Next Section: Recordings
Previous Section: Internet Resources
List of Questions

5.1. What books are available about Paul and his musical career that I might be interested in?

Biography

Miles, Barry. (1997). Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now. London: Secker & Warburg.
ISBN 0 436 28022 1


Full review pending. As good as you've heard and probably better. Based on extensive interviews with McCartney, covering the years up to 1970, with a 20 page Afterword on the solo years. The definitive work on McCartney's Beatles years for the forseeable future, and a very significant contribution to Beatles scholarship generally.

Coleman, Ray. (1995). McCartney: Yesterday and Today. London: Boxtree.
ISBN 0 7522 1669 4


A fine book. Based on interviews with McCartney, and an interview with George Martin, this is the kind of scholarship that you would expect from the man who wrote what many consider to be the finest biography of John Lenon. Yesterday and Today, however, insomuch as it tells McCartney's story, is telling it through the lens of the song 'Yesterday'. As such, it makes fascinating reading, but the potential reader should be aware that the song, and not the musician, is the main focus of this book.

Welch, Chris. (1984). Paul McCartney: The definitive biography. New York: Proteus.
ISBN 0-86276-125-5 (paperback).
ISBN 0-86276-126-3 (hardback)

While not quite living up to its colon-title, Welch's '"Definitive" Biography' has a number of things to recommend it. Put out as a series title by Proteus Press, it sketches Paul's musical career with reasonable critical acumen, resulting in a surprisingly balanced, and reasonably accurate, account of Paul's solo recording career. I have reservations about some of Welch's facts, notably ascribing Paul's switching to bass as the result of some early "pre-Townshend violence", but I find myself returning to it probably more often than any of my other solo McCartney reference books. The discography in the back, including both Beatles and solo recordings, is quite well-organized, and has proved invaluable over the years. A unique feature are Welch's potted summaries of the solo albums, included as an appendix. You may not always agree with Welch's musical assessments -- in particular the over-assessement of the then-current 'Pipes of Peace' -- but Welch has clearly listened to and thought considerably about the music. Though comparatively out of date, probably still the most important book to have for biographical information concerning Paul's solo career.

Salewicz, Chris. (1986.) McCartney, The Biography. London: Macdonald.


Review pending.

Gambaccini, Paul. (1976). (repackaged by Omnibus press 1996). The McCartney Interviews: After the Break-up. London: Omnibus. ISBN 0-7119-5494-1 Order No. OP47813


An valuable compendium of interviews by Gambaccini from 1973 and 1975.

McCartney, Michael. (1981). The Macs: Mike McCartney's Family Album. New York: Delilah. ISBN 0-933328-05-2

The first of Michael McCartney's books contains much entertaining anecdote about growing up in the McCartney family, the early days of the Beatles and of the Scaffold, and their social milieu. Heavily illustrated with poorly reproduced black and white photographs, correspondence and relevant ephemera. Enjoyable reading but could be better organized.

McCartney, Michael. (1986).Mike Mac's White and Blacks plus one colour. New York: Penguin ISBN 0-14-010251-5

Many beautiful reproductions of Michael McCartney's best early fab pics, many of which are widely reproduced, but seldom as well as this. Text consists mainly of paragraph-long captions to the photographs.

DeWitt, Howard. (1992). Paul McCartney: From Liverpool to Let It Be.
Horizon: Freemont, CA.
ISBN 0-938840-04-5

An enthusiastic but underdocumented survey of the Beatle years (focussing on 1968) making it difficult to assess the accuracy of the information provided. You might describe it charitably as a journalistic, rather than a scholarly book, attributing motives to the characters involved, and using lots of undocumented information. It is now largely superceded by Barry Miles 'Many Years From Now'. The notes in the back mention sources for each chapter, and the bibliography is usefully annotated.

Benson, Ross. (1992). Paul McCartney: Behind the Myth. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd.
ISBN 0 575 05200 7

Tells the McCartney story up to the Liverpool Oratorio. Full review pending.

To the best of my knowledge, there are no reasonably current biographies of the solo years which are also reliable. Geoffrey Giuliano's 1992 outing, 'Blackbird: The Unauthorised Biography of Paul McCartney,' in particular, is very unreliable, and should probably be avoided. It's sort of the Albert Goldman of the McCartney biographies. The rmb ALLBOOKS FAQ puts it like this: "Not a very good book. Much of it seems to have been written after one interview with Denny Laine's wife." The same problem, essentially, as Goldman -- poor research, and his sources, all of whom have an axe to grind, leave much to be desired.

Music

The Beatles

Lewisohn, Mark. (1996). The Complete Beatles Chronicle. New York: Barnes & Noble.
ISBN 0-7607-0327-2. 368 pages.

The pre-eminent reference work on the Fab Four. While it does not entirely supercede Lewisohn's monumental (and sadly out of print) The Beatles Recording Sessions (A book McCartney describes, simply as, "the Bible" of Beatles scholarship), it does include much of the information from that estimable tome, combined with Lewisohn's equally meticulous research for The Beatles Live!, supplemented with information about the Beatles films and about overdubs not involving the Beatles. Not by any means a day-by-day accumulation of trivia -- Chronicle is a substantive guide to all that is known about how the Beatles music was made, in chronological order, with precise details and scrupulous scholarship. Not for the casual fan, especially given its high price, but tremendously interesting reading for the more serious Beatles fan. If you own one book on the Beatles, this should be it.

Kozinn, Allan. (1995). 20th Century Composers: The Beatles. London, Phaidon.
ISBN 0-7148-3203-0. 240 pages.

For those not quite ready to tackle The Complete Beatles Chronicle, Kozinn's book for Phaidon's 20th Century Composers series is equally scrupulous, equally lovely to look at, and contains some fine analysis which is neither too technical nor too speculative. Contains a lengthy, and reasonably balanced appraisal of the solo years, and a superb annotated biblography.

Riley, Tim. (1988). Tell Me Why. New York: Knopf.
ISBN 0-394-55061-7. 423 pages.

MacDonald, Ian. (1995). Revolution in the Head. London: Pimlico.
ISBN 0-7126-6208-1. 387 pages.


Song by song analyses of the Beatles catalogue.

Turner, Steve. (1994). A Hard Day's Write: The stories behind every Beatles Song.
Carlton: n.l.
1-85868-034-4


Steve Turner has done his homework, and came up with a wonderful array of new facts to document his song-by-song "how each song came about". Turner is also to be praised for examining his sources critically, questioning them if the facts don't add up. A good book.

Wings

Gelly, David (text) & Sykes, Homer (photogr.) (1976). The Facts about a Pop Group. London: G. Whizzard / Andr� Deutsch. 54 pages. ISBN 233 96771 0

In choosing McCartney's 'Wings' as the prototypical 1970's touring rock band, this book in the 'Facts about' series uses Wings tour of Britain prior to their American tour to show the reader what goes into a modern stadium tour, in the process scrupulously detailing the recording and tour preparations, with side-notes on auditions, rehearsals, set design, wardrobe, album cover design, publicity, songwriting, and recording. Surprisingly detailed and surprisingly balanced, since its principle subject is touring and the record industry, with Paul "merely" being used as an example. Very detailed coverage of instruments and personnel. An interesting feature is a copy of a rooming list from one of the hotels on the tour. The original photographs, some colour, are a nice feature.

Solo career

Gross, Edward. (1990). Paul McCartney: 20 Years on His Own Las Vegas, Nevada: Pioneer.
ISBN 1-55698-263-1
An album-categorized selection of interview material from 1970-1990.

Harvey, Andrew (1984). Give My Regards to Broadstreet. London: Pavilion.
ISBN 0-907516-62-9

Essentially an elaborate puff-piece for the movie, it is nonetheless an enjoyable read about the story and making of the film, with an appealing set of photos. One might concievably have a more enjoyable time reading this book and listening to the album than watching the movie, which has never been rated very highly by fans. A revealing 'Private Views' section about the McCartneys' real, day-to-day life, is included to balance the fantasy version of their life portrayed on film, which, just like the Beatles in 'Help', is not in any way to be taken seriously.

5.2 Which back-issues of Life Magazine have contained articles about the Beatles and/or Paul McCartney and how can I find them?

Thanks to Jennifer DeBernardis, Alexandra Burack, and Aline Marchi for providing this information. Initials indicate the source of the information. The following is not a complete list. If you know of issues of LIFE relating to the Beatles that do not appear here, please forward the information for inclusion here.

1960

January 31, 1964 -- "Here Comes Those Beatles" (am)
August 28, 1964 -- Cover story: "They're here again and what a ruckus!" (ab)

July 24, 1967 (Australian edition) -- Cover story: "The new far-out Beatles" (ab)

September 13, 1968 -- Cover story: "The Days In The Lives of the Beatles" (jd)
September 20, 1968 -- Part 2 of the article begun in the September 13, 1968 issue; continued serialisation of Hunter Davies' authorised biography (ab)

November 7, 1969 -- Cover story: "The Case Of The Missing Beatle [-] Paul Is Still With Us"
January 31, 1969 -- small review of The White Album ("if memory serves", ab)
December 26, 1969 -- Cover story: "The 60's" (jd)

1970

April 16, 1971 -- Cover Story: "The Ex-Beatle Tells His Story: Paul McCartney" (jd)

1980

June, 1981 -- "Inside Article on Ringo's Wedding To Barbara Bach" (jd) *

February, 1984 -- Cover Story: "The Beatles 20th Anniversary of Coming To America" (jd)

September 1985 -- Cover story: "Live Aid" (jd) *

1990

December 1995 -- Cover story: "Reunion Special -- The Beatles from Yesterday to Today" (jd) *

Issues marked with an * are still available as back-issues from Time Life (who publish LIFE magazine) by calling (813) 878-6100 or 1-800-541-1000. All other Life magazines listed above are unavailable through Time Life's back-order department. These older back issues can sometimes be found at Beatles conventions or in used book stores (This information thanks to Natalie Hodge).

5.3 What was Club Sandwich

Club Sandwich was a quarterly magazine, recently discontinued, documenting Paul McCartney's current projects, fan art, and other topical McCartney-related items. It came as part of membership to the Paul McCartney Fun Club (a name intended to convey the spirit in which it was put together).

MPL (McCartney Publishing) is building an archive of old Club Sandwiches on the web. http://web.archive.org/web/20050214085923/http://www.mplcommunications.com/mccartney/club/

5.4 In what feature films has Paul and/or his music, appeared?

• The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) allows one to search for films to which McCartney has contributed in various capacities. rickrson@bullock.com (MACCA-L v.2 494) notes that a few films are missing from this list, and asks anyone with full information on Daumier's Law (in particular) to submit a update request (found at the bottom of the search results page).

  Searching under cast/crew members for "Paul McCartney" presents lists of films in which Paul was separately composer, actor, writer, or director. Two foreign films of potential interest appear -- a 5 minute Finlandic educational film called 'Sol, sol skin a mig...' (1996), and an 87 minute film from Poland, with Polish actors playing the Beatles, called 'Yesterday' (1985). The following URL will conduct this search directly: http://web.archive.org/web/20050214085923/http://us.imdb.com/M/person-exact?McCartney%2C+Paul

---

Next Section: Recordings
Previous Section: Internet Resources
List of Questions

1) Introduction
2) MACCA-L
3) History
4) Internet
5) Books and Media
6) Recordings
7) Current Projects
8) Musician
9) Songs and Songwriting