The Beatles Are Here!: 50 Years after the Band Arrived in America, Writers, Musicians & Other Fans Remember

It had been a hard day's night for us. Not 3 months before, our young president had been stolen from us in a violent and brutal ambush. The television united the country in a new way, as no other medium could have; geography, time zones proved irrelevant to the medium that allowed us to be part of the national mourning, from riderless horse to funeral Mass to the lighting of an eternal flame. Perhaps we were ready for, perhaps we were in need of, a rejuvenation. And suddenly, there they were. 4 young men. On Ed Sullivan for 3 magical Sunday nights. And, as in November, we were all watching, together.
When you are 64, adults had told me, you will still remember where you were on Nov. 22d. They were right. I do. But I also remember show more vividly where I was on February 9th, 1964. WIth enraptured older brother and sister, perhaps two feet away from the tiny TV screen. Penelope Rowlands' warm and wonderful collection of reminisces of musicians and fans took me down that long and winding road of a 1/2-century ago, rekindling memories and feelings. You had to be there, I've always said to younger people; I can't explain it; it wasn't simply seen, it was felt. Now, I can happily add, "Just get yourself a copy of 'The Beatles Are Here!' and you'll have a very good portal to travel back in time." To the days just before, that presaged, the marmalade skies that would so soon open for us all. show less

Rolled my personal clock way, way back until I was re-living vivid memories of 1964 passions

Several new books mark the 50th anniversary of the Beatles arriving in the US and performing in front of a screaming live audience on the Ed Sullivan show--a show that everyone I knew at the time, young and old, watched. What I love about The Beatles Are Here! is that it isn’t about the Beatles themselves--there are plenty of other books for that and I’d rather listen to Beatles music, watch a video of them performing, or laugh through one of their irreverent interviews than read about them anyway. Instead, this book is a forceful but widely varied collection of personal essays by writers, musicians, fans young and old, and even non-fans show more about the rather amazing impact the Beatles had on culture, music, and individual lives.

Expecting to like this book, I ended up loving it. Just about every essay was fascinating in its own way, bringing back some aspect of that strange 1964, just post-Kennedy assassination, no longer the 50’s but not yet what we think of as the 60’s time like nothing else ever has. The essays that almost electrified me are the ones written by fans because those reignited my own vivid memories of passionate pre-adolescent obsession.

Being only nine I loved Paul because, well, he was the cutest and I wasn’t old enough to be very deep. The problem was, I was almost too rational for my own good. (I wanted to believe in Santa but long before kindergarten I just couldn’t.) I KNEW it was crazy for a nine year old to be infatuated with a 21 year old man she had never met , so I hotly denied any interest in the Beatles as long as I could with frequent random and vehement diatribes that must have fooled no one--I give my mother credit for never calling me on it--but then I reversed and embraced my Paul obsession with fervor. And, like many of the essayists in the book, that passion ended up influencing a somewhat amazing/ridiculous amount of my life.

I read that Paul claimed to like classical music so I decided I did too, and then listening to it I actually did. John, Paul and George wrote their own songs so I wanted to be original too and wrote reams and reams of immature but deeply felt poetry. Unlike many bands the Beatles continued to evolve by keeping their art and lives growing and changing, and still to this day being a lifelong learner and explorer who investigates ideas and embraces experiences is how I try to live.

So thank you John, Paul, George, and Ringo, and thank you Penelope Rowlands for putting this book together. (Penelope got caught up in the Beatles excitement when she was young too--one of those girls screaming on that cover photo is her.)

Essayists include Gay Talese, Verlyn Klinkenborg, Billy Joel, Cyndi Lauper, Fran Lebowitz, Renée Fleming, Janis Ian, Tom Rush, Roy Blount, Jr. Barbara Ehrenreich, Cousin Brucie, and plenty of “ordinary” but highly articulate fans. This is the second collection put together by Penelope Rowlands that I’ve read and the first, Paris Was Ours which has essays by people who spent formative parts of their lives in the City of Light, is also wonderful.

I received a review copy of this book from the publisher through LibraryThing. The opinions are obviously all mine. show less

The Beatles Are Here!: 50 Years After the Band Arrived in America, Writers, Musicians, and Other Fans Remember
Edited by Penelope Rowlands
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill/Workman Publishing
Reviewed by Karl Wolff

The Beatles. When the Fab Four hit American shores in 1964, everything changed. You can't say that for too many things, especially in our fragmented, hyper-mediated, pop culture saturated culture. The title of the book says it all: The Beatles Are Here!: 50 Years After the Band Arrived in America, Writers, Musicians, and Other Fans Remember. What makes this anthology stand out is the quality and variety of its contributors and Ms. Rowlands's own personal history with the band. While hipsters (the current iteration, not the Jazz Age show more and Beat Generation versions) try to out-obscure each other with their esoteric musical tastes, the Beatles were mainstream and corporate. (They signed to a major record label.) Who liked the Beatles? Everyone. It is a challenge to think of a pop cultural milestone that has universal appeal. The original Star Wars blockbuster phenom from 1977 to 1983 comes pretty close, since it appealed to non-science fiction fans.

When the Beatles played on Ed Sullivan in 1964 and at Shea Stadium, everything changed. Elvis was mere prelude. The opening essay sets the mood. "My sisters and I grew up despising Welk and all those of his ilk, so when the Beatles showed up, we felt the way the French must have felt when the GIs swarmed into Paris in August 1944." The Beatles ushed in the British Invasion. For decades, American music - blues, jazz, rock, etc. - had influenced British musicians. The Beatles reversed the tide. Elvis was a shot across the bow of Frank Sinatra. In the Thirties and Forties, Frankie had been the teen pop icon beloved by screaming teen girls. When the Beatles played Ed Sullivan, Frank was done. Sinatra must have the felt same way the members of Whitesnake felt when Kurt Cobain played the first chords of "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

Some historicizing is in order. The band didn't just come out of nowhere. Numerous contributors remember the Beatles TV appearance shortly after the Kennedy assassination in late November 1963. With their optimism and energy, they were a means for a nation to heal. And while the anthology is full of warm memories and a not undue amount of nostalgia, the anthology includes some wonderful variations on the Beatles. There are radio Djs from the era recounting the rabid fandom of Beatlemaniacs. But we also get to read travel writer Pico Iyer's take on the Fab Four. The original newspaper feature by Gay Talese is included, along with the original typos and fuddy duddy snark at the young kids with their long hair and skinny ties. "Cut those sideburns, Mattingly!" To be fair, Talese was doing journalism back in the day when type was set manually.

David Thomson, the film critic, interlaces his memories with the Beatles filmography. Biographer David Michaelis recreates his memories of the Beatles but augments it with a deep reading of the lyrics and his academic career in English literature. Michaelis draws the pop culture of the Beatles into the larger tributaries of English literary tradition. There are others. Facebook encounters of long lost friends and the eminent wit of non-fan Fran Lebowitz gives her take.

Where an anthology about the anniversary of the Beatles could have been a love-fest or a tar pit of reactionary nostalgia ("Things were better in the past. Modern life is awful."), Penelope Rowlands gives the reader a varied and enjoyable collection of anecdotes, pop culture analysis, and Sixties history. It is also a wonderful relic of what fandom was. And Beatlemaniacs are sure fanatical about their band. Before Team Edward and Team Jacob in the Sparkly Mormon Vampire Supernatural Romance saga, there was Team Paul and Team John. Sure, there was Team Ringo and Team George too. But Paul was dreamy and John was so totally a poet!

All mockery aside, the Beatles created the zeitgeist of the era and transformed music, pop culture, fashion, cinema, you name it. They also represented a band that was mainstream and part of the monoculture. This monoculture came into being with the transition from radio to television and the dominance of the Big Three (NBC, ABC, CBS) until the retirement of Johnny Carson in the Nineties. (It should be noted, I'm painting the picture in broad strokes and speaking in generalities.)

Before there was Star Wars, before Cheap Trick at Budakon, before all that, there was the Beatles. It was fifty years ago today ...

Out of 10/9.5 and 10 for Beatlemaniacs

http://www.cclapcenter.com/2014/01/book_review_the_beatles_are_he.html

or

http://driftlessareareview.com/2014/01/31/cclap-fridays-the-beatles-are-here-edi... show less

This book of short essays reflecting on the Beatles' importance in various people's lives is surprisingly readable - the quality of writing is high throughout and each person has something unique to contribute. I was a little too young to participate directly in the earliest Beatle frenzy (although like all my friends I chewed innumerable sticks of Beatles gum, accumulated a heavy shoebox full of gum-scented Beatles cards, and had a Favorite Beatle). Thus the book was a revelation to me. Reading it made me realize for the first time how deeply the Beatles affected America, not just the culture, but untold numbers of individuals.

Hard to believe its been 50 years, but what a great way to celebrate this heartbreaking anniversary.
I was just a young boy when the Beatles came to the USA, but I still remember it well. Music is always so closely tied to powerful and emotional memories, and the Beatles music was the perfect soundtrack for a young persons childhood and coming of age transitions.
This book is a beautiful tribute to the band, as its a collection of memories from the people just like you and I...where they were, how the band affected them.
Make no mistake, the Beatles affected EVERYONE in one way or another, and this is the real treasure of the band.
This book focuses on that issue specifically and does so in a wonderful way. Time and money allowing, this show more book could and should be thousands of pages long, as each of us has something to remember and most of us just love sharing it with others.
Great book. Thank you very much. show less

I was not a Beatles fan when they arrived (mostly because of the hysteria surrounding their appearances--and because I love folk music)and I never became a fan of the Stones, but the music shift was unavoidable. I became a fan of the music and lyrics and today, my grown daughter, is a huge fan of the Beatles. All that said, this collection of personal essays collected by Penelope Rowlands (the girl in the middle of the banner featured on the cover), is a fascinating oral history of not only the Beatles, but the era, its politics, its social movements, and the exceptional long life of a British band that only stayed together for seven years. Highly recommended to fans of the group, students of history, and just for a bit of entertaining show more commentary on the world of the 1960s. show less

I was extremely excited to receive this book. I've been a fan of The Beatles as long as I can remember. I was born in the 80's and was hoping this book would give me a glimpse of what life was like in America when The Beatles arrived, and it did just that. I would highly recommend this collection not only to Beatles fans, but also to fans of music in general. The stories don't just deal with the initial Beatlemania but also help explain what made the music so revolutionary, right from the opening chord of the first song they played on the Ed Sullivan Show. The stories help explain not only what it was like in America when they arrived, but also why they were able to make such a instantaneous and unmatched impact on American pop culture.