Cheap Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now (Book) (Barry Miles) Price

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Customer Reviews of Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now

I loved it--but then, I am already a Beatlemaniac
No doubt this was a great book, a great source of information on Paul, and a must for any true Beatlemaniac. <
>The pluses of this book: <
>--The author was close to Paul beginning in 1964. I think he provides the right balance to all the events, and since he was in the artistic and musical circles the Beatles and the Stones were in, he's able to put press hype into perspective. There were several sides of stories I'd never before heard or considered, but his version is the best. <
>--The author had unlimited interview access to Paul, and to his archives. The text is full of long quotes by Paul, describing in detail his memories of songwriting, touring, fame, daily life, and anything else you could want to know about. In this way, the book sort of has a special place as the "official" Paul McCartney biography. It would not be unfair to say that Paul was the main writer and source of information, and Miles was the ghostwriter, and provider of context. <
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>The minuses: <
>--Boring/unnecessary sections. Other reviewers complain that there were parts that were very boring and unnecessary. I enjoyed the whole book, but I definitely do know what they're talking about. One chapter, "Up the Smoke," seems to be mostly devoted to name-dropping all the famous people the Beatles hung out with when they were 21 and first got famous. Miles goes to a great length to describe the London celebrity scene pre-rock-n-roll. The book talks about all these old radio stars they met, all the restaurants and nightclubs they went to, all the special treatment they got as stars, and all the other great things about their new lifestyle, then ends up saying that a lot of these old stars got put out of business because of the Beatles. <
>Similarly, the chapter "Avant Garde London" spends a long time going over people's lives who seemed very tangential. After reading all of it (and it's not the first Beatle book I've read), I still don't know exactly who people like Robert Fraser, Peter Brown, and John Dunbar were or why they were important, but I see their names everywhere. <
>--In the great Paul/John debate, the book always rules in favor of Paul, but that could only be expected. I've come to the conclusion that there are no clear answers as to who wronged who when the Beatles broke up, and most of it was nobody's (within the Beatles anyway) fault. Paul has a platform to defend himself in this book, and actually does a very fair job. I think he's the best steward of John's memory, and the way he talks about John and their friendship is a credit to both of them. Both John and Paul come off looking good. As Paul says in the book, he's got no reason to tear John down in memory, and he wants to present things as they truly were. He's got one advantage no other biographer has, and that was actually being one half of the friendship. Paul defends John when necessary, and is conciliatory about some of John's attacks. <
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>I definitely recommend it. Goes over every song, gives lots of interesting stories, and a clear start-to-finish review of the Beatles' career.

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I enjoyed about half of it
I honestly enjoyed perhaps a good half of this book. The first few chapters, and the later sections on Paul's life in the Asher household, the making of the albums, and his romance with Linda, are quite good and fast-paced. However, there are also numerous long boring stretches, particularly most of the "Avant-Garde London" chapter. Mr. Miles isn't a professional writer or journalist, and it shows. He's a longtime close personal friend of Paul's, and it just comes across like he's way too close to be objective and analytical about his subject. He even writes himself in as a character on a fairly regular basis (esp. in "Avant-Garde London"), which ordinarily would be a hint the writer is way too close to the subject and story and a more neutral third party should be found. And at least half of the book seems to consist of huge block quotes from Paul (sometimes others), making it hard sometimes to tell when one quote ends and another begins, or when we've shifted back to the voice of the narrator. A good biographer is supposed to analyse and synthesise the information, challenge it when need be, and rewrite it in his or her own words, not merely present information. <
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>Apart from a number of typos and grammatical errors, there are a lot of factual errors too. Errors include attributing certain songs to the wrong albums, crediting them to the wrong vocalist, and leaving off songs entirely (e.g., George's two songs on YS are never even mentioned and we're told there were "only two new songs" on the album, instead of actually four). And when it comes time to discussing the individual songs, Paul can't stop intruding into songs which have long been established as having been written entirely or primarily by John to claim that he helped to write the song too, or that his minimal contribution was the most important contribution, taking credit for innovations and songs that rightly belong to John. So many times it seems like his underlying message is "Everything John did, I did better." And Mr. Miles never challenges any of this historical revisionism. <
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>The constant trashing on John, my own favorite Beatle, was really over the top, mean, and uncalled for. This constant unprofessional mean-spirited savaging of him doesn't square well with the frequent quotes from Paul about how they were very close friends and he loved John dearly! You don't need to put others down to build your subject up. And events that might cast aspersions on Mr. Miles's portrayal of Paul as an absolute prince are often left out. I almost wish the book had been written by Paul (as it is, at least half of it seems to be in his words), since he comes across as rather candid, honest, and open, like acknowledging that he could be very bossy, overbearing, controlling, and selfish in the studio, even when it really rankled his bandmates. <
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>Paul does seem like a really nice guy, and he was originally my favorite Beatle, but in this book he just comes across as childish, petty, insecure, and even a liar. That might not have been Mr. Miles's intention, but given his refusal to challenge anything Paul says, no matter that it's contradicted by every other source out there, it sure ends up that way. It's a shame, really, since in another biographer's hands this could have been a much better book, letting people know that Paul is a lot deeper, more interesting, and multi-faceted than his image would seem to suggest.

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Riveting, I Love It
I probably can't improve on Amazon's editorial review on the first page of this site, because it says it all,but I will try anyway. This is the most revealing book I've ever read about any aspect of the Beatles, probably because it is told in Paul's own words, in that honest, matter of fact way that all four of them always had. And that's one of the reasons we love em. It really is more of an autobiography. There are three outstanding things about Many Years from Now. One is Paul's recollections about almost every Lennon McCartney song; who wrote what,and each writer's contribution. He even remembers where he was when he wrote each song,and he remembers smells and other people in the room,or what was happening in his life at the time. Very vivid memories. It's incredibly exciting to have this written down in a book that you can refer to any time. Also,his recollections match John's for every song except just two, In My Life and And I Love Her. That's amazing considering John did his song by song thing back in 1980, and Paul deliberately didn't look at it just to see if their memories matched, and they do. Speaking of John, the second wonderful thing about this book, is the facinating, personal info. that Paul brings to light about his best friend and song writing partner. It's obvious that Paul's feelings for John are deep and complicated and tied up with very strong emotion. He goes into a lot of detail about this. I don't understand some reviewers' remarks that Paul is somehow petty because he claims to have written the music to In My Life. Why is this so difficult to believe? Are some people so enamored by John Lennon that they can't imagine that he might have made a mistake? And why do they seem to think that Paul is the one who's lying here? Paul's been saying that he wrote the melody since John's 1980 interview came out. Why would he keep saying it if he didn't feel it was the truth? All through the 70's John was given to mood swings about Paul. Sometimes he loved him and sometimes he said the most outragiously rude things about him. Also, not for anything but how many acid trips did John take in the 60's? Not to mention his heroin use. Can't be so good for the memory. They are actually believing every word that this man says instead of someone who took only a few acid trips and never used heroin. John's feelings often changed with the wind. How could people have missed that? Anyway the third lovely thing about this book is Paul's candidness about everything. For instance, he talks about how he once became sexually aroused at the sight of his mother in her underwear. One reviewer was discusted by this but wait a minute. How many guys would ever admit something like that? Anyone who's read the Kinsey Report about human sexuality will know that there is nothing abnormal about this. But no one would ever admit it. To say the least there was certainly an oedipal thing on Paul's part,concerning his mom. This book is filled with no holds barred,honest stuff like this, and I found it refreshing. No one can ever again, say that Paul holds anything back. He also speaks very candidly about his drug use,revealing a few startling surprises. There is a section about the recording of each album which was wonderful. He talks about his early relationship with Linda,which I enjoyed. What I didn't like is that he dismisses two very important ladies, Dot Rhone and Jane Asher. I guess he has his reasons but I would have liked to see his candidness about these two for a change. I think it is because he didn't want to trespass on their privacy and also, Linda was pretty jealous especially about Jane. This book covers only his youth and the Beatle years, so Wings fans won't find anything here. He also tells the facinating story about his near nervous breakdown after the Beatles break up. The first time I read this book was when it first came out and I was really bowled over by it. At the time I didn't know much about McCartney. What an eye opener. I read it the second time just recently, and I had the same reaction. So I bought it. I will read it again because I love it and want it in my collection. If you only read one McCartney book it should be this one, but there are others that I recommend if you are so inclined: Paul McCartney the Definitive Biography by Chris Salwicz is very good. And of course the Anthology book, and Hunter Davies' authorised biography. Also Ray Coleman's Paul McCartney Yesterday and Today about Paul's music, mainly Yesterday. Even McCartney, the new one by Chris Sandford is not bad, but it is the weakest of the ones mentioned here.But this book, Many Years From Now is the BEST McCartney book, bar none. It is essential reading for not only Paul fans, but Beatle scholars as well. Even casual fans will enjoy it.