The Beatles, Popular Music and Society A Thousand Voices

by Inglis, Ian

• ISBN13: 9780312222369
• ISBN10: 031222236X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-06-17
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

The Beatles' evolution from a Liverpool rock and roll group into one of the 20th century's defining images has been repeatedly chronicled but rarely analyzed; a critical appreciation of their music and career, and the issues and debates they provoked, is long overdue. This book provides the first sustained investigation of some of the many historical, cultural, musical, and sociological facets of the group's career. Written by an international group of scholars, it is essential for those wishing to understand not only the phenomenon of the Beatles, but the broader social contexts which popular music continues to be practiced and studied.

Author Biography

Ian Inglis is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Northumbria, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Table of Contents

List of Tables and Figures	ix
Acknowledgements	x
Notes on the Contributors	xiii
Introduction: A Thousand Voices	xv
Ian Inglis
Men of Ideas? Popular Music, Anti-intellectualism and the Beatles	1	(22)
Ian Inglis
Coming out of the Rhetoric of `Merseybeat': Conversations with Joe Flannery	23	(12)
Mike Brocken
The Beatles and the Spectacle of Youth	35	(18)
John Muncie
Lennon-McCartney and the Early British Invasion, 1964--66	53	(33)
Jon Fitzgerald
From Me to You: Austerity to Profligacy in the Language of the Beatles	86	(19)
Guy Cook
Neil Mercer
The Postmodern White Album	105	(21)
Ed Whitley
You Can't Do That: the Beatles, Artistic Freedom and Censorship	126	(24)
Martin Cloonan
Tell Me What You See: the Influence and Impact of the Beatles' Movies	150	(13)
Bob Neaverson
The Celebrity Legacy of the Beatles	163	(13)
P. David Marshall
Refab Four: Beatles for Sale in the Age of Music Video	176	(13)
Gary Burns
`Sitting in an English Garden': Comparing Representations of Britishness in the Songs of the Beatles and 1990s Britpop Groups	189	(18)
Andy Bennett
Index	207