Dreaming the Beatles
A Love Story of One Band and the Whole World
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Narrated by:
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Rob Sheffield
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By:
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Rob Sheffield
About this listen
Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone columnist and best-selling author of Love Is a Mix Tape, offers an entertaining, unconventional look at the most popular band in history, the Beatles, exploring what they mean today and why they still matter so intensely to a generation that has never known a world without them.
Dreaming the Beatles is not another biography of the Beatles or a song-by-song analysis of the best of John and Paul. It isn't another exposé about how they broke up. It isn't a history of their gigs or their gear. It is a collection of essays telling the story of what this ubiquitous band means to a generation who grew up with the Beatles' music on their parents' stereos and their faces on T-shirts. What do the Beatles mean today? Why are they more famous and beloved now than ever? And why do they still matter so much to us, nearly 50 years after they broke up?
As he did in his previous books, Love Is a Mix Tape, Talking to Girls About Duran Duran, and Turn Around Bright Eyes, Sheffield focuses on the emotional connections we make to music. This time he focuses on the biggest pop culture phenomenon of all time - The Beatles. In his singular voice, he explores what the Beatles mean today to fans who have learned to love them on their own terms and not just for the sake of nostalgia.
Dreaming the Beatles tells the story of how four lads from Liverpool became the world's biggest pop group then broke up - but then somehow just kept getting bigger. At this point their music doesn't belong to the past; it belongs to right now. This book is a celebration of that music, showing why the Beatles remain the world's favorite thing - and how they invented the future we're all living in today.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
©2017 Rob Sheffield (P)2016 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
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From the moment their hugely influential 1978 debut landed, Van Halen set a high bar for the rock 'n' roll lifestyle, creating an entirely new style of post-'60s hard rock and becoming the quintessential rock band of the 1980s. But the high-flying success was fraught with difficulty, as Eddie struggled with alcohol and drug addiction while simultaneously battling David Lee Roth over the musical direction of the band, eventually taking the band in an entirely new direction with Sammy Hagar and scaling new heights, before that iteration of Van Halen disintegrated.
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Please don't read other audible books
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Wild Tales
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- Narrated by: Graham Nash
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- Unabridged
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From Graham Nash - the legendary musician and founding member of the iconic bands Crosby, Stills & Nash and The Hollies - comes a candid and riveting autobiography that belongs on the reading list of every classic rock fan.
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The Best of the Recent Rock Biographies
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Fornication
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- By: Jeff Apter
- Narrated by: Adrian Mulraney
- Length: 15 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Despite an epic reputation for exhibitionism, drug taking, and drunkenness, through it all the Chili Peppers have continued to produce records that shock, challenge, and intrigue their fans. Jeff Apter tells the complete Red Hot Chili Peppers story, from their first meeting at a Los Angeles high school to the creation of such career-defining albums as BloodSugarSexMagik, Californication and By The Way.
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Cabron
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Walk This Way
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- By: Geoff Edgers
- Narrated by: Geoff Edgers
- Length: 6 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Washington Post staff writer Geoff Edgers takes a deep dive into the story behind "Walk This Way", Aerosmith and Run-DMC's legendary, groundbreaking mashup that forever changed music.
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A MUST LISTEN/READ
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All These Things That I've Done
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Matt Pinfield is the ultimate music fan. He's the guy who knows every song, artist, and musical riff ever recorded, down to the most obscure band's B-side single on its vinyl-only EP import. As a child, music helped Pinfield make sense of the world. Later he would approach his music idols after concerts and explain why he loved their music. As an adult, rock music inspired his career, fueled relationships, and, at times, became a life raft.
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great listen
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How did a pair of little Dutch boys trained in classical music grow up to become the nucleus of the most popular heavy metal band of all time? What's the secret behind Eddie Van Halen's incredible fast and furious guitar solos? What makes David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar so wacky? And, are all those stories about groupies, booze bashes, and contract riders true? The naked truth is laid bare in Everybody Wants Some - the real-life story of a rock 'n' roll fantasy come true.
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Good details of albums and post-1984 career
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Torment Saint
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Elliott Smith was one of the most gifted songwriters of the 90s, adored by fans for his subtly melancholic words and melodies. The sadness had its sources in life. There was trauma from an early age, years of drug abuse, and a chronic sense of disconnection that sometimes seemed self-engineered. Smith died violently in LA in 2003, under what some believe to be questionable circumstances, of stab wounds to the chest. By this time fame had found him, and record-buyers who shared the listening experience felt he spoke directly to them from beyond: astute, damaged, lovelorn, fighting, until he could fight no more.
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Almost interesting, often overwrought, poorly read
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In this incisive memoir, Steve Lukather tells the complete Toto story. He also lifts the lid on what went on behind the closed studio doors, shedding light on the unique creative processes of some of the most legendary names in music: from Quincy Jones, Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney, Stevie Nicks, and Elton John to Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, Bruce Springsteen, and Aretha Franklin. Lukather’s extraordinary tale also encompasses the dark side of stardom and the American Dream. Frank, engaging, and often hilarious, The Gospel According to Luke is no ordinary rock memoir.
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Wow Best Rock Biography Ever
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John Lennon
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- Narrated by: Graeme Malcolm
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Philip Norman turns his formidable talent to the Beatle for whom belonging to the world's most beloved pop group was never enough. Drawing on previously untapped sources, and with unprecedented access to all the major characters, here is the definitive portrait of John Lennon. This biography takes a fresh and penetrating look at Lennon's much-chronicled life, including the songs that have turned him, posthumously, into almost a secular saint.
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Really Bad Abridgement Job (slash job)
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Who I Am
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From the voice of a generation: the most highly anticipated autobiography of the year, and the story of a man who wanted The Who to be called The Hair; wanted to be a sculptor, a journalist, a dancer and a graphic designer; became a musician, composer, librettist, fiction writer, literary editor, sailor; drank too much and nearly died; detached from his body in an airplane, on LSD, and nearly died; planned to write his memoir when he was 21; and published this book at 67.
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Glad To Meet You
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Small Town Talk
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When musicians in the New York folk scene of the 1960s grew tired of city life, they decided to "get it together in the country". They headed for Woodstock - not to the site of the infamous music festival of 1969 but to the Catskills, to Bearsville, to Woodstock proper. Counterculture revolutionaries like Janis Joplin, Richie Havens, and Paul Butterfield got "back to the land", turning the once sleepy hollow into a funky Shangri-La.
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Captured the era - too many mistakes
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By: Barney Hoskyns
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What listeners say about Dreaming the Beatles
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Geo LaRue
- 04-12-24
Still Dreaming...
My introduction to Rob Sheffield's writing, who is now one of my favorite authors, affectionately writing about one of my favorite bands. So, of course, "Dreaming the Beatles" has become one of my favorite books. I read the book on it's release and just now completed the audiobook for a revisit. Sheffield's writing, and delivery in the audio, is hilarious, with thoughtful. detailed and well-researched anecdotes of the Beatles and the world they still impact. Many of these stories I hadn't heard before. I have since devoured Sheffield's whole bibliography and now waiting for more.
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- 509Cougs
- 12-14-21
Whimsical and Bright
I wish this went on forever. Wait a minute; it will. Ya, ya, ya, yaaaaaaa.
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- Wilson W. Smith III
- 06-30-22
Beatles Fans: A MUST..!
This book captures the nuance of what makes The Beatles such a unique gift to our culture. It’s written from a “fanboy“ perspective but totally justifies why. It’s also a good analysis of rock ‘n’ roll from the 60s - 2000s.
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- Neil Shurley
- 08-06-18
Enjoyed it so much I bought it again
Loved it. Fascinating structure, full of interesting details. I loved the audiobook and, when I finished, bought the hardcover so I'd be able to thumb through it at my leisure.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Lee Sanford
- 05-17-17
If you love The Beatles, this is a fun read!
Are you a Beatlemaniac? Listen to them every week? Taught your kids The Beatles? Think The Beatles? Then this is your book. Fun, insightful, educational, arguable and more. Wonderful narration by the author. Love to John, Paul, George and Ringo (and George Martin).
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2 people found this helpful
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- KellysHero718
- 05-09-21
A Worthwhile Mlx
The first five minutes sound like a book report by a clever Sixth-grader, but it soon becomes an entertaining and informational treat, containing much that is either new or a fresh opinion about some event. While I disagree with Sheffield on some opinions and interpretations, this is an excellent discussion by a fan and Amanda who knows music and performers. Well done.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Scott Green
- 03-01-18
Faded toward the end
I really enjoyed the first half, three quarters of the book. I learned a lot and will looking for the boots he speaks of. Minus one star for saying at one point Dylan was trying to keep up with the Beatles and for the comment on Neil Youngs’s Tonight’s The Night.
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2 people found this helpful
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- d. pelfrey
- 01-18-20
it isn't about The Beatles but ABOUT the beatles
This is the book I would have written if I could, not so much a history of the band, though that is used as a framework, but instead a love letter to the band and the fans.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Tad Davis
- 05-18-17
Wonderful ramble
This isn't so much a history of the Beatles as a loosely chronological collection of essays. It's engaging, well-informed, and highly opinionated; it covers the group, the individuals in the group, the music, why many of the songs are brilliant but a few are rubbish, and why and how the world bowed down in homage. If you're a Beatles fan, get it. If you're a Stones fan, get it too - you'll find some useful information here.
Sheffield does a great job narrating his own book, with one exception. His occasional attempt at a British accent (usually in a quote from a Beatle) is pretty bad. Aside from that, he's one of the best writers-as-narrator I've heard. His passion for the subject comes through in his voice.
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8 people found this helpful
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- Rick R.
- 06-02-17
Pop Storytelling Standout
If you are like me, especially on this 50th Anniversary of Sgt Pepper, you've read some, possibly many books on my favorite subject, The Beatles. And like the escape they provided in the early 60's after the Kennedy assassination and since, this book and the journey it provides functioned as yet another escape in these most difficult political times. Worth spending time together.
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3 people found this helpful