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The fab four and our politicians

A fabulous spot in People today:

By their Beatles favourites shall ye know them. Politicians have been arguing over which Fab Four classic drove them to become the well-balanced souls they are today.

Gordon Brown opts for All My Loving (“Tomorrow I'll miss you”, indeed). “This was my early favourite because it was the first I learnt to play on the piano when my parents sent me for lessons when I was young,” he told the Liverpool Daily Post. David Cameron, a “McCartney fan”, picks The Long and Winding Road. “The road he was thinking of was the B842 that runs down Kintyre to Campbelltown,” says Dave, who seems to be taking Wikipedia at face value. “It has a wonderful melody and emotion and pretty much sums up the life of the Leader of the Opposition.”

Discover Nick Clegg and Alistair Darling's picks here.

Ticket to Ride

The Beatles have undergone a curious transformation from mop-topped band to part of Liverpool's civic furniture. So integral to the success of all things Scouse are the formerly Fab Four, that Merseytravel have shelled out £8 million and bought the Beatles Story museum in the Liverpool docks.

The rationale is that, to pay for the failing Mersey ferries, the company should make some money elsewhere. Of course, they have been trying to make money from the ferries for years, by playing the Gerry and the Pacemakers' hit Ferry Cross the Mersey incessantly during the crossings. They have obviously decided it was necesssary to up their game. Poor Gerry.

A book to read - Revolution in the Head

I am now going to recommend a book that a large proportion of you wouldn't dream even of picking up in a bookshop to scan its contents. But you should read it anyway. Even you, Oliver Kamm.

And now I will explain why.

The volume in question is Ian MacDonald's Revolution in the Head.

What is it? It is a song by song account of the Beatles recording career. And on the surface of it, that is all it is. But I think it is really a very profound book indeed.

Stick with me for the next bit.

I was reminded of Revolution in the Head yesterday for an extremely nerdy reason. The excellent Hugo Rifkind had written in his People column about Beatles producer Sir George Martin and his relationship with Ringo Starr.

On several occasions (and this was the latest of them) Sir George has apologised to the Beatles first drummer Pete Best for pushing him out of the group in favour of a session man, and to Ringo for replacing him with a session musician when he first turned up at Abbey Road.

Yet in both cases he has got the chronology wrong. He can't have done quite as he said. He had Ringo play the drums on Love Me Do first and got the session man in later.

So Revolution in the Head gives you so much detail about the Beatles that you can start challenging participants on what they actually did.

Why on earth would you want to do that?

Well, it is quite interesting to note how fallible human memory is. But that's not the real reason I want you to buy and read Revolution in the Head.

The first real reason is that the introduction contains a brilliant argument about the 1960s and its place in history.

MacDonald explains that to understand the counter-culture we first have to understand the culture. You will never look at that era, its politics and its art, in the same way again once you have read his book.

The second reason is the light it sheds on a very old controversy. Is the personal behaviour and political view of an artist relevant when assessing their artistic output? MacDonald answers in the affirmative and goes on to make his case song by song.

Anyone who is familiar with the Beatles will realise that his evidence is very strong indeed.

But even those with little interest in the music will learn of how drugs, personal issues and the politics and ideas of the era shaped the music.

I really think you will find it worthwhile.

Learning to love the new Beatles album

Perhaps you couldn't care less about the release of the new Beatles album "Love" but some people care a great deal. And I'm one of them.

Love is a remix, a mash-up of tracks recorded by the group. Bob Stanley in a fine op-ed for The Times on Saturday argued that the whole idea of mucking about with Beatles music was dreadful and Rod Liddle in the Sunday Times rather agreed. Dan Cairns, on the other hand, thought the new album a materpiece.

I can't agree with Bob and Rod.

I am fanatical about the music of the Beatles, but I think the glory of pop is that it is manufactured, commercial, up for sale.

Those who insist on authenticity ignore the fact that even that it is usually manufactured. The glorious Motown sound was produced in offices by people working office hours. The Beatles were bought up the charts by Brian Epstein after Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best had been pushed out of the band.

The version of Long and Winding Road that appears on Let it Be was produced by Phil Spector, adding strings and voices without McCartney's permission. Why is this any more authentic than Love, which at least two Beatles did sanction?

The production of new takes on Beatles music does not remove any of the original canon from anybody's collection.

So I can't see anything wrong with it.