Beatles Book:

The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions: The Official Story of the Abbey Road Years 1962-1970 Reviews:
Awesome! The Complete Beatles Recording
2009-06-23 - The book contains a vivid, precise and descritive text about the way The Beatles record.
The author researched in the papers from Abbey Road and talked with Paul McCarney to deepen the information.
It's a gift!

How the greatest records ever made were made
2009-03-11 - There's an old saying that it's better to lucky than good, but if you're both, that's when greatness can result. Consider the talent and creativity of the Beatles, but also a patient producer willing to take risks, and a team of engineers that came up with consistently brilliant solutions to problems despite working in an outdated, sometimes poorly-equipped studio. Put them all together, and you have that greatness.

Although heavy on the details so many fans desired for so long, the real story here is how a raw club band became the first recording act to use the studio as an instrument in its own right. They created music intended to exist solely on record and never be played live. Nobody had done that before. They did it so well that even their own engineers today admit it would be impossible to duplicate what they did with today's technology.

Mark Lewisohn takes the dry details and weaves them into his unequaled knowledge of Beatles history to produce a very readable account of how the Beatles made their records. His work in compiling all this information so well is exceeded only by the Beatles' efforts in creating it.

Sit down, put on a Beatles song, then read Lewisohn's account of how it was made. You'll never hear the Beatles the same way again, and you'll be shocked at how many hours they would spend to make a three-minute song just the way they wanted it.

Even better, do this with Andy Babiuk's "Beatles Gear" book alongside. These two books plus the actual music are just about all you need to know about the Beatles.

The Complete Schoolbook
2008-12-23 - I found my copy of "The Beatles' Complete Recording Sessions" after three years of ruminating through my house. In an earlier review I mistakenly referred to Mr. Lewisohn as "Michael". Mea maxima culpa, Mark. It is THE instruction book for making records. As a die-hard analog recording composer, I marvel at what the Fabs, Sir George and the engineers did with relatively limited resources. In this review, I will attempt to explain how hard it was to do what they had done.

Initially, the Beatles recorded on two-track stereo. This meant they had to record live, evidenced by the use of Alan White, a session drummer, on "P.S., I Love You". This version was used for the single, but Ringo had proven himself to Martin for the album. You have to keep in mind that EMI was more like Underwriters' Laboratories than a recording studio, so new innovations in technology was given an inordinate amount of time to be "experimented' with by EMI techs until they were deemed suitable for producers' use. When simul-sync was approved, the Fabs and Sir George could isolate pairs of musical elements to achieve the most acceptable tracks, and, with a second two-track machine, allow the singing of vocals without the necessity of playing at the same time.

This practice of using two recorders was used until The Beatles, Let It Be and Abbey Road albums were recorded, and as they grew as musicians, they could avail themselves more tracks by accompanying themselves individually. The so-called "White Album" was recorded on eight-track after George Harrison sprung the machine from the EMI quarantine policy, but their most adventurous technological undertakings, Revolver, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and Magical Mystery Tour,
were recorded on two four-track machines! It still boggles my mind!

Necessity being the mother of invention and all that, Martin and the engineers developed flanging, pitch changing,32-and 72-channel sound boards and turned tape cutting into an art form, which they used liberally throughout the Beatles recording career.

The Fabs recorded Let It Be and Abbey Road on 16-track recorders, as they were finally allowed to depart the technological dark ages.

When you listen to these recordings, you'll hear a warmth that digital can't provide unless you copy an analog version onto it. Beyond that, if you have the songs and wanna make records, read and learn!




Thoroughy researched and detailed
2007-07-05 - Mark Lewisohn gets it right - a hefty oversize book, this is one Beatles book that stands out from the crowd. You'll quickly see that ML has done his homework, not from the view of a giddy fan, but of a journalist looking to gather, verify, and report the facts, dates, and where possible, photos of the Beatle recording sessions. This book is the one to settle bets or arguments with friends. For the serious collector of Beatle facts!

Essential Source
2006-08-10 - This book is one of the essential primary sources in Beatles scholarship, and it established Lewisohn as a prime authority.