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The first half hour+ was taped live at The Fest in August 2023, as you can doubtless tell. The rest was done in the usual way, and you’ll note we didn’t necessarily cover everything we listed in great detail, but that’s showbiz.
Here’s Erin’s list:
1. A Hard Day’s Night film
2 and 3. The Internet. Two slots because I see it impacting the historiography in two major ways: First, it has vastly increased accessibility to primary sources and research materials that in previous decades were extremely difficult to find. Second, its fundamentally changed the fandom experience thru podcasts, discussion boards, etc.
4. Hunter Davies: The Beatles – An Authorized Biography
5. Lennon Remembers/Rolling Stone
6. Mark Lewisohn: The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions
7. Philip Norman: Shout!
8. The Beatles Anthology (mainly the documentary, but the book, too).
9. Barry Miles: Many Years From Now
10. Christine Feldman Barrett’s A Women’s History of the Beatles
Here’s mine:
Influential
- Red and Blue albums
- The Beatles: An Illustrated Record by Roy Carr and Tony Tyler
- Shout!
- Lennon Remembers
- Here, There and Everywhere by Geoff Emerick
- Important
- The Beatles and The Historians by Erin Torkelson Weber
- Lewisohn Chronicles/Tune In
- Love Me Do by Michael Braun
- The Beatles: An Authorized Biography
- A Women’s History of The Beatles
What’s your list look like?
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Great episode! I was born in 1968, and my top 10 would have to include “The Compleat Beatles” documentary narrated by Malcolm McDowell. For people of my age getting into the Beatles in middle and high school, this was where we learned the story of the Beatles. Yes, there were books, but this doc was much easier and more fun. The book “Growing Up with the Beatles” was also a great resource for me, as I learned what it was like to be a fan during the time of Beatlemania.
Interesting and enjoyable episode; thanks! Loved your source selections. ‘Illustrated Record’ was my first experience of rock criticism when I got the book as a teenager in the mid-70s. I still have it on my shelf and often go back to it. Great information and pictorial content. Many of the comments and views expressed in the book have stayed in my memory. For example, on the ‘Help’ single release: “The Beatles were becoming masters at supplying what was needed *when* it was needed.” Quite!
Keep on keeping on, Robert and friends!
Best wishes,
Guy
Southsea, Portsmouth, England