

        Mark hopes that after a clean-up in the studio, the Stowe tape will be become publicly available, though he was not overly optimistic. Indeed, his belief that all manner of Beatles artefacts ought now to be made accessible to fans seems to have come up against the commercial objectives of those who control them. This was the only slightly sour note in an afternoon devoted to celebrating The Beatles not only as a musical phenomenon but as an important catalyst for positive change in the culture and mood of the British people. “They uplifted lives,” said Mark to unanimous agreement. 

        Naturally enough, discussion with Samira on the Stowe concert and recording opened yesterday afternoon’s talk before Mark delved into his Beatles archives to come up with many more gems. He is at pains to point out the many strange coincidences that occurred before and during the Beatles’ collective career, among them the case of 15-year-old Melanie Cole, who was adjudged by Paul to be the winner of a Brenda Lee miming contest on Ready Steady Go! on October 4, 1963. Two years later the same Melanie Cole ran away from home, inspiring a story in the press that was read by Paul who, as a result, sat down to write ‘She’s Leaving Home’. He had no idea it was the same girl. 

Among other Beatle topics discussed was the thorny question of how their songs became credited to Lennon-McCartney, as opposed to McCartney-Lennon, and how this still vexes Paul; the importance of their hairstyles at a time when almost all men or boys in the UK asked their barber to give them a short back and sides; and how conscientious JPG&R were at answering letters from fans, at least until the task became too onerous. Scanned letters from fans and the responses they received appeared on the big screen behind Mark and Samira, one of which – written by Paul – concluded with, ”Must rush, we’re due on stage”, which suggests they filled in the time between shows by responding to letters in their dressing rooms. 

Just before the afternoon concluded with knockout footage of the group in their With The Beatles black polo neck sweaters miming to ‘Twist And Shout’, Mark mentioned how Capitol Records, EMI’s US arm – which turned them down more than once – finally capitulated and began to promote The Beatles in the US. That, of course, would have to wait until 1964, which will no doubt be the theme of Mark’s next series of fascinating talks.  

Finally, I should add that the great honour of being accorded the title of ‘fifth Beatle’ is generally conferred on Brian Epstein, George Martin or Neil Aspinall. For admin purposes, I have now conferred it on Mark, as all posts on my blog that relate to him and his work can now be found under the heading ‘Beatles (Mark L)’, just as the individual Beatles have their own similar headings. 

BEATLES/EVOLVER:62 – By & With MARK LEWISOHN

To the Bloombury Theatre in WC1 for a preview of Mark Lewisohn’s second public discourse on The Beatles. In 2019 Mark, now universally acclaimed as the world’s leading authority on the Fab Four, expounded on the group’s Abbey Road LP in a talk intriguingly titled Hornsey Road, after a site where EMI almost bought a recording studio so that the famous St John’s Wood premises could be reserved for classical and jazz musicians only. This never happened but if it had The Beatles would have recorded there and, ipso facto, Abbey Road would have been called Hornsey Road.

        This sort of left-field, join-up-the-dots and occasionally slightly surreal thinking illuminates Mark’s outlook when he shares his knowledge with those who, like me, are enthralled by the depth of his research. “The deeper you go, the higher you fly,” he says, introducing his new show, if it can be called that. Beatles/Evolver:62 comprises 62 sparkling gems from his archives that relate, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly, to The Beatles’ progress in the year before they exploded into the national consciousness. 

        

        The results of the research Mark expounded on yesterday can be found in the pages of Tune-In, the first book in his multi-volume biography of The Beatles, published in 2013. His talk is essentially a demonstration of his methods, expanded with details that seem all the more profound when extracted from the page and brought into focus by his words and insight. 

        A large screen behind him is filled with icons that represent each of the 62 moments. Some are of great import, like Ringo replacing the hapless Pete Best or the series of events that led to George Martin becoming their producer at Parlophone, and some are trivial but enormously fascinating, like Mark’s claim that on March 7, during what was The Beatles’ first appearance on national radio, on a BBC show broadcast from Manchester called Here We Go, their live cover of The Marvelettes’ ‘Please Mr Postman’ was not only their radio debut but the first time anything from Tamla Motown had been broadcast on BBC radio. 

        Mark revels in coincidences. In the last week of October Paul and a girlfriend called Celia Mortimor hitchhiked to London to see the sights, staying with John’s friend Ivan Vaughan who lived in a flat on Great Portland Street. Deep research on Mark’s part among electoral records has revealed that Dr Richard Asher and his wife Margaret lived in the same building, along with their children, Peter, Jane and Clare, and that George Martin took oboe lessons from Margaret in the same premises. And that week, according to Celia, Paul was working on new song about a girl who was just seventeen. 

        Mark is at pains to get at the truth and disprove myths that have circulated over the years through sloppy reportage. For example, while it is generally accepted that Decca passed on The Beatles following their disappointing audition on January 1, the reality is that Brian Epstein passed on Decca, or at least passed on the terms that Decca offered. This, of course, was to The Beatles’ good fortune in the long term, not least because Brian Poole & The Tremeloes, whom Decca signed instead, were obliged to anonymously record LPs of current hit songs for their downmarket Ace Of Clubs label. Can you imagine JPG&R doing that?

        And, of course, while Decca’s A&R chief Dick Rowe became notorious as the ‘man who passed on The Beatles’, he was far from alone in this. In America Atlantic’s celebrated Jerry Wexler did the same thing, as did Laurie Records whose A&R man at the time was Doug Morris, a future chairman and CEO of the Universal Music Group, subsequently fulfilling the same role at Sony Music. Both were sent copies of ‘Please Please Me’. Strangely, Morris didn’t respond to Mark’s request for a comment on this.

        What did take my breath away was Mark’s research into the no-hopers who were signed by UK record labels while Epstein was desperately trying to get a deal for his Beatles. With the aid of pictures of their actual singles, Mark lists dozens of singers with little or no experience, all of whom made inferior records that went nowhere. Most of these complete unknowns – there were no groups and none played an instrument – were even promoted for having done regular jobs, as if a few years apprenticed to a painter and decorator was all that was required to record a hit. Meanwhile The Beatles, who’d logged up thousands of hours on stage in Liverpool and Hamburg, who had a thriving Fan Club in Liverpool and who were regularly voted Top Group in local polls, were shown the door. 

What were the record companies playing at? What were they thinking? Mark can’t answer those questions, only laugh, as did his preview audience. It was more than simple complacency, or even deafness. The answer, of course, is that in 1962 the UK record industry was a closed shop, run by middle-aged men who dictated what their young consumers were going to get, which was not what they wanted. The Beatles were so new, so different, so self-contained, so engaging, so experienced, so talented and, ultimately, so wanted that no one in the record business could see the wood for the trees. In Mark’s view, what they became wasn’t surprising really, not after you’ve heard him explain how and why it all happened. In a nutshell, they broke the system. 

        The talk is chronological and lasts just over two hours, with a break. Anyone with an interest not only in The Beatles but in the era just before fame beckoned will love it. My only complaint is that in doing shows like this Mark breaks off from writing the second in his trilogy of books, a tome I await with an eagerness now bordering on obsession. 

Beatles/Evolver: 62 is at the Bloomsbury Theatre, 15 Gordon Street, London WC1, on October 7 at 7.30pm and October 8 at 2.30pm and 7.30 pm. Tickets go on sale from 10am on Friday July 29 and can be obtained from the theatre. Unlike Hornsey Road, as yet Mark has no plans to take his show to other parts of the UK. 

BEATLES: MARK LEWISOHN AT ABBEY (OR HORNSEY) ROAD

To the Bloomsbury Theatre on London’s Gordon Street to witness Mark Lewisohn’s run-through for his forthcoming UK lecture tour on The Beatles’ Abbey Road album, ingeniously titled Hornsey Road. Why is that, I hear you ask? All will be revealed later.

         Having now firmly established himself as the world’s foremost Beatles archivist and historian through his many books and sleeve notes on various historical Beatles product, Mark is taking time out from writing Volume 2 of his humungous All Those Years trilogy (the extended edition of Vol 1 was a staggering 1,698 pages long) to undertake this 25-date UK tour that opens on 18 September in Northampton and closes on 4 December in Manchester.

         Addressing an invitation-only audience last night from a stage whose floor was painted like a zebra crossing and flanked by two flashing belisha beacons, Mark began by solemnly instructing us to switch off recording devices and cameras. This was in order to prevent us from revealing too much, but at the same time we were encouraged to be judgmental, to make notes, all in the interest of offering Mark suggestions whereby his talk might be improved.

         This is a bit like being asked to improve on the Taj Mahal. All around me were other music writers of similar vintage to my own, persons whose knowledge of The Beatles might not be in Mark’s league but is probably greater than the average fan. That we all clapped during those portions of the show wherein Mark’s research revealed arcane bits of minute trivia, like where Paul might have come across the word ‘pataphysical’ or John discovered a real life Mr Mustard who was, indeed, very mean, indicated a keen awareness of the extremes to which Mark goes when chasing down a lead. Sherlock of Baker Street could do no better.

         The show is a multi-media event. Accompanying Mark’s erudite discourse are photographs, video footage, documents and newspaper clippings on a big screen, and the whole caboodle is soundtracked by the songs from Abbey Road, of course, albeit not as you know them. Instead Mark has used 5.1 mixes and The Beatles’ Rockband Playstation game that enable him to utilise isolated individual performances and in this way we get a feel of how the songs developed in the studio and who contributed what. Two things stood out for me: the inimitable three-part choral wash that John, Paul and George were able to conjure up when required, and the sophistication of Paul’s bass playing, those melodic touches, often in a high register, that were too often buried in the mix. The music tracks are sequenced chronologically, ie in the order in which they were recorded, and accompanied by still photographs, mostly black and white, and judged by Mark to have been taken while a particular track was being recorded, or thereabouts. The many different guitars and keyboards, including a Moog, that The Beatles used are therefore clearly in evidence.

         This is the meat of the two-hour plus presentation. Interspersed between the songs are sections wherein Mark deals with whatever else was happening in the world of the individual Beatles during 1969, among them John’s Plastic Ono Band, his peace campaigning, bagism and the fateful car journey – in a humble Austin Maxi – to Scotland with Yoko and their children; George’s involvement with the Hare Krishna movement and growing friendship with Eric Clapton; Paul and Linda’s wedding and trip to Scotland; Ringo’s acting debut with Peter Sellers; the transformation of four Beatles into family men; and John and George’s drug busts, both of which seem likely to have been the result of police corruption.

         Towards the end of the lecture, after the album has been recorded and is waiting release, we are informed that John, Paul and George met to discuss their future together, and because Ringo was absent – in hospital with an upset stomach – John recorded the meeting so that Ringo would know what was said. Herein lay the most interesting part of Mark’s speech, also judged as such earlier this week in the Guardian when he gave an interview to my former Melody Maker colleague Richard Williams. Somehow or other Mark has obtained a copy of that recording, until now unheard by any of us in the room. Suffice to say that John, for one, envisaged a future for The Beatles, albeit one in which the traditional songwriting credit of Lennon/McCartney would be discontinued in favour of individual credits for each and that George, and to a lesser extent Ringo, would have a greater representation in this area. To say more would be to disclose too much.

         The closing sequence is wonderful, tearful almost. “And in the end…” sing John, Paul and George, in perfect harmony in the Abbey Road studio even if business issues were dragging them apart outside. This was the year of their breakup – not that you’d know it from the unity they exhibit on Abbey Road – and, lest we forget, the youngest of them in 1969 was just 26, the eldest 29.

         And Hornsey Road? Apparently EMI were in the process of buying up a recording studio there where all of the non-classical artists signed to the label, including The Beatles, would have been obliged to record their music. It doesn’t have the same ring to it somehow does it? And nor would it attract the crowds like Abbey Road does. There’s even an EarthCam set up there 24 hours a day recording the action on the world’s most famous pedestrian crossing point: (https://www.earthcam.com/world/england/london/abbeyroad/?cam=abbeyroad_uk). Seems like every moment of the day someone is taking a photograph there.

Full details of Mark Lewisohn’s talk can be found here: https://www.marklewisohn.net/hornsey-road/

TUNING IN AGAIN – Mark Lewisohn & The Beatles

Monday evening and to Kings Place near King’s Cross Station where Mark Lewisohn, the world’s foremost Beatle historian and biographer, is in conversation with music writer and editor David Hepworth, the occasion to mark the publication last month of the softback edition of Tune In, Volume 1 of All These Years, Mark’s monumental Beatles biography, which I reviewed at length here on March 4, 2014 (http://justbackdated.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/tune-in-overview.html). It was also no coincidence that 53 years ago on this day, October 5, ‘Love Me Do’, The Beatles’ first single, was released.

         Tune In was first published in the autumn of 2013 as a de-luxe two-volume cased edition as well as an abridged single edition which, at over 960 pages, suggests a generous interpretation of the abridging process. It is, in fact, the first of three such packages, this initial one covering The Beatles’ lives up to the end of 1962 when they were on the cusp of becoming the greatest entertainment phenomenon in popular music history. Volume 2, when it arrives, will probably take in the years 1963-1966, with Volume 3 taking The Beatles from 1967 to 1974 when the partnership was formally dissolved, though I think Mark is still a bit unsure quite where Volume 2 will stop and Volume 3 begin. He’s also playing it safe on when Volume 2 will be published, suggesting 2020 as the prospective year, let alone making predictions about Volume 3, though it’s likely the gap between these two will be shorter because he’s been able to research them both together, unlike the more detached research concerning The Beatles’ childhoods and early years that was required for Volume 1. 

        

Beneath this photograph of The Beatles on the rubble of Saltney Street, taken on September 28, 1962, Mark began the evening with a reading from the book; a passage about Pat Moran, the group’s first ever fan who in 1960 defied her strict Catholic father and befriended Paul, John and George, delivering much needed food to the disgustingly filthy flat where they lived in Gambier Terrace near Liverpool Cathedral. Pat had seen them play around Liverpool and in their demeanour, their cockiness and the music they performed recognised the qualities that three years later took them to the toppermost of the poppermost, as John put it. Paul wrote to Pat, thanking her, and Mark traced her through the auction house where, in the 1990s, she sold the letters. “She really was the first fan,” said Mark, “the first of millions.”

         Thereafter the evening settled into a conversation between Hepworth and Mark that centred largely on his research methods and the many strange coincidences that crop up in the Beatles’ story. As regards the former there is little doubt that Mark leaves no stone unturned in his quest for information and, occasionally, comes upon a goldmine, such as happened when he traced Brian Epstein’s Liverpool solicitor who had a huge box of hitherto unseen correspondence between them. Mark’s major regret, of course, has been the sad death of Neil Aspinall, the group’s original roadie, eventual manager and closest advisor for five decades. Aspinall, who never gave an interview while in the Beatles’ employ, was prepared to reveal all to Mark and had begun to do so shortly before he passed on. One issue that Aspinall impressed upon Mark was that the order in which the names of the four Beatles are traditionally rendered – John, Paul, George & Ringo – came about because of the order in which they joined the group, John inviting Paul to join, Paul suggesting George and George favouring Ringo. Another was how the need to keep evolving kept them together, even before they made their first record. “They never wanted to do the same thing twice,” said Mark. “If that was happening then they’d have split up at any time.”

         As regards the coincidences, those who’ve read Tune In will be familiar with the almost supernatural twists of fate that litter their career. Among a few that Mark spoke of was the occasion in late 1962 when Paul hitched to London with his girlfriend and, having spent an evening at Peter Cook’s Establishment Club, crashed out on the floor of a flat now occupied by their Liverpool friend Ivan Vaughan. Aware that this was the weekend when Paul began writing ‘I Saw Her Standing There’, Mark was determined to find out precisely where this flat was. This wasn’t easy but when he did – through an Electoral Roll – he discovered, bizarrely, that it was in the same block of flats in Great Portland Street where George Martin had received oboe lessons from Margaret Asher 15 years earlier. She and Dr Richard Asher raised their family there before moving to nearby Wimpole Street where Paul, of course, resided for two years after their daughter Jane became his girlfriend in 1963.

         After answering a few questions from the audience Mark finished the evening with another reading, this one from the closing passage in Tune In. Somehow or other the stars were aligned for The Beatles as 1962 drew to a close. “We were the best fucking group in the goddamned world,” said John later. “And believing that is what made us what were … We thought we were the best in Hamburg and Liverpool, and it was just a matter of time before everyone else caught on.” 

TUNE IN - An Overview

I finally finished reading the de luxe edition of Tune In at the weekend. Here's my final summary: 

Opposite the title page of my copy of The Beatles At Abbey Road is the above inscription which its author, Mark Lewisohn, wrote at the book’s launch party in 1988 held, appropriately enough, in Studio Two where the group recorded almost all of their music. This was Mark’s second Beatles book after the almost-as-impressive Live, and when I read it I realised that not only had he become the world’s leading authority on The Beatles but that he’d been recognised as such by the group, or at least Paul McCartney, Apple Records and those at EMI charged with overseeing the distribution of their music. Such recognition was the only possible explanation for the unlimited access he’d had to the Aladdin’s cave that is The Beatles’ Abbey Road archive.

         Mark subsequently compiled his two books and additional research into The Complete Beatles Chronicles, a large format diary-style chronology that remains the standard reference book on the group’s career. In the meantime he was employed as a researcher by Apple on the Anthology series and to write liner notes on Beatles reissues, all of which added to his impregnable status as the world’s leading Beatles historian.

         Like most observers who take an interest in such matters I first became aware of Mark when I read about him in Philip Norman’s Beatles biography Shout, the first book to seriously peel away the layers of secrecy and deference that seemed to surround the group. Norman acknowledged Mark as a point of reference long before the ‘Beatle world’ at large became aware of him, and to say Mark has realised the promise that Norman recognised in him is to seriously understate the case.

         Nevertheless I felt that Mark had since become an ‘insider’ and

this, I mused, was a double–edged sword. ‘Official’ recognition often comes at a price, usually the need to compromise when it comes to revealing matters that the subjects might prefer remain under wraps, controversial issues like inter-group disputes, behaviour that involves sex, drugs and alcohol, financial chicanery, all the things that people want to read about but which are all too often swept under the carpet in the need to present a positive image to the public.

          Similarly, I’d imagined that Mark’s obvious devotion to The Beatles, his evident love of their music, would render him unwilling to write a book that was 100% objective; that his mission – as in his previous books – was to present facts, diligently researched and always 100% accurate but facts pure and simple, without comment or critical analysis. In short he could never write about The Beatles as a detached observer.

         Well, how wrong I was. Switching from Beatles fact-finder to Beatles biographer seems to have reinvigorated the skills I noted in Funny Peculiar, Mark’s disquieting biography of the comedian Benny Hill which spared few blushes when it came to revealing Hill’s less likeable traits. Tune In, the first volume of Mark’s All These Years trilogy, presents The Beatles in the same way, with all their dirty washing hanging out to dry, all their unseemly behaviour, their vanities and drinking and promiscuity, on view in hitherto unimaginable detail. This is not to say that Mark's book dwells on scandal, nor that it muck-rakes unduly or seeks to expose The Beatles as dislikeable or disreputable in any way; no, this is simply precisely what happened as it happened, researched through over 250 interviews and heaven only knows how many letters, documents and newspaper clippings. Tittle-tattle is dismissed, accepted myths demolished, all leads investigated, and the natural authority of Mark’s writing conveys without question that THIS IS THE TRUTH, good and bad, take it or leave it.

         There are insights too numerous to mention, not least a number of bizarre coincidences, as well as the facts you would expect alongside many new ones, and all are laid to rest in ways that suggest Mark has researched his subject so forensically as to render all previous Beatle biographies redundant at a stroke. To recap: John was a force of nature, the indisputable leader of the group, capricious and extreme each and every way, callous one minute, compassionate the next, totally unpredictable, incorrigibly loutish and definitely dangerous to know; Paul was earnest, occasionally vain and scheming, and unusually ambitious, determined to be a pop star with or without the group; George was watchful and shrewd and Ringo was the ultimate survivor, a hero who took all that life could throw at him and hurled it right back; John and, most especially, Paul were naturally gifted, their talents inherited from Irish forebears, but George had to work at it which he did with extraordinary diligence; all four Beatles were unreservedly dedicated to American rock from the moment they first heard it, students and connoisseurs par excellence, probably more knowledgeable of the genre than anyone else in all of Europe; all four necked pretty much everything they were offered and were promiscuous on a level that, for the era, defies belief, terminally incapable of being faithful to their regular partners, a state of affairs that will no doubt escalate as opportunities increase along with their fame; Pete Best was never a Beatle because he was never in a Beatle mind-set; JP&G stuck together like glue, developing a shared sense of unity that simply refused to be extinguished, a resolve that brooked no opposition, be it parental, financial or practical. They somehow knew they were going to be ‘The Beatles’ and the way Mark tells their story you know this was meant to be.

         Although not a literary stylist in the manner of a practised novelist, Mark has a pleasing, easy-going style so that despite its length the book rarely sags. His portrayal of the deprivation endured in post-war Liverpool is particularly eye-opening, and in the extensive acknowledgements I was charmed by his evocation of fifties Liverpool observed from Lime Street Station as he imagines the Beatle parents going about their daily business. He also has a whimsical tendency to include the odd Beatle lyric within the text, almost as if by accident but that’s surely not the case. He explains in some detail the sources of the group’s early repertoire and it is a surprise to learn that contrary to widespread belief John and Paul did not write ‘hundreds’ of songs before they became famous and, indeed, wrote very little either individually or together between 1960 and 1962. The genesis of those Lennon and McCartney originals that did emerge is covered in great detail (I especially enjoyed reading about the evolution of ‘I Saw Her Standing There’) which suggests later volumes will be equally perceptive in this regard. Ringo’s life story is told in parallel with those of John, Paul and George until they merge in the summer of 1962, and both Brian Epstein and George Martin receive similar treatment and detail. Those episodes in the story that Mark feels are of paramount importance – J&P meeting at the Woolton Church Fete and the death of Stuart Sutcliffe – are given chapters of their own, much shorter than most, and the huge wealth of footnotes and endnotes is never less than fascinating.

        Finally, in writing a biography as substantial as Tune In Mark has conferred upon The Beatles the same status as any great historical figures, be they statesmen, scientists, writers, entertainers, sportsmen, religious figures or royalty. In this regard Tune In positions The Beatles alongside Churchill, Darwin, Shakespeare, Chaplin, Mohammed Ali and any pope or king and queen you care to mention. Quite right too – their influence is as great and the pleasure they gave far outweighs all of them put together.        

         Mark Lewisohn’s destiny in life seems to have been to write this book, the definitive book, the only one that is truly worthy of its subject. Bring on Book Two. 

THE BEATLES - Tune In Continued

The first ‘new’ post I wrote for this blog on New Year’s Day was about All These Years, Volume 1 – Tune In, Mark Lewisohn’s monumental Beatles biography, the de lux edition of which was underneath our Christmas tree. I have now reached page 1,416 with a couple of hundred or so to go. They have just released ‘Love Me Do’ and it’s time for a catch up.

Imagine, if you will, that when Henry Ford invented the motor car his creation was rejected by the transport industry. “How on earth can a vehicle move without being towed by a horse?” they asked. “Go back to where you came from and take your motor car with you. Motor car! Whoever heard of such a thing?”

            So Henry took his car back to where he came from and continued to develop the idea, perfecting it and exhibiting it only to a small group of converts who watched him driving around and marvelled at his ingenuity. His band of local admirers grew and grew but each time he tried again to interest the transport industry he was rebuffed until, by a strange quirk of fate, someone who’d fallen out of favour in that industry was charged with investigating Henry’s invention. Then, suddenly, everyone wanted one.

            Now substitute John Lennon for Henry Ford, The Beatles for motor car and George Martin for the man who’d fallen out of favour.

That might sound like an absurd analogy but of all the many insights into the pre-fame Beatles that Tune In is revealing to me, the one that strikes me most forcibly is the music industry’s inability to see the future when it was staring them in the face. It’s all very well saying that hindsight leads me to this conclusion but there is still something very disturbing about this aspect of their story. Up to the middle of 1962 no rock’n’roll group in the world – not that there were many of them – was anywhere near as experienced as The Beatles, and by experienced I mean no group anywhere had played together for so long or so often. Although Ringo was absent for much of this time (but still clocking up similar mileage elsewhere), they played the Cavern 292 times in all and were on stage for well over 1,000 hours in Hamburg. Neither had any act unsigned by a record company gathered a fan following such as The Beatles had on Merseyside, a following numbering into the thousands by mid-1962, many them members of a well organised fan club, all accumulated purely on the strength of their live performances in the region.

Recording artists, always hitherto unknown, were ‘launched’ by record companies, always had been. There was no precedent for a pop act that didn’t need ‘launching’, that already had fans galore. Neither was there any precedent for an act that wrote and sang its own songs and provided its own instrumental backing. Record label A&R men supplied artists with songs written by professional songwriters and the artists were told to sing them whether they liked them or not, and the backing was provided by session musicians employed for the purpose. Everyone knew that. And everyone also knew that pop music was rubbish, of no lasting value, delivered by no-talent puppets created within the industry by means of worthless gimmicks before being jettisoned into obscurity, along with the disposable records they’d made, everyone bar the artist making a fast buck along the way. The pop music industry was run by spivs selling tat.

            The Beatles changed all this but it took a colossal effort on their and manager Brian Epstein’s part to do so, like changing the course of an ocean liner really, and the day-to-day reportage of that effort is for me the most remarkable aspect of Tune In – how they got to be a recording act and the hoops they had to pass through to reach that point. Because they were the first, because they led the charge, the going was so much harder for them than anyone else and nowhere is it explained in as much fascinating detail as within these pages. In this respect the first volume of Tune In becomes a history of the recording industry in the UK up to 1962 seen from the point of view of The Beatles and Epstein, and a damning indictment of that industry it is too.

           

More on Tune In when I’ve reached the final page…

TUNE IN

I’m up to page 270. John, who like Brian of Nazareth is a very naughty boy indeed, and Ringo, who seems to have spent more time in hospital than school, are both 15. Paul, who has discovered an inherited gift to play any instrument he lays his hands on is 13, and George, already showing signs of withdrawal from exposure, is 12. They, along with posh but troubled Brian Epstein, haven’t met yet but are encircling one another in Liverpool like vultures hovering above the carcase of the UK’s teenage population which in a few years time they will devour like hungry beasts.

Yes, Santa brought me the special extended edition of Tune In, the first two cased volumes of All These Years, Mark Lewisohn’s monumental Beatles biography. I’d already dipped into the ‘short’ version but I’ve put that aside now that I can tackle the big one.

What we have here is not just the most comprehensive, accurate and eminently readable biography of The Beatles ever written but the whole history of just about everything else appropriate to the story as well; the mass emigration from Ireland after the potato famine, the rise and fall of Liverpool as a great port, the history of the record industry from shellac cylinders to vinyl discs, and how rock and roll was born from the jazz, blues and C&W and came to dominate that industry despite attempts by many – not least the industry itself – to derail it. In reality it’s the story of The Beatles in extraordinary detail set against a social history of the 20^th Century, the UK for now but, surely, the USA to come.

It’ll probably take me until March to finish this book, not least because it’s too heavy to carry around and I’m forever looking up note references and footnotes to discover all sort of titbits (like the astute history master who hung on to one of John’s schoolboy essays, and sold it in 2006 for £126,500… how did he know?). At 1,698 pages Tune In is a staggering achievement, epic indeed. I salute Mark, and I know for certain that when I have finished these two volumes (which bring the story up to the end of 1962), I will have difficulty waiting for the next instalment and reading what Mark has uncovered about the Beatlemania years.