Paperback: 313 pages
Genre: Non Fiction, Biographical, Memoir,
Publisher: Cockney Kid Publishing 2013
Source: Sent to me in November 2015 by Clive Walters, agent on behalf of the author.
First Sentences: Introduction - It was 1964 and I was the slightly wet-behind -the ears, twenty six year old West Coast correspondent for one of Britain's biggest newspapers, the London Daily Express - circulation four million daily.
My Opinion: This title was published to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Beatles 1964 tour of North America. In 1964 I was a young Beatles fan so was delighted to be given the opportunity to read and review this account by Ivor Davis of his experiences whilst on tour with them. As he was with them the entire time during the tour, which was over a month, so he became quite close to them. The tales he tells and the many photos that are included give us another insight into The Beatles. This was a very special era in musical history and I urge all fans of any age to pick up this book as it is well written and interesting either to dip into or read from cover cover.
Précis Courtesy of Goodreads:
In the summer of 1964, the Beatles took America by storm and changed rock ’n’ roll forever. In this first-ever chronicling of that revolutionary tour from the inside, author Ivor Davis serves up the stories behind the stories as only an insider can.
In the rowdy and riotous recollections of THE BEATLES AND ME ON TOUR, Ivor Davis, then a reporter for the London Daily Express, shares his unrestricted access to the Liverpool lads as a member of the Beatles entourage. From inside the band’s hotel suites to the concert arenas to the private jets, the madness and magic plays out through Davis’ personal accounts of hanging with the Beatles for thirty-four jam-packed days.
Go behind the scenes for all-night Monopoly games with John Lennon, witness the Beatles’ legendary living-room jam with Elvis, and be there the night Bob Dylan introduces the band to pot. Roll up for this definitive account of the legendary band at a critical moment in the history of rock ’n’ roll.
Author Profile
Biography Courtesy of Goodreads.
In the summer of 1964, the Beatles embarked on a record-breaking pandemonium-inducing tour of America and Canada. The Beatles and Me on Tour presents the first chronicle of that tour told by an insider: author/journalist Ivor Davis, then a young British reporter for the London Daily Express. Ivor was the only British newspaper writer invited on the entire tour.
Through thirty-four days and twenty-four cities, Davis traveled with the Beatles watching them make rock history. He enjoyed unrestricted access to the four boys fresh from Liverpool—from their hotel suites to backstage at concert arenas to their private jet. He fended off excited girls, and their insistent mothers, attempts to hook up with the band. Ivor played all night games of Monopoly with John Lennon, became the ghostwriter of a newspaper column for George Harrison, and witnessed the night Bob Dylan “deflowered” the young marijuana virgins.
London-born Ivor Davis first came to America in the early sixties and was appointed West Coast correspondent for the 4-million-a-day circulation London Daily Express in l963.
Over more than four decades as a writer for the Daily Express and the Times of London, Ivor covered major events in North America. He penned a weekly entertainment column for the New York Times Syndicate for over 15 years, interviewing some of the biggest names in show business, from Cary Grant to Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton to Tom Cruise and Muhammad Ali.
In 1962 he was smuggled onto the campus of the riot-torn University of Mississippi when James Meredith was enrolled and three years later was in the front lines as Los Angeles’ Watts riots erupted.
Ivor covered Robert Kennedy’s 1968 presidential bid and was in the Ambassador Hotel the night Kennedy was assassinated. He was one of the Boys on the Bus chronicling the life of actor-turned-politician Ronald Reagan, first in his campaign for governor of California, then for president.
He was a co-author of the l969 political book Divided They Stand, which chronicled the Presidential election; and witnessed some of the biggest trials in American history: Sirhan Sirhan, convicted of killing Bobby Kennedy in 1969; black-power militant Angela Davis, acquitted of murder in l972; a year later, Daniel Ellsberg’s trial for leaking the Pentagon Papers, and, in 1976, he was in San Francisco to see heiress Patty Hearst convicted of robbery after being kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army.
In l969 he co-wrote Five to Die, the first book ever published about the Sharon Tate murders. (The book was updated in 2011.) As a foreign correspondent, he traveled throughout the western hemisphere covering riots, floods, earthquakes and politics. As Editor at Large for Los Angeles Magazine, he and his late wife Sally Ogle Davis wrote over 100 major magazine and cover stories. He has reported on four World Soccer Cups for CBS radio.
He currently lives in Southern California and is working on two new books: one about movies the other a true crime story.
Photographs, Trailer and Biographical Information courtesy of the following sites.
Goodreads Author Profile Ivor Davis Official Website Amazon - Ivor Davis Page
