Here, There, and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of The Beatles

Friday, January 29th, 2010 at 4:56 am

Geoff Emerick’s Here, There, and Everywhere is maybe my most favorite Beatles connected book. Why? Because it offers such an interesting perspective on the recording of The Beatles classic albums such as 1967’s Sgt. Pepper.

I love that the book is targeted on what was occurring within the studio instead of what John, Paul, George, & Ringo were doing personally. In comparison other such books are far too targeted on the biography of The Beatles and not enough on the music that made them famous. It is as a result of of their albums that anyone cares about their personal stories.

The book is not entirely regarding The Beatles, it’s more of a Geoff Emerick autobiography (with a clear focus on his time with The Beatles) but if you think that that may make it not as interesting, I really don’t think that it does. I actually think it helps make his stories about The Beatles appear more “real.”

The book’s “realness” is one of the best things about it. I’ve read a heap of books on the Fab Four however many of them appear quite clinical. Like a bunch of facts pieced together. With this book I really felt like I was there at Abbey Road Studio in the 1960s. Sort of a fly on the wall.

This book provides a great look into The Beatles as musicians there’s actually a series of books called The Beatles as Musicians which goes into that more indepth.) We get a glimpse at Paul McCartney working for hours in the studio to get his bass parts on Sgt. Pepper just right and we see George greatly improve his guitar playing skills through the decade.

Emerick was a very important part of the band’s sound during their most creative period. Incredibly on his first full day as lead engineer he came up with ideas which helped make “Tomorrow Never Knows” sound so amazing.

If you are interested in shopping for this book you aren’t stuck with shopping for it on old fashioned paper, you can also obtain it for your Kindle. If you do not have a Kindle yet then I suggest shopping for the big Kindle DX because of it’s larger size, it makes it far easier to read. If you live outside of the USA, you will need to get a Global Wireless Kindle.