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I have a good collection of Beatles books. One of my favorites is Mark Lewisohn's "The Beatles Recording Sessions" copyright 1988. I was aware
that he had published an expanded version, so I shopped around and
bought a copy of "The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions" off of eBay.
It arrived today - oh, joy! Except it turns out that they are both the
same book - the "Complete" version was published in England and the non-Complete one is American. The title, cover, and publishing credits
are different, but they're otherwise page-for-page identical. Doh!
Didn't do my research. Fortunately, it wasn't expensive.
Turns out what I *really* wanted was "The Complete Beatles Chronicle",
which includes updated content from "Recording Sessions" plus entries
about their live performances. I found a copy of that for a few dollars
and I'll have it in a week or two.
I collected Beatles books pretty avidly in the '70s through the
'90s, after a while I gave up because what's the point. Seems like
10 new Beatles books get published every year because publishers
know there's a built-in audience.
I remember the first Beatles book I ever bought though -- well I
acquired it for free in a radio station contest in 1975. It's "The
Beatles - An Illustrated Record" by Roy Carr and Tony Tyler. It
has a sticker on the cover, "Thanks for Listening" and below that
"WKDA-FM 103.3."
Used to be the hip local station but sadly it went to a country
music format several years ago.
On 02 Aug 2025, super70s <super70s@super70s.invalid> wrote in rec.music.beatles:
I collected Beatles books pretty avidly in the '70s through the
'90s, after a while I gave up because what's the point. Seems like
10 new Beatles books get published every year because publishers
know there's a built-in audience.
I remember the first Beatles book I ever bought though -- well I
acquired it for free in a radio station contest in 1975. It's "The
Beatles - An Illustrated Record" by Roy Carr and Tony Tyler. It
has a sticker on the cover, "Thanks for Listening" and below that
"WKDA-FM 103.3."
Used to be the hip local station but sadly it went to a country
music format several years ago.
I don't collect them as much as I used to and I like to think the
keepers are the really good ones. I had gotten Lewisohn's "Tune In"
when it was first published but didn't really have time to devote to it
so I set it aside... and lost it for a decade. I found it last year and
read it from cover to cover. I loved it! Compellingly written, not too detailed, which was my original fear. I hope Lewisohn will finish the
series, but I'm doubtful now.
I especially like the ones that go into the technical music stuff, like
their recording process and their instruments and studio gear. For that
I like "Recording Sessions", "Recording the Beatles", "Beatles Gear". I
used to like some of the earlier biographies, like the Bob Spitz one
but now they can seem shallow and pandering, maybe because "Tune In"
was so thorough. I started "John Lennon: The Life" by Philip Norman a
couple years ago - it was OK, but I got distracted and didn't finish
it. I'll go back to it one day.
There are plenty of cheaply done, thoughtless Beatle-related books out
there. I have a few, but I know enough to avoid them now.