302 pages, 741 black & white illustrations, 7.4 x 9.7 inches 18.8 x 24.6 cm. An anthology of some of the 'other' groups that were part of the 'Merseybeat' era. However, it is not possible to consider this book without reference to Manfred's previous publication, 'Beat Waves 'Cross the Mersey' (ISBN 9781588502018). While this book chronicles the stories of an additional 66 Merseyside groups, plus 108 line-ups, the combination of both books accounts for more than 750 'Merseybeat' groups that Manfred has researched and documented. As such, this publication should be considered to be a companion volume to 'Beat Waves 'Cross the Mersey'. While most people are familiar with the 'Beatles', there is a universal misconception that they invented 'Merseybeat'. However, nothing could be further from the truth as 'Merseybeat' was 'under construction' long before the 'Beatles' exploded onto the scene. While not in any way attempting to detract from their ability, it is important that anyone interested in that era gives consideration to the other groups that were the backbone of this phenomenon. 'Merseybeat' was a product created by the many hundreds of Liverpool groups that played there. So, here are the complete stories of another 66 'Merseybeat' groups, the names of some of them may be unfamiliar to those that were not part of the era. Regardless, it is a fascinating insight into one of the greatest musical revolutions of the 20th century.

An updated and revised version of The sound with the pound.

A survey of the significant body of recorded works by the Beatles that were not released includes discussions on an array of live concert performances, home demo recordings, studio outtakes, and more, in a chronologically arranged volume that includes coverage of unreleased video footage. Original.

A life-enhancing tour through classic and contemporary poems that have made men cry: “The Holdens remind us that you don’t have to be an academic or a postgraduate in creative writing to be moved by verse….It’s plain fun” (The Wall Street Journal). Grown men aren’t supposed to cry…Yet in this fascinating anthology, one hundred men—distinguished in literature and film, science and architecture, theater and human rights—confess to being moved to tears by poems that continue to haunt them. Although the majority are public figures not prone to crying, here they admit to breaking down, often in words as powerful as the poems themselves. Their selections include classics by visionaries, such as Walt Whitman, W.H. Auden, and Philip Larkin, as well as modern works by masters, including Billy Collins, Seamus Heaney, Derek Walcott, and poets who span the globe from Pablo Neruda to Rabindranath Tagore. The poems chosen range from the sixteenth century to the twenty-first, with more than a dozen by women, including Mary Oliver, Elizabeth Bishop, and Gwendolyn Brooks. Their themes range from love in its many guises, through mortality and loss, to the beauty and variety of nature. All are moved to tears by the exquisite way a poet captures, in Alexander Pope’s famous phrase, “what oft was thought, but ne’er so well express’d.” From J.J. Abrams to John le Carré, Salman Rushdie to Jonathan Franzen, Daniel Radcliffe to Nick Cave to Stephen Fry, Stanley Tucci to Colin Firth to the late Christopher Hitchens, this collection delivers private insight into the souls of men whose writing, acting, and thinking are admired around the world. “Everyone who reads this collection will be roused: disturbed by the pain, exalted in the zest for joy given by poets” (Nadine Gordimer, winner of the Nobel Prize for literature).

‘Who gave the drugs to the Beatles? I didn’t invent those things. I bought it from someone who got it from somebody. We never invented the stuff.’ – John Lennon Riding So High charts the Beatles’ extraordinary odyssey from teenage drinking and pill-popping, to cannabis, LSD, the psychedelic Summer of Love and the darkness beyond. Drugs were central to the Beatles’ story from the beginning. The acid, pills and powders helped form bonds, provided escape from the chaos of Beatlemania, and inspired colossal leaps in songwriting and recording. But they also led to break-ups, breakdowns, drug busts and prison. The only full-length study of the Beatles and drugs, Riding So High tells of getting stoned, kaleidoscope eyes, excess, loss and redemption, with a far-out cast including speeding Beatniks, a rogue dentist, a script-happy aristocratic doctor, corrupt police officers and Hollywood Vampires. ‘The deeper you go, the higher you fly...’

Liverpool in the 1980s. With prospects for the city's youth bleak, a scheme for unemployed musicians commenced, inadvertently shaping the future for members of Cast, Space, the Lightning Seeds and giving fresh impetus to the idea of song as a saviour for the city. Foremost of the bands to emerge from this ill-fated scheme was The La's. Inspired by a chance meeting with Captain Beefheart, Mike Badger formed the band with the enigmatic Lee Mavers. First they conquered the city, and then on the brink of hitting the big time, and eventually inspiring what would become Britpop, Badger quit to form Americana pioneers The Onset, find international recognition as a sculptor, produce album art and videos for some of the country's biggest bands, before finally co-founding Liverpool's Viper record label (which has recently released its 100th album). Featuring everyone from Arthur Lee to Frank Sidebottom, Jonathan Richman to Half Man Half Biscuit, and above all with new insights into the early years of the great lost Liverpool band The La's, The Rhythm and the Tide is both the personal story of a restlessly creative individual, and a reflection on the ebb and flow of the music scene in the city that he loves.

Includes primary source material in the form of photographs, transcripts, etc.

The Casbah Coffee Club, which opened in Liverpool on 29 August 1959, was the brainchild of Mrs. Mona Best, the mother of Pete Best. It is well known that Pete Best was the drummer for The Beatles in their early days in Liverpool and Hamburg. Less well known is that The Beatles' origins were in fact at Pete's mother's club - it was at the Casbah and with Mona Best's blessing that the greatest popular music phenomenon of the twentieth century began. This book tells the story of how Mona Best created the Casbah, and in the process played a major part in creating The Beatles. The band played the Casbah over ninety times, first as The Quarrymen, then as The Silver Beatles and finally as The Beatles. The Casbah's significance cannot be overestimated - it brought together some of the greatest names in rock music and became the catalyst for the Mersey Beat phenomenon which swept Liverpool in the early sixties. Seen here for the first time in forty years is the club's interior as it was at the very beginning, juxtaposed with the rooms as they are today, and still showing the ceilings that were painted by John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Pete Best. A wealth of rare material from the Casbah and the Bests' own archives, together with newly commissioned images by photographer Sandro Sodano, documents the club's and The Beatles' intertwined story. Accompanied by a personal memoir of this extraordinary time, written by Roag Best with his brothers Pete and Rory, this is both a moving family tribute from the Bests to their mother, and a unique insight into a remarkable period of Beatles history.

Applelog 5th Edition is the only complete resource for collectors of U.S. and Canadian Apple recordings and related material, including: • Albums • Singles • E.P.'s • Compact Disc's • 4-Tracks • 8-Tracks • Cassettes • Reel-to-reels • Apple reissues • Apple Advertisements • Apple Studios • Details on unreleased items • Apple Memorabilia • Foreign Apple Records • Special Interest Items, and more!

How the Beatles Destroyed Rock 'n' Roll is an alternative history of American music that, instead of recycling the familiar cliches of jazz and rock, looks at what people were playing, hearing and dancing to over the course of the 20th century, using a wealth of original research, curious quotations, and an irreverent fascination with the oft-despised commercial mainstream.