Media reviews
“The biggest, deepest Beatles book ever.” –Rolling Stone
“This beyond-essential dive into the Beatles’ early Liverpool and Hamburg days is a wildly evocative portrait of our lads on the verge.” –Entertainment Weekly
“A fast-moving page-turner overflowing with warm humor, passion, and (of course) music…For anyone who loves music, this book is the genuine ultimate.” –VH1.com
“Astonishing…Lewisohn’s masterful, step-by-step account raises the intriguing possibility that the Beatles’ success was anything but foreordained .” –Bloomberg News
“A definitive history of the band…Mr. Lewisohn's chronicle fills in vital details that had been missing from the existing Beatles canon and corrects mistakes that have been reprinted for years.” –The Wall Street Journal
“Lewisohn treats his subjects seriously, as historical, if ultimately remarkable, figures, and eschews the myriad myths that have grown up around the band in favor of the sorts of details and minutiae, wrapped in a serious but breezy narrative, that give us the fullest picture of who John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and, eventually, Ringo Starr were.” –Esquire
“Astounding…. packed with revelations and demystifications.” –The Economist
“[Mark Lewisohn is] arguably the most widely respected Beatles historian currently working, and his bona fides served him well — not only in terms of gaining access to materials and interviews, but in obtaining the necessary perspective for a clear-eyed appraisal of rock’s most beloved band.” –CNN.com
“These are the least documented, least known years in the Beatles’ lives but in some ways the richest material, as Lewisohn shows John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Richy Starkey (not yet Ringo Starr) as wartime Liverpool babies who get inspired by American R&B, rock ’n’ roll and skiffle records (the last played partially on washboards and tea chests) while becoming the first British generation in decades to avoid call-up to National Service.” –Chicago Tribune
“The choicest parts of the band’s story are the early, pre-fame years, culminating with 1962. These are the hell-for-leather years, the period when a band from a grimy, bomb-scarred city—a city that didn’t exactly turn out world-beaters—defied long odds and commenced a quest that has something almost preordained about it. In this book, which focuses on 1957 to 1962, Lewisohn picks up on that supernal feel to the Beatles’ success, and at times his own wonder that all of this ever happened, with one amazing coincidence after another, feeds into our own…Lewisohn has a knack for underscoring the moment, the precise moment, when things change.” –Slate.com
“No half measures here: If you ever cast an eye toward Pepperland and wished for an epic Beatles bio, this sprawling tome would seem to be pure payoff.” –The Boston Globe
“The story is told so definitively that, after this, that really should be it…Lewisohn is a Beatles oracle.” –The Guardian (UK)
“I can think of no greater praise for Tune In than to say that it gives The Beatles the beginnings of the biography they deserve….gripping.” –Financial Times
“Unlikely to be surpassed as factual record…Once anointed ‘Beatle Brain of Britain’ while working in accounts at BBC Radio, Lewisohn amasses and investigates facts without sacrificing an iota of the excitement.” –Telegraph (UK)
