Revolution in the Head

By: Ian MacDonald

Narrated by: David Morrissey, Robyn Hitchcock, Danny Baker, Peter Curran, Matt Berry, David Hepworth, Geoff Lloyd

Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins

Publisher's Summary

Regarded as the greatest and most revealing account of how the Beatles recorded every one of their songs, Revolution in the Head is brimming with details of the personal highs and lows experienced by Lennon, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr as they made some of the most enduring popular music ever created.

©1994 The estate of Ian MacDonald (P)2014 Talking Music

Five Stars with an Asterisk

Any additional comments?

This is a fascinating book - lovingly narrated by an ensemble cast - all listenable, and a couple of them exceptional. After an introduction it traverses the Beatles recording career song by song - going session by session rather than album by album, including unreleased oddities. The writer is very intelligent and almost invariably brilliant in terms of his analyses of the lyrics and the broader role of the group in the culture of the 20th Century. He's also *sometimes* brilliant in his musical analyses - often enough to warrant 5 stars across the board. That said, he's also sometimes annoyingly stupid on strictly musical elements, making some technical musical errors and overlooking critical details. A perfect example is the song Day Tripper, which he pans rather ruthlessly. Failing to grasp the importance of layered thematic riffs in popular music (and frankly, failing to grasp what a musical hook is) he thinks this is merely a 12-bar blues variant that the Beatles rushed out in an uninspired moment. I find it hard to believe that anyone interested enough in the Beatle to consider buying this book could fail to hear the virtues of this song. He's even more critical of All You Need Is Love, whose thematic 7/4 riff is stunningly brilliant to anyone with ears but he ignores this entirely and damns the song for what he considers its nonsensical lyrics ("nothing you can do that can't be done") but then a few songs later he heaps near-Shakespearean praise on the (similarly full of convoluted word-play) lyrics of I Am The Walrus and lavishes modern "concept art" superlatives on Revolution 9. My point is that Walrus and All You Need is Love - whatever you think of their lyrics - are both dumbfounding brilliant and original from a musical point of view and to say that the first is pure genius and the second is a pathetic piece of rubbish is just infuriating. That said, many of his analyses are spot on and the fact that he's so arrogantly opinionated will challenge you to think, even if you sometimes want to reach through the speaker and slap the guy. So, 5 stars, take each opinion with a pillar of salt, and don't let his sometimes inaccurate use of highbrow technical musical terminology override what your ears are telling you. If you filter out the nonsense, there's an abundance of really great insights to be had.

If you're looking for a 5 star Beatles book without the asterisk, Lewisohn's Tune In is without the slightest doubt the gold standard in terms of both content and narration. Can't Buy Me Love is also fantastic.

6 of 7 people found this review helpful

Unbelievable.

An unbelievably great in-depth critique of the Beatles' entire recorded output, song by song. Indispensable for the serious Beatles fan.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Brilliant

Loved every minute. Took a long time to get through it because I had to stop as each track was introduced and listen to the song. As such, it creates a cumulative sense of the Beatles’ development as artists. It’s organized by recording session rather than album track number, so if you ARE trying to follow along with the music, you have to hop around a bit.

Fortunately the audiobook omits some of the session and technical details from the book, easy to represent in tabular or list form on the page but very hard to get across effectively in audio. From my standpoint that’s a plus.

Yes, I differ with the author in his take on specific songs, but that would be true no matter who was writing it and how good it was. Like anybody else, the Beatles produced some turkeys; best to be honest about it.

A Strange Listen

I've been on a bit of a Beatles binge recently, and several other authors spoke highly of this book, so I thought I'd give it a try. Strange, but enjoyable. It starts out with an essay that argues that the cultural trends the Beatles helped foster in the 1960s were responsible for everything nasty in Western society by the 1990s -- essentially the rise of Reaganism/Thatcherism and the decline of Western Civilization. After this incredibly pessimistic opening, the book itself is a discography-style covering of every track they recorded -- when and where, how many takes, instrumentation, mixing and so on. Only a few of these essays have anything to do with Macdonald's introductory thesis. His opinions can be contrarian to the point of being infuriating -- one minute trashing Across the Universe, the next claiming that Hey Bulldog was one of Lennon's best songs. He virtually skips over Here Comes the Sun, and goes on forever about Revolution 9. For extra weirdness, the audiobook changes narrators every few chapters -- some are ok, some just drone on in various monotones. There's a ton of great information here and I enjoyed it, but it's definitely one of the more unusual audiobooks you'll ever listen to.

Robyn Hitchcock is fantastic!

Lots of different voices and accents, some reading better than others, all charming... Robyn Hitchcock is best though!

Way too much information

What disappointed you about Revolution in the Head?

Was expecting to get an overview of the Beatles formation and recording of albums but got way too much about politics in the 60's. This book will put you to sleep if you don't understand music theory.

Has Revolution in the Head turned you off from other books in this genre?

yes

How did the narrator detract from the book?

yes. They switched back and for, it seemed.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

The Beatles have an interesting history.

good information but biased

any beatles fan will enjoy this. especially for the track by track behind-the-scenes. the author ticked me off a few times when criticizing the structure of many late beatles favorites. He seems to prefer older pre LSD Beatles tracks. Give it a listen: Warning. if you are a true beatles lover, you might disagree with some of his opinons.

just read the book!

Very irritating reader doing impressions which were awful. Just read the story spare me ad-libbing!

What a pleasure!

What did you like most about Revolution in the Head?

I knew of this famous book being the best history, but found it quite hard to read a friend’s copy I borrowed. Listening to it though made a real difference. Knowing the details of how they made the songs and what was going on in their lives has made my understanding of the Beatles music much richer. I like the variety of great voices, men and women. Superb.

5 of 5 people found this review helpful

Brilliant

Would you consider the audio edition of Revolution in the Head to be better than the print version?

Well I managed to listen to all over it in a few days - mainly on my computer's speakers - can't imagine I would have managed that had I been reading... books sometimes take weeks to read...

What was one of the most memorable moments of Revolution in the Head?

I enjoyed the little digs taken at the hippy movement... Was also v interested to learn about the history of the How Do You Do track. Had no idea about that...

What does the narrators bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?

Getting to hear people like Danny Baker and Dave Hepworth narrating...

Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Made me happy to live in a country with such a rich cultural history...

Any additional comments?

Definitely worth listening to...

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Interesting and intruiging

I don't agree with all the author says but that's good. A real insight into the songs and their recording.

Loved it

Very detailed .loved it .lots I didn’t know .kudos to the author.narrators are
good too .

This Book Is ABRIDGED

What did you like best about this story?

It's about The Beatles, and probably the best book on the subject i've read. Notice i said read. The printed book is full of foot notes, several on almost every page, that provide a real context to the history. The Audible version misses these out in their entirety. It also misses out much of the specific recording details, other than recording studio number, from each entry.

I love this book, but the Audible version is a definite letdown. Buy the printed book and enjoy...

Frustrating

The opening chapter is psychobabble. The reds of the audio is a chronological look at the recording of each Beatles song. They are very much subject to the authors opinion & I disagree with more than I agree with. As a result it can be quite an annoying listen at times. I also came to hate the phrase ‘pass the baton.’ Having said that it’s still a pretty good listen.

Provocative take on the greatest rock canon of them all

Having read this donkeys years ago, a chance to re-listen post-Lewisohn was welcome. Can be a little too technical at times, and the author's opinions are often ones that I disagree with - any criticism of 66/69 Beatles immediately sets my teeth on edge - but it remains fascinating stuff, underlining just how important The Beatles were and remain.
Well performed by and large, I could have done without Berry and Lloyd, and more of Hitchcock and Hepworth.
Great value overall, well recommended.

Fine book - variable reading performances

Ian MacDonald's excellent dissection of every Beatles recording is essential reading for fans, although die hard fan-boys may take some of his opinions a little hard. Even I - more interested than fanatical - bristled a little at some of his critical comments about some of my favorite tracks - like "Nowhere Man" for instance. More often than not, though, he is bang on the money. He writes from a musician's point of view, and some non-musicians may find some of his references to keys and scales tricky. Most, however, will hang on in there. His rather academic introduction to the book may also alienate some, particularly as it is read by David Morrissey, not the most expressive of readers. The rest of the book is disconcertingly read. Robyn Hitchcock reads over half of it, and this is fine, but the other readers only take small chunks, and I found the change overs a little jarring. Just as I was enjoying (for instance) David Hepworth's amused reading or Danny Baker's enthusiastic section they ended, just leaving me wanting more. This "relay" process was, I think, a tribute to MacDonald from people who knew and worked with him, but on balance, I'd rather have had Hitchcock read the whole thing.

Not what I expected!

I thought I would hear about the social and plural influences on The Beatles music, and vice versa. However, it starts with a summary of the sixties which uses far too many long words to be comfortable. It resembles an academic work rather than a leisurely read.

This is followed by a comprehensive list of Beatles' recordings. Much of the detail of this is section was beyond my comprehension as I don't know the difference between an augmented 5th and a diminished 7th, if they exist. There were also many subjective critical comments about the value of the songs. I am one of gang who feel The Beatles did no wrong throughout there career so I am not happy hearing somebody say that any of the songs may have no worth.

Having said that, I did listen all the way through and some of it was of interest. On the whole I have to say that it is probably of more interest to a musician. It could have been so good.

1 of 2 people found this review helpful

This is really something to Twist & Shout about!

Revolution in the Head is an intriguing and revealing account of all things Beatles and the time in which they shined.

Listen to some of the bands most avid fans as they narrate an account of the journey though creating some of the most durable music in our existence …

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to these guys tell Ian MacDonald's non-fictional account who clearly writes with passion and energy.

I have yanked my albums off the shelf once again and have been listening abundantly!

Listen to this book!

1 of 2 people found this review helpful