New Beatle Book---another Goldman job?
LL Beanie
air to his work over AG's...yet some are finding fault with it already:
NEW BEATLES BIO IS RIDDLED WITH ERRORS
Review - The Beatles: The Biography by Bob Spitz
Time Warner Book Group, 2005
983 pages; $29.95
by Trina Yannicos and Shelley Germeaux,
Daytrippin' Editor-in-Chief and Daytrippin' West Coast Correspondent
thanks to Daytrippin' Magazine
Here's an idea for a new Beatles trivia game--take the new biography, The
Beatles, by Bob Spitz, and try to see how many factual errors you can find
throughout the book. A group of Beatle fans have already started the game
and as you can see below, our list is quite extensive.
It's obvious that there was a gross lack of regard for editing and checking
source material in the compilation of this book. As we began to notice
glaring errors with some shock, we then began hearing from others, most
notably Mark Naboshek who sent us quite a list, which we have included. Mark
is a well-known Beatles collector and writer for Beatlology Magazine with a
tremendous knowledge of Beatles history. He has also fact-checked Elizabeth
Partridge's new book "John Lennon: All I Want is the Truth" as well as
"Lennon Legend" by Jim Henke, no doubt helping them achieve the status they
deserve, as well-researched books.
Mark, in his email to us, expresses the dilemma any Beatles fan would feel
after just looking at the errors in the photo captions alone: "When the
photo captions in a book are this grossly incorrect, it makes me wonder how
much of the book's text is incorrect..An elementary knowledge of the band, a
little research, would have taken him (Spitz) far. If I found several errors
in one photo section, I shudder to think how many errors the text will have.
The bookmark (I saw in the book) stated, "This is the book you've been
waiting for!" Thanks, but I think I'll wait for Mark Lewisohn's three-volume
Beatles bio. Now THAT'S something worth waiting for!"
Another friend who picked up on many of the text errors right off the bat,
commented that these are the easy ones; anyone could have spotted them. He
said, "I don't want to miss the forest for the trees, but at this point in
Beatles scholarship, there's really no excuse for some of these errors. I'll
send a complete list when I'm done. I have a feeling it's going to be rather
long."
A comment from a music forum echoes these sentiments. After saying "quite a
few errors and plain wrong information", adds, "Nothing new here, no
tremendous insight." It continues, "I had a couple of laughs at some of the
mis-heard interview transcriptions.". He refers to Spitz talking about the
Beatles eating 'chick butties' and Bob indicates in the book that he thinks
these are "chicken sandwiches". This amused reader ends with, "I'm a born
and bred Liverpudlian and we never ate such a thing as chick butties. CHIP
butties, yes.."
Some errors in Beatle books can be forgiven, like mistakes due to memory
loss by the people who were actually there. But when a new mega- biography
on The Beatles comes out that claims to offer new, inside information to The
Beatles story, you bet it's going to get examined. Bob Spitz has made a
purposeful effort at consulting many different published sources to write a
Beatles history. So he should have gotten it right.
Regarding Terry Ott's commentary on "Beatle Bits" on the Abbey Road site on
October 23, it seems Ott must have gone to the same writing school as Bob
Spitz. Instead of generating an educated opinion on the subject of whether
Beatle "experts" have become too picky or not, he spews insults at those who
might care if a book is accurate or not, citing the uproar over Bob Spitz's
errors.
In his eyes, people like us are "dopey get-a-lifers" who "wank about mundane
points of view". We are now "Beatle fetish freaks" who are "dissing any
author who dares to make a mistake" and now have nothing to do but "post
snotty comments." I guess in his eyes it's OK to do a sloppy job without
checking source material, and forget that the work should be fact checked by
several experts prior to pressing "print" for the last time and having it
bound. Even self-published books with fewer resources have retained a higher
standard of accuracy-- and astonishingly this book is published by Time
Warner!
The list of errors follows:
Please remember these are at "first glance" since these errors were found
within minutes of picking up the book and thumbing through it. It is in no
way meant to be all-inclusive. We believe that if we have found this many
errors already, there must be pages more. But as we see it, you the fans
should have this information as we are getting it, as soon as possible.
Photo captions:
1. Numerous photos from their fall 1960 visit to Hamburg were captioned as
being taken at the Star Club. Interesting...since the Star Club didn't open
until 1962. We all know that on their first trip to Hamburg in 1960, they
played the Indra and Kaiserkeller.
2. Photos taken in Hamburg in 1961 were ALSO captioned as shots from the
Star Club when, in fact, they were taken at the Top Ten Club. Again, the
Star Club didn't open until 1962.
3. Even Astrid's famous "Hugo Haas" fairground photo taken in Hamburg in
1960 was captioned as being taken after they played a gig at the Star Club!
Again, no cigar!
4. There's a photo showing Gerry Marsden, George's friend Arthur Kelly,
George and Pattie. It's captioned as having been taken at Paul's 21st
birthday party (which would have been in June 1963). Hmmm. George and Pattie
didn't meet until the spring of 1964 when "A Hard Day's Night" was being
filmed.
5. Page 6 of photos the caption reads: "George with Pattie Boyd, soon after
they met on the set of Help!" Wrong: refer to #4 above
6. One of Albert Marrion's famous leather suit photos from December 1961 was
labeled as The Beatles in 1962. Nope.
7. There's a photo identified as a shot of The Beatles playing one of their
final gigs at the Cavern in 1963. It's clearly NOT taken at the Cavern,
making this a gross faux paux!
8. Page 16 of photos: "The Beatles last appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show
in August 1965" is wrong. The photo is from their Feb. 1964 appearance.
9. Page 5 of photos: "In a rare display of fatherhood, John shows off
Julian, age two, to Uncle Paul and Uncle Ringo". That photo is from the
Central Park, NYC photo shoot in Feb. 1964, where John was holding someone
else's daughter. Julian, John's ten month old son was in Liverpool at his
aunt's house. (For the record, the little girl's name was Debbie Fyall and
her father was a London Daily Express reporter following the Beatles. Of
course, Bob could have found that out with simple research. There was a 40th
anniversary story about that little girl and it can be seen at
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/gossip/story/158154p-138835c.html)
Text:
10. p 419: Twist and Shout was the "first EP ever to enter the top 10."
How's that? What about the 13 EPs Cliff Richard had in the top 10, the 6 by
The Shadows, 2 by Adam Faith and 1 by Peter Sellers, to name just a few, all
prior to August 1963, when Twist and Shout entered the top 10.
11. p587: Run For Your Life was "one of the last songs recorded for the
album."
It was actually the very first.
12. p588: Rubber Soul was to have "an unheard of 14 cuts."
All their UK albums thus far had 14 cuts, except A Hard Day's Night, with
13.
13. p591: George Martin was "not a pianist by training."
Piano was a required instrument of all students at Guildhall, easily
checkable in All You Need Is Ears, which Spitz cites repeatedly.
14. p604: "layers of overdubs on take 5 of Got To Get You Into My Life."
This is on Anthology 2, just two tracks of the four were used, no tape
reductions.
15. p605: backward sounds on Taxman and She Said She Said.
Not exactly sure what Ringo is doing on She Said; it sounds backward at
certain points, but there's no evidence to support that anything was
backward on that song, and the way it was recorded left no room for backward
additions. Ditto Taxman.
16. p612: George Martin recorded Spike Jones!
I guess he's older than we thought.
Of course we must acknowledge that many Beatle books in the past have been
known to contain a factual error or two. As the author himself, Bob Spitz,
writes:
"One of the drawbacks in preparing a definitive biography of the Beatles is
the stunning lack of reliable source material. Most of the nearly 500
volumes that make up their canon lack proper citations, and even in those
remarkable cases where sources are offered, the accuracy remains suspect . .
. For better or worse, misinformation has always been a key element of the
Beatles' legend."
But who would've thought he was describing his own book?
There may be some good aspects of this book as reported by the New York
Times' Janet Maslin (one only wishes Allan Kozinn was the one to review the
book). However, in her one-sided review, she failed to mention that the book
contains inaccuracies.
Something else must be noted. Outside of a blatant disregard for accuracy,
we are appalled by Mr. Spitz's lack of professionalism when confronted with
our concerns over his book. Daytrippin's editor, Trina Yannicos, sent a
letter to him, outlining just a few of the errors in his book. This was Bob
Spitz's response, quoted word for word: "You need an enema. Really! Do
something useful with your life."
Did his publicist advise him that a response like this would be good
promotion for his book?
The bottom line is this: We, as Beatle fans and journalists, feel a
responsibility for getting the history of the Beatles correct, for this
generation as well as the ones to come. We've seen the horrors that myth and
error can cause for historical legends. With so many resources available to
us now, the "truth is out there", so let's not foul it up.
We think we'll take Bob Spitz's advice, and do something useful--we won't be
wasting time reading his book, looking for more inaccuracies. We've got
better things to do.
Published October 28, 2005
Village Idiot
Not good.
esé
>I guess he's older than we thought.
Jones was still recording in the early 60s.
PapaNate
> Jones was recording in the ealy 60s, fyi.
Except that would been Spike *Milligan* who was recorded by Martin.
Lookingglass
"LL Beanie" <smoker...@myway.com> wrote in message
news:3sr62dF...@individual.net...
Thanks for posting this................ it's too bad that this is not the
book we have been waiting for, despite his hard (?) work.
dave................ www.Shemakhan.com
Durwood
"Lookingglass" <Shem...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:Vradncniu8_...@comcast.com...
>
> "LL Beanie" <smoker...@myway.com> wrote in message
> news:3sr62dF...@individual.net...
> > The volume of research Mr. Spitz is said to have conducted lends a
> > weightier air to his work over AG's...yet some are finding fault with it
> > already:
> >
> >
> >
> > NEW BEATLES BIO IS RIDDLED WITH ERRORS
> >
> > Review - The Beatles: The Biography by Bob Spitz
> > Time Warner Book Group, 2005
> > 983 pages; $29.95
> >
> > by Trina Yannicos and Shelley Germeaux,
> > Daytrippin' Editor-in-Chief and Daytrippin' West Coast Correspondent
> > thanks to Daytrippin' Magazine
> >
> >
> > We think we'll take Bob Spitz's advice, and do something useful--we
won't
> > be wasting time reading his book, looking for more inaccuracies. We've
got
> > better things to do.
> >
> > Published October 28, 2005
>
>
> Thanks for posting this................ it's too bad that this is not the
> book we have been waiting for, despite his hard (?) work.
>
I have no idea if this is the book worth waiting for or not. I reckon we'll
all have to read it and make up our own minds. Errors or not, I do not
think this person had the same evil intent as Goldman so right out of the
gate it is a better, more honest effort.
Lookingglass
"Durwood" <Dunde...@griselda.com> wrote in message
news:3ss65qF...@individual.net...
Honest is good... but so much ink and time not to check facts. If the errors
are minor and will be corrected in future editions... but otherwise a
brilliant read, wonderful... it is about a subject of unending fascination
for me... and others.
dave (paperback rain...........)
www.Shemakhan.com
Patrick Hernan
>
> 9. Page 5 of photos: "In a rare display of fatherhood, John shows off
> Julian, age two, to Uncle Paul and Uncle Ringo". That photo is from the
> Central Park, NYC photo shoot in Feb. 1964, where John was holding someone
> else's daughter. Julian, John's ten month old son was in Liverpool at his
> aunt's house. (For the record, the little girl's name was Debbie Fyall and
> her father was a London Daily Express reporter following the Beatles. Of
> course, Bob could have found that out with simple research. There was a 40th
> anniversary story about that little girl and it can be seen at
> http://www.nydailynews.com/news/gossip/story/158154p-138835c.html)
>
Does anyone know if the little girl on the train that sat with Ringo
was ever found? It was on their way to Washington to play their first
American concert. Ringo took her to get the autographs of the other
Beatles. She sounded American.
D. Rusnak
flowed easily. I was entertained so I went out and bought it. At 2"
thick for 983 pages there's got to be something in it! The "Star Trek"
errors didn't seem to subtract much from it (we know what they are) and
it's good to have another bio other than the Hunter Davies book.
geoff.s...@twbg.com
Spitz's THE BEATLES. Like many of you, we were dismayed that several
errors, mostly in the photo inserts, snuck into the final book. I
wanted to reassure everyone that the text and photo errors will be
corrected in the reprint, and we greatly appreciate the fans who helped
point them out. I also appreciate those readers who are taking the work
as a whole and bothering to read the book before slamming it. Over
almost 1,000 pages, a few mistakes slipped in. But I think the
incredibly positive reviews of the book in places like the New York
Times, the Boston Globe, Time magazine, etc. are a sign that this book
is worth reading. Most of the angry reviews we've seen on Amazon are by
folks who confess they have not bothered to read the book.
In any case, we take responsibility for the few mistakes that snuck in,
and will fix them. I trust that if readers engage the book as a whole,
they will find it an incredibly rewarding experience. I've emailed with
one of the folks who gave it a one-star review on Amazon and he
confessed privately that the book had much to recommend. He's right. As
for the Goldman concern--well, you'll just have to read it and judge
for yourself, but I think Bob's book is more balanced than a Beatle
book has ever been.
If folks have noticed any other mistakes, or want to communicate about
the book, feel free to contact me directly.
Geoff Shandler
Editor in Chief
Little, Brown & Co.
BL Bleanie
acknowledge and correct mistakes rather than run from them (ala Goldman).
This certainly bodes well for the book as a whole, I would think.
<geoff.s...@twbg.com> wrote in message
news:1131144579.0...@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
PapaNate
might want to not let your email fakery sneak in next time....
geoff.s...@twbg.com
folks know that the corrections have been made and a reprint of the
book should arrive in stores relatively soon. It turns out that the
incorrect captions for some of the photos were the "fault" of the photo
agencies that supplied them, so we're also working with those agencies
to make sure other folks in the future don't have the same problems.
For instance, the photo that was described as one of the last Cavern
shows in the book--apparently incorrectly--is in fact explicitly
described by Corbis (who own the rights to it) as the Beatles playing
one of their last Cavern shows. We should've more carefully discussed
such credits instead of trusting them blindly.
In any case, we again thank you for helping us make the book better.
richar...@yahoo.com
BL Bleanie wrote:
> Thanks for the update. It's rather refreshing to have a publisher
> acknowledge and correct mistakes rather than run from them (ala Goldman).
Mistakes? They were lies. Lies made up from whole cloth. I met
Goldman's researcher and she proved this. If you want me to tell the
story I am more than willing.
fatt...@yahoo.com
Unfortunately, a relative of mine has already bought the book and
shipped it to me, so I will be reading the incorrect one. However, at
least the publisher has class.
BB Leanie
<richar...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1131652192.2...@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
I was referring to the publishers (if it was even they who posted) of Bob
Spitz' new book about the Beatles, that apparently has various errors,
mostly minor from what I understand.
I've heard the Japanese Goldman source story before and I fully believe it.
Preachin to the choir here.
>
VI
Bullshit.
Being called on the facts and becoming red face doesn't give one class.
Class would have been making 100% sure everything was correct the first
time before claiming to.
dahldude
What I've noted scanning a copy:
the Sgt. Pepper idea came off of salt and pepper packages with Mal and
Paul on his solo trip to USA and Kenya - I thought it was originally
Dr. Pepper, then changed because of the soft drink.
no mention of Yoko hitting up Paul for sponsorship prior to meeting
John. Rather, it regurges the classic myth of the Indica Gallery
meeting.
Brian Jones "tinkered with a spacey oboe effect" on "Baby You're A Rich
Man". So was it Brian on Clavioline w John on piano?
paramucho
There are earlier references which have Brian Jones on oboe on the
track:
Recorded at Olympic Sound Studios...a studio which the Rolling
Stones had been using. In fact, Mick Jagger was present at this
session and it was rumoured that he had joined on the backing
vocals. Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones played oboe on the track.
At the beginning of the song John played a clavoline and both he
and Paul played pianos. ...the second engineer, Eddie Kramer,
played vibraphone.
Ultimate Beatles Encyplopedia, p56
There is a rather wierd instrument that's heard in the choruses. I
always thought it was a bit of backwards guitar -- it's quite high and
plays only a few notes.
dahldude
i...@hammo.com (paramucho) wrote:
> There is a rather wierd instrument that's heard in the choruses. I
> always thought it was a bit of backwards guitar -- it's quite high and
> plays only a few notes.
You're right - I remember that now. It doubles the vocal line
(partially?) as I recall. Maybe that's Brian's oboe. Or a guitar.
Nothing on the oboe in Lewisohn's Chronicle.
The Beatles Monthly #49 Aug 67 offers it all up - EXCEPT Brian and the
oboe:
The song started life under another title. It was "One Of The Beautiful
People".
The Beatles began recording BABY YOU'RE A RICH MAN on May 11 at Olympic
studios in Barnes. In fact this was the very first session they have had
outside the EMI studios, and all their amplifiers, instruments and
session gear had to be moved from St. John's Wood to Barnes.
Incidentally Mick Jagger was one of the several friends who dropped in
that night to watch the recording work.
The instrument heard at the very beginning of BABY YOU'RE A RICH MAN is
a Clavioline, which has a keyboard and an amplifier. Unlike a piano, it
can't play more than one note at once, and if you hit two keys the
Clavioline always decides to play only the higher of the notes. That's
why it sounds a bit like some sort of pipe instrument and you might not
guess it had a keyboard at all. So John plays Clavioline, John and Paul
play pianos and a studio engineer at Olympic obliged by playing a bit of
vibes! You know by now that the lead voice is John with George and Paul
joining in. Paul does the very high falsetto voice bits.
paramucho
Many thanks for that. I wish I had a collection of the Beatle
Monthlies... I ordered some "Best Of" book months ago Amazon keeps
putting the delivery back by another six weeks..
dahldude
i...@hammo.com (paramucho) wrote:
Since they're written for "fans" and not gearheads and note-nigglers,
the info isn't very in depth, but as you can see, it IS a source,
dollopped out a month at a time, and sometimes it's all between the
lines.
One of "Mal's Diaries" was about George's trip to L.A. in 1967. He
mentions in the middle of it that George was given a "SHH! You don't
know- it's a top secret new special guitar" with a tease that it no
doubt will be heard on a future recording. Nothing ever came of that
special guitar and for years I wondered what it was.
It took me until 1987? to realize it was the Coral Electric Sitar which
George lent to Spencer Davis, ultimately getting it back decades later
(this info courtesy of a late eighties Guitar Player interview), and
that's why it never graced a Beatles recording. (Well maybe- the sitar
sound was no longer novel and was becoming all-too-much by autumn '67).
paramucho
<dahl...@aoNOSPAMMAGEl.com> wrote:
Nice work...
Most Beatle quotes from the published books seem to be circulating
around the web, but it seems to me that a lot of the material from the
Beatles Monthly still hasn't made it out here.
Francie
> What I've noted scanning a copy:
>
>
> John.
>
Although she's never gone "on the record" there is, I think -
a more believable legend:
Yoko collected/traded original music and before she met John at the
Indica, she contacted Paul about getting a Beatle original, which she
intended to give to her pal John Cage for his birthday. My memory is a
combination of everything I've read, filtered through my knowledge of
the person I knew in '68 and the one I know now (99-05).
Contradiction: She has said she didn't know who the Beatles "were"
(presumably because she was so into the art scene and didn't listen to
the radio. She was 30 by then so that's probably true). OTOH where did
the item about hitting up Paul for some original sheet music come from?
Yoko HAS said she never went to Paul's house, but does that mean she
called him about the sheet music through his NY publicist? See where it
gets contradictory?
Contrary to popular belief (heh), I doubt she was in London on the
prowl for a new backer. There is no desperation in her now, and there
was none back then. She was a radical artist and fixture in the
Village, the true avant garde subsculture.
And that "myth" about Indica has been told by John from his point of
view as well. It was all about the "yes" Yoko wrote on the ceiling as
part of that piece. A ladder, a magnifying glass attached to the
ceiling, one word.
And the title of her magnificent art book is that same word.
;-)
You may now resume abnormal activities.