Behind Sad Eyes: The Life of George Harrison When a celebrity passes away, that passing seems to serve as permission for some biographers to write about the dark side of the dearly departed. Marc Shapiro carries on this dubious tradition in BEHIND SAD EYES: The Life of George Harrison. As fans of the Fab Four will recall, Harrison was considered the quiet Beatle, the spiritual one who kept to himself, and was content to stay in the background. Just like his fellow Beatles, Harrison grew up amid lower-middle class surroundings. He displayed a musical talent that overrode his scholastic career. As a teenager, he hooked up with Paul McCartney and later John Lennon to form the Silver Beatles; once Ringo Starr supplanted Pete Best as the groups drummer, the quartet was on its way to stardom.
The long and winding road to fame had its share of stumbling blocks, along with the perks that fall to those in rock-and-roll. However, Shapiro holds Harrison to a higher moral standard. He describes Harrisons rite of passage into manhood during the Beatles tour to Hamburg in the early 1960s: As promised, George would regularly write home to let his parents know that everything was all right. Needless to say it was a sanitized version of what had become, for George, a willing descent into debauchery. This same attitude is seen when Shapiro derides Harrisons use of drugs, which was, unfortunately but almost inevitably, part and parcel of the rock scene. Only Harrison is singled out for these perceived indiscretions. Shapiro depicts Harrison as Machiavellian.
The Essay on George Washington Carver
George Washington Carver was born into slavery January of 1860 on the Moses Carver plantation in Diamond Grove, Missouri. He spent the first year of his life, the brutal days of border war, between Missouri and neighboring Kansas. George was a very sickly child with a whooping cough, which later lead to his speech impediment, and he was tiny and puny. Georges father, James Carver, died in a wood ...
For someone who was supposed to be in the background, he is given a lot of influence with having Pete Best replaced by Ringo. Shapiro also tells readers that Harrison did not get along particularly well with Paul or John in later years. To be fair, it was no secret that Harrison was constantly pressing to come out from the shadows of Lennon and McCartney. He was tired, and rightly so, of being thrown a bone, so to speak, with only a song or two on each album. The groups record producers, however, decided that many of Harrisons tunes were less than, well, tuneful. Shapiro portrays Harrison as a seeker, the one who turned the rest of the band onto Transcendental Meditation. He remained a follower of the faith, with the ebbs and flows of piety the devout often face.
He, however, also writes about the almost soap opera-ish triangle between Harrison, his wife Pattie and Eric Clapton, who eventually won her heart. Mixed in this storyline are the occasional affairs and the seeming indifference towards the love triangle. Even when Harrison displays his generous side, Shapiro shows that no good deed goes unpunished. Commenting on the ex-Beatles philanthropic best with his involvement in the Concert for Bangladesh, he writes Unfortunately, the occasion . . .
would also expose his weakness as a human being, again holding Harrison up to that higher standard. As Harrison moves through middle age, Shapiro lightens up a bit, giving him credit for his comebacks both as a solo artist and as a member of the Traveling Wilburys. But the darkness was never far behind. He battled cancer. While recovering from the ordeal he was brutally attacked in his own home by a disturbed fan (Harrison was a fanatic about security, especially after the murder of John Lennon).
Only the brave intervention of his second wife, Olivia, saved him from almost certain death.
Sadly, Harrisons cancer resurfaced; he faced the end with dignity and peace. Behind Sad Eyes is Shapiros attempt to lift the window shade on this mystical life. It might be easier to take if his prose was not so stilted. In his introduction, he relates how difficult this undertaking was: normal. And so to the task at hand: to discover the real George Harrison in all his varying shades of light and dark. It is not an easy life to put in order. George Harrison spent his entire life trying to hide from us and, depending on how one addresses that elusive beast called Fame, he either failed miserably or succeeded to the nth degree.
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In college it is easy to stray away from the main purpose, which is having a higher education. College years are supposed to include fun but not too much fun. There are many ideals to consider when trying achieving success in school. They way students manage their time and consume energy has an effect on the outcome of their success. Relaxation also plays a significant role in the turn out of ...
The author continues to pat himself on the back later in the introduction when he states, Youve been here before, But, youve never been here this way. Shapiros treatise is full of gossipy tidbits many readers will enjoy; whether his words reach the Beatles uber-fans is another story. Shrouded in a sea of mystery, the elusive George Harrison has long been the most private and enigmatic member of the Beatles. From his hard knock childhood in Liverpool to his ascendance into rock infamy, George Harrisons life has been a torpid ride filled with legendary success and heart crushing defeat. New York Times bestselling author Marc Shapiro sheds new light on this paradoxical rocker, whose reputation for unusual religious practices and drug abuse often rivaled his musical notoriety. A man whose desire was to be free rather than be famous, Harrisons battle against conformity lead him to music making, a soulful and creative expression that would be his ticket to success and the bane of his existence. Behind Sad Eyes is the compelling account of a man who gave the Beatles their lyrical playing style and brought solace to a generation during turbulent times.
Books that capitalize on the grisly interest spawned by the death of a star are usually inferior. Not so this biography of Harrison, universally famed as the quiet Beatle. Biographer Shapiro (J.K. Rowling, Carlos Santana) creates a complex portrait that shies from melodrama. For instance, Shapiro does not wring heroic sentiment from Harrisons working-class roots, as others have been so inclined. Instead, Shapiro focuses on the unusual level of support Harrison received from his parents, who encouraged their imaginative young son to make a serious go at the seemingly dead-end vocation of rock guitarist. Roughly one-third of the biography is devoted to Harrisons career as a Beatle.
Rather than analyze the group (territory covered countless times), Shapiro uses well-chosen anecdotes to describe Harrisons role in the band. The musicians frustrations as an underappreciated writing talent and his disappointment in both work and private life emerge as major contributors to the bands demise. Though Harrison appeared to be passive, Shapiro notes that this humble exterior was often more form than substance. When the Beatles made the unpopular decision to fire drummer Pete Best, Harrison played dumb, though he was the one who pushed to fire Best. Shapiro writes, In what would become his typical response to uncomfortable situations, he denied any involvement in the firing of [drummer] Pete Best, when he in fact pushed for the unpopular decision. One of the first biographies fully devoted to Harrison, this volume brings keen perspective to both his great contributions and bland failures. Behind Sad Eyes: The Life of George Harrison, by Marc Shapiro (St. Martins), and Harrison, an anthology of Rolling Stone articles (Simon & Schuster), follow the same basic format. In doing so, they underscore the fact that, as a musician, Harrison had passed away decades before he succumbed to cancer.
The Essay on The Life Of George Washington
Flexner, James Thomas. George Washington. Little. 1967 George Washington was one of the founding fathers of the United States of America. He served as commander-in-chief of the Continental army during the Revolutionary War, and later served as the first president of the United States. His thoughts and ideas helped mold the United States into the great country that it is today. George Washington ...
Hence, the final entry in a 2002 Rolling Stone piece detailing 25 Essential Harrison Performances is a squib about the 1973 hit Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth).
In his musical career, if not in other parts of his post-Beatles life, Harrison turned from a seeker who brought new sounds and ideas to his audience to a didact quick to dismiss both indifferent listeners and newer artists. Grow or die may be a hoary business maxim, but it is an aesthetic imperative as well. Though never as strong a songwriter as John Lennon or Paul McCartney, Harrisons better Beatles tunes show great range. Still, his real contribution to the group had less to do with composing and more to do with experimentation, sonic and otherwise. Harrison enriched the band by bringing new sounds into the mix, most famously the sitar, which he used to memorable effect in the song Norwegian Wood. (To be sure, it is far from clear that the sitar on balance has benefited rock – skeptics need only point to most other Beatles songs that feature it, not to mention tunes such as the Animals hilarious Winds of Change, a droning, semi parlando history of music.) More important than the Indian instruments was the Eastern mysticism they symbolized.
It was Harrison who introduced his bandmates – and their fans – to Hinduism, transcendental meditation, and other exotic elements that helped define the 60s as a liberation period. Harrison similarly led the way in terms of drug use, particularly mind-expanding psychedelics. Indeed, Harrison helped to expand massively the set of cultural resources and identities available in the West. Through his public (if often tedious) spirituality and his key role in the first superstar benefit concert, he also helped redefine the modern pop star as a messiah. When the Beatles broke up, it was Harrison who scored the first massive solo success, 1970s All Things Must Pass, which included the hit, My Sweet Lord, that would later cause him legal problems. He followed that up a year later with the well-received The Concert for Bangladesh, which featured prominent performances by Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, and Ringo Starr.
The Term Paper on Born In Liverpool Germany Beatles Album
... album Electronic Sound encountered even less enthusiasm. After the Beatles demise, Harrison had great successes with the triple-album All ... als (March 1960) and The Silver Beatles (May 1960). In August 1960, Lennon, McCartney and Harrison - together with Stuart Sutcliffe ( ... still did not like his post-Beatles music. Somewhat disillusioned by the music business, Harrison produced the cult movie Water ...
Then began a long, slow decline in terms of sales, critical acclaim, and relevance. Many things changed, but perhaps none more important than his relationship to his audience, which grew from one of engaging spiritual guide to hectoring high priest. His albums became less adventurous musically and his lyrics became increasingly self-absorbed. Touring in support of 1974’s muddled ….
