George Harrison cover art

George Harrison

The Reluctant Beatle

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George Harrison

By: Philip Norman
Narrated by: David Holt
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About this listen

 From the author of the million-copy selling Shout!: The Beatles in Their Generation and the bestselling John Lennon: The Life comes a revealing portrait of George Harrison, the most undervalued and mysterious Beatle.

Despite being hailed as one of the best guitarists of his era, George Harrison, particularly in his early decades, battled feelings of inferiority. He was often the butt of jokes from his bandmates owing to his lower-class background and, typically, was allowed to contribute only one or two songs per Beatles album out of the dozens he wrote.

Now, acclaimed Beatles biographer Philip Norman examines Harrison through the lens of his numerous self-contradictions. Compared to songwriting luminaries John Lennon and Paul McCartney he was considered a minor talent, yet he composed such masterpieces as ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ and ‘Here Comes the Sun’, and his solo debut album All Things Must Pass achieved enormous success, appearing on many lists of the 100 best rock albums ever. Modern music critics place him in the pantheon of Sixties guitar gods alongside Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Keith Richards and Jimmy Page.

Harrison railed against the material world yet wrote the first pop song complaining about income tax. He spent years lovingly restoring his Friar Park estate as a spiritual journey, but quickly mortgaged the property to help rescue a film project that would be widely banned as sacrilegious, Monty Python’s Life of Brian. Harrison could be fiercely jealous, but not only did he stay friends with Eric Clapton when Clapton fell in love with Harrison's wife, Pattie Boyd, the two men grew even closer after Clapton walked away with her.

Unprecedented in scope and filled with numerous colour photos, this rich biography captures George Harrison at his most multi-faceted: devoted friend, loyal son, master guitar-player, brilliant songwriter, cocaine addict, serial philanderer, global philanthropist, student of Indian mysticism, self-deprecating comedian and, ultimately, iconic artist and man beloved by millions.
©2023 Phillip Norman. All rights reserved. (P)2023 Simon & Schuster, UK. All Rights Reserved. Entertainment & Celebrities Music Celebrity Guitar Funny

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Critic reviews

'You've got him' (Pattie Boyd)
‘You have taken your readers right down the steps and into the Cavern as it really was’ (Bill Harry, editor of Mersey Beat)
All stars
Most relevant  
I have listened to all the Beatle stories and found this to be the most fascinating.
I would highly recommend this book

Fascinating story

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Easy to listen and well told biography. Additional biography of the beatles. It is a must for every Beatles fan. It could be better with some song inserted.

lots of information not included in beatles bio

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There’s not as much available data on Harrison so this relies quite heavily on The Beatles Anthology. whereas Lennon’s and McCartney’s biography from Norman were detailed and enlightening. Alas this is a bit of a potboiler, hackneyed and cliche ridden.

Disappointing after the biographies of Lennon and McCartney

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Workmanlike telling of George Harrison's story. Most well-read Beatle fans will not find anything new in this book, in my view. I was hoping to find out more about George, the person, but pretty much knew everything which was said about him in this book.

It was okay

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Author is very good and thorough on all the Beatles bio’s
Just need a Phillip Norman Ringo book now!

Great Narration

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Disappointingly superficial and pedestrian overview of a fascinating man and his life. Strictly by the numbers - no insight whatsoever.

Unremarkable take on a remarkable life

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Philip Norman is back flogging another version of his book Shout. If you read that you don’t really need to bother with this at all. It’s full of Norman’s bizarre takes on British culture. Claims such as the Lumberjacks Song could be seen as transphobic (he lacks understanding that it’s about a cross dresser not a trans person) just seems to be crazy. You really don’t get the feeling he’s moved on from his original view of Harrison from Shout. To be honest I have always been amazed he’s got away with his reworking of the Beatles story so many times!

The narration is pretty dreadful. The gentleman is not at good at accents as he thinks he is. The production values are not so great. And his attempts at female voices just come across as patronising. Really a huge miss.

George Harrison deserved so much better

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Nothing particularly new and a number of basic errors whilst delivered in a condescending tone. Did we really need to be told 33 & 1/3 is the rotation speed of a LP or Sean Connery played James Bond? Mr Norman has surely squeezed the Beatles stone beyond dry.

Below average

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I was surprised when I heard Philip Norman had written a biography of George Harrison. Why would a man with such an obviously low opinion of George - as evidenced by his infamously mean-spirited obituary - bother attempting to get to grips with the life of this talented and complex man?

Upon listening to this superficial account of George's life, laced together with some well trodden Beatles anecdotes and a trite, meaningless theme of George being a man of "contradictions", its easy to see what has happened here.

Having written biographies of McCartney, Lennon, and Clapton, Norman has evidently found himself with enough material to cobble together a book about Harrison, a man to whom he has previously shown nothing but disdain.

Any material that doesn't come across as the offcuts from books about men in whom Norman is far more invested seems to have come solely from Pattie Boyd. At one point while listening to this book I wondered why I hadn't just cut out the middle-man and bought Pattie's book instead.

If this is your first Beatles book, you'll find a serviceable telling of the story of the band's career and an account of George's life that's more indepth than a Wikipedia article, but not by much.

But for those who have read literally any other Beatles biography, or seen Martin Scorcese's Living in the Material World, there's very little that's new here.

Offcuts from Norman's previous biographies

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