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Out now: The Unreleased
Beatles: Music and Film has just been published by Backbeat
Books. It's a
mammoth 400-page, 300,000-word guide to the incredible wealth of music
the Beatles recorded that they did not release, as well as musical
footage of the group that hasn't been made commercially available. The
8 1/2" X 11"-sized, illustrated book examines all unreleased studio
outtakes, BBC radio recordings from 1962-65, live concert performances,
home demos, private tapes, fan club Christmas recordings, and other
informal recordings done outside of EMI studios that have escaped into
circulation. Chronologically sequenced entries for all the Beatles'
unreleased recordings of note from 1957 to 1970 are here, as well as
all the unreleased Beatles musical video footage of note from 1961 to
1970.
Also included are overviews of songs composed by the Beatles that were never recorded by the group, but given away to other artists; recordings known or rumored to have been made by the group that haven't yet circulated; Beatles compositions never recorded by anyone; coverage of music the group didn't release while active, but later put out on albums such as The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl, Live! At the Star-Club, Live at the BBC, Let It Be...Naked, and the Anthology volumes; and a history of Beatles bootlegs.
The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film is written with lively critical, descriptive analysis emphasizing the music and its most human, artistic qualities—and not just where and when the recordings were made. Click here for excerpts from the book, a table of contents, and various Beatle-rarity-related lists of items covered in the volume.Also just out is The Rough Guide to Shopping with a Conscience, co-authored by myself and Duncan Clark. It covers options for ethical food and drink consumption, socially responsible investment and finances, no-sweat clothes, animal-free cosmetics, green energy household and travel alternatives, fair trade goods, consumer boycotts, and much more. Click here for excerpts from the book.
In person: I'll be discussing The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film, and showing rare films and playing rare recordings featured in the book, on Friday, May 2 from 7:30pm-10pm at the Port Washington Library at One Library Drive in Port Washington, New York. Admission is free.
I'll be discussing The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film, and showing rare films and playing rare recordings featured in the book, on Thursday, May 22 from 7pm-9pm in San Jose at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library at 150 E. San Fernando St., 2nd Floor. Admission is free.
On Wednesday, June 11 from 7pm-9pm, I'll be presenting rare vintage rock film clips from 1968 as part of my regular bimonthly series of events at the Park Branch of the San Francisco Public Library at 1833 Page Street. Assembled at the library's request, this is to commemorate the 40th anniversary of this tumultuous year, with clips from the Beatles, Rolling Stones, James Brown, Arthur Brown, the Supremes, Pete Seeger, Janis Joplin, the Jefferson Airplane, and numerous other artists. Admission is free.
I'll be discussing The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film, and showing rare films and playing rare recordings featured in the book, on Tuesday, October 21 from 7pm-9pm at the Hercules Library at 109 Civic Drive in Hercules, Califiornia. Admission is free.
On-line: I was interviewed on-line, taking questions from both conference hosts and readers, about The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film from November 1 to November 14, 2006 on The Inkwell. The Inkwell is an on-line conference that's part of the WELL website, and these discussions are readable (whether you're a member of the WELL or not) on-line by clicking the link to The Inkwell, then clicking on the sentence "More conversations with authors" (the first sentence in the right column), and then clicking on the topic title "Richie Unterberger, 'The Unreleased Beatles: Music and Film'".
Also, I was interviewed on-line by
veteran rock
journalist Ed Ward, as an ongoing discussion, about Eight
Miles High for two entire weeks from September 19 to October
3, 2003
on The Inkwell. I was
previously
interviewed by The Inkwell
about Turn!
Turn! Turn! from September 27 to October 11, 2002. These
discussions are still readable (whether you're a member of the WELL or
not) on-line by clicking the link to The
Inkwell, then clicking on the sentence "More conversations with
authors" (the first sentence in the right column), and then
clicking
on the topic titles "Richie Unterberger, 'Turn! Turn! Turn!'" and
"Richie
Unterberger, 'Eight Miles High'". Elsewhere, you can read on-line
interview
with me about Turn! Turn! Turn! by Michelle E. Malik and Jim
Davison
on the Libranpoet
site,
and Derk
Richardson's
review of the book by in the San Francisco Bay Guardian, the Bay
Area's
top weekly paper. Also, there is a transcript
of my July 17, 2002 interview on KPFA on "Dead to the World" in
Berkeley,
CA discussing Turn! Turn! Turn! on the website of the show's
host,
David Gans.
On the best of 2004 lists: Eight
Miles High was chosen as #3 on Record Collector
magazine's
list of the Top Ten books of 2004.
On the best
of 2007 lists: The Unreleased
Beatles: Music and Film won a 2007 Association for Recorded Sound
Collections Award for Excellence in Historical Recorded Sound
Research in the "Best Discography" division of the "Best Research in
Recorded Rock Music" category.
In Ugly Things: Issue #25 (Summer 2007) of the (mostly) 1960s rock-centered magazine Ugly Things has my huge (30-page) story on the Music Machine, one of the greatest garage-psychedelic groups of the 1960s, and the group that had more depth and quality to their original repertoire than perhaps any other '60s band who are known primarily for one hit single ("Talk Talk," in the Music Machine's case). The article is based around lengthy interviews with two original members (bassist Keith Olsen and guitarist Mark Landon) who have rarely spoken about their experiences in the group, as well as two members of the second Music Machine lineup (keyboardist Harry Garfield and guitarist Alan Wisdom) who have never before discussed their stint in the band.
Also in Ugly Things, issue #23 (Summer 2005) has my similarly lengthy (20-page) story on the Belfast Gypsies. Including ex-members of Them, they were one of the finest overlooked bands of the British Invasion, their sole 1966 album produced by the legendary Kim Fowley. This is the first comprehensive history of this mysterious group ever to appear, the twisted stranger-than-fiction saga drawn from extensive interviews with Belfast Gypsies guitarist Ken McLeod, who consulted his original diaries from the mid-'60s to reconstruct the group's career. Excerpts from my interview with Kim Fowley about the Belfast Gypsies also appear in the article; for the full interview, click here.
In Record Collector: The September 2007 issue of Record Collector has my feature on Fairport Convention's original woman singer, Judy Dyble, drawing from an extensive recent interview with her. The August 2005 issue of Record Collector has my 20-page article on the top 25 overlooked American folk-rock albums, with in-depth analysis of each LP and new first-hand interview material with some of the artists.
In MOJO: The Hendrix & the Summer of Love edition of the MOJO Classic series, published in the summer of 2007, has my articles on Big Brother & the Holding Company and George Harrison's visit to Haight-Ashbury in the summer of 1967. The Greatest Album Covers of All Time edition of the MOJO Classic series, published in spring 2007, has my article on psychedelic LP sleeves. Also, the January 2005 issue of MOJO has my lengthy article on Donovan, and the July 2004 issue of MOJO has my lengthy article on the 1972 Wattstax Festival, the largest American soul concert ever staged.Turn! Turn! Turn! influences Johnny Cash?: From the November 2004 MOJO cover story on Johnny Cash, where producer Rick Rubin discusses the last album Johnny Cash recorded, American V: A Hundred Highways:
"Rubin, meanwhile, had been discovering a new fascination with early '60s American folk music. 'I had just read the book Turn! Turn! Turn! [by MOJO's own Richie Unterberger] and I started getting very excited about a bunch of people like Tim Hardin, Joan Baez. I sent Johnny some of these songs. Whether he liked the song or not, it would always spark his memory and he'd say, "That made me think of this other song, and I like this one better." One example of that was the song "Four Strong Winds." Johnny said he remembered the version by Ian and Sylvia."
Author Sylvie Simmons goes on to write:
"I sat and watched Cash record 'Four Strong Winds' in his bedroom in Hendersonville -- a beautiful, vulnerable version. He also recorded Tom Paxton's 'Can't Help But Wonder Where I'm Bound.'"
On this site: Newly added pages of reviews of spring 2008 reissue albums (entirely different pages of 2000-2007 album and book reviews are still accessible). Also: my August 2005 feature in Record Collector magazine on the 25 top overlooked folk-rock LPs of the 1960s.
Book Buying Info:
All of my books are widely available at both
independent
booksellers and chain bookstores throughout North America, as well as
many
such outlets overseas. To order on-line via amazon.com, click on the
appropriate
book cover below.
