The Changes That Came: Sam Cooke & the Beatles

~post by Joe T.

I’m a big fan of celebrating anniversaries. Whether it’s birthdays, death days, or commemorating epoch events, it’s all awesome to me. This last week from January 30th through February 9th has seen two anniversaries of world shaking importance.

First off, January 30th was the 50th anniversary of the recording of Sam Cooke’s song “A Change Is Gonna Come.” Not released as a single until after his death in December of 1964, its popularity grew until it became the unofficial anthem of the Civil Rights Movement. It’s an amazing song written and performed by one of the 20th century’s greatest singers operating at the top of his game.

Peter Guralnick, the author of Last Train To Memphis and Careless Love, the two volume biography of Elvis Presley, and Sweet Soul Music, the best history of soul music yet written, turns his eye for the grand historical sweep towards this greatest of soul singers with the book Dream Boogie, The Triumph of Sam Cooke. If you were to ask me to recommend one music book that I think is the best, this is the one I’d put in your hands. Tracing the life of Cooke from his humble beginnings to his climb to the top of the gospel industry to his sellout to the secular world and becoming the greatest soul singer and success as a label owner to his controversial death at 33, this book is definitive and delightful. I dare you to not tear up when reading Aretha Franklin relate her heartbroken reaction to Cooke’s murder.

“A Change Is Gonna Come” debuted with a performance of The Tonight Show on February 7th, 1964. Unfortunately, this performance was little remarked upon for nothing was more important to the world at this time than the impending arrival of The Beatles.

February 9th marks the 50th anniversary of the world shattering performance of the Fab Four on the Ed Sullivan show. At that moment, the whole country was kickstarted from black and white into color as girls screamed, boys grew out their hair, folkies became rockers, parents grew concerned and a whole industry was changed seemingly overnight.

You’d think there’s nothing more to say about The Beatles with the millions of books written about them, but there are a couple that have been released in the last couple of months that are well worth the attention of the casual and devoted fan.

Beatles Vs. Stones by John McMillian is a fun, quick read. A joint biography of the Stones and The Beatles, it tells their stories with alternating chapters that focus on how they each reshaped their images trying to one-up each other as the ’60s belonged to the working class Liverpool set and the middle class London blues hounds conquered the ’70s. I thoroughly loved this book.

But if, like myself, you worship at the altar of The Beatles, there’s only one book you should own. Tune In, The Beatles All These Years vol. 1, weighing in at 3 pounds with a page count of 944, is the first in a trilogy of books recounting the definitive history of The Beatles.

Written by Mark Lewisohn, “the world’s only professional Beatles historian,” this book focuses on the early years of the mop topped quartet. From their childhoods in Liverpool to the formations of their multiple bands, Lewisohn is able to make the part of The Beatles history that I find the least interesting into a fascinating tale that I never wanted to end. Ending at the close of 1962 after the release of “Please, Please, Please” but before their moment of domination with the arrival of their second single, “Love Me Do,” this book tells the complete story The Beatles as a gang of punks and thugs who conquered Hamburg and Liverpool and leaves us with the cliffhanger of their transformation (or sell-out according to John Lennon) into the lovable Fab Four who took over London and then the world. I WANT THE NEXT BOOK RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!

So let’s get together and celebrate the impending 50th anniversary of “The Sixties” by picking up a book or two honoring two of the greatest artists of all time: Sam Cooke and The Beatles.

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JOE T. BY THE MINUTE: 

What I’m Reading: 

Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett

Talulla Rising by Glen Duncan

The Mayor of MacDougal Street by Dave Van Ronk

The Norman Conquestby Marc Morris

What I’m Watching: Hannibal (NBC television series based on Thomas Harris’ Red Dragon)

What I’m Listening To: Jess and the Ancient Ones (Svart Records)