Jan. 24, 2025
Ian MacDonald’s “Revolution in the Head” is a book that I’ve read parts of dozens of times and even all the way through once or twice. I picked it up again today and thought I would write about it. It’s a detailed analysis of every Beatles song ever released, along with the details and events of their recording. I own a copy of the second edition which was updated to include the anthology material. Today you can still get hold of a 3rd edition on the Waterstones website (not sure that I like the new cover though).
I like to pick it up very now and again, like today, and flick to a random page. I’ll admit my interest (like most people I presume) lies mostly between 1967 and 1968 where you genuinely wonder how did they do that? The book tends to fall open there now. It’s quite sanguine about the tensions within the band and is keen to describe some of the motivations for the writing of the songs through that lens. Paul McCartney disputes this, though his autobiography also has some contested facts about the authorship and circumstances of how some songs came to be. You sense the author’s frustrations about their drug use stem from a lack of empathy with or understanding of the creative pressures the Beatles ended up struggling under.
Among my favourite entries are those for “A Day in the Life”, “All You Need is Love” (very scathing) and “Revolution 9” (total bewilderment about the music but a good description of how it came to be and the context for its existence). It’s a testament to the author’s skill that the scathing entries are just as fun to read as the passionate ones. I think many Beatles fans would enjoy this book and given some of the snark on show, a good many non-Beatles fans might like it too!
Sadly the author died by suicide in 2005. I do wonder what he would have made of the recently AI revived Beatles single “Now and Then”, which is mentioned in a footnote to the entries discussing the other “reunion” songs. Even though the AI remastering of the original cassette meant a better job could be done with the demo this time around. But as he himself so eloquently puts it when discussing “Free as a Bird”, I thought that “Now and Then” made for a fine soundtrack for a nostalgic video but a poor finale for the band who changed the world. Perhaps he would have felt the same.