Book reviews - Reading of Redemption

The Gospel According To the Beatles - Steve Turner

Steve Turner has done what seems pretty much impossible at this stage of Beatles books – he has unearthed new stories and brought a new slant to their work and influence. I have been reading Beatles’ books for thirty years and would suggest I’ve enjoyed none as much as this one. I guess that I have been a fan of Turner’s for some twenty years and have the same Christian world view – indeed I doubt if I myself would be writing books on rock music without his inspiration. Yet, I am not sure that that was to his advantage. It lifted the bar for me. As I opened the book I wondered what possible reason Turner had to attempt this book, particularly having already published a decent book on the band called A Hard Days Write.

The title also made me uneasy. I had actually been asked to write a book about The Beatles and Christianity and even as a thirty year old Beatles’ nut couldn’t see a book on that theme. First point about the book (about time I hear you say) is that it is not about the Gospel and The Beatles. It is about the message of The Beatles which through most of the book is in a direct challenge to the Gospel or at least the Church that promotes it.

Early on, however, Turner does a study on the young Beatles relationship with all things Christian and here is where some of the new interesting stuff is unveiled. It seems that John Lennon in particular was well churched. It seems that not only did the young Lennon go to Bible Class etc but he also went through confirmation not because of any family pressure but of his own volition. Who would have thought and yet perhaps in hindsight the “bigger than Jesus” quote, the “they’re gonna crucify me” on the Ballad of John and Yoko and one day at Apple claiming to be Jesus has roots in this church youth. Turner also has a great story, which I had heard in a Greenbelt seminar some years ago about interviewing Lennon on a day when he was reading some American magazine that seemed to be trying to convert him. To have an almost evangelistic conversation with a Beatle does give Turner some kudos to write about such stuff!

The bigger than Jesus quote is again where Turner uncovers a wider story of how the seeming innocuous interview with Maureen Cleave gets syndicated to the US where it catches fire through an array of scenarios not least a national broadcaster driving through the south coincidently as the furor sparks and making it a nation wide story.

Turner’s contribution though is in showing how The Beatles changed the world in the sixties and as he has written about before how the Church was in no shape to deal with the cultural change being unleashed. The fifties society is one that is bland and regimented, ready for a Dean or Presley or Beatle to set it free from the chains of respectable traditional values. The Church too is seen as weak, anemic and inane. It is this lack of spiritual vitality that Turner sees as the reason that when The Beatles went searching for more than materialism and hedonism that they turned east. For George Harrison the religious soul of the four he could not see any practical earthed outworking of his Catholic upbringing.

In a fascinating subjective strand to the book and particular the last chapter Turner shares how The Beatles helped him find the Christian faith even though they were rejecting it. Harrison’s quoting of The Bible in his defence of Krishna encouraged a Turner who was investigating Christianity that religious pursuits were cool enough to continue. Where Turner didn’t follow was in the use of drugs to start the journey. He does show how important drugs were to that mid sixties phase, particularly the writing of Revolver and Sgt Peppers, and also on their God consciousness. I almost thought that we should start adding spliffs to our Alpha groups, it seemed so important to The Beatles opening up (joke by the way)!

The one Beatles album I have been cold to in my thirty year fandom was Sgt Peppers. Turner converted me at last. That A Hard Days Write, the book I mentioned earlier, was a detailed song by song explanation and so he has the research to share. He does it particularly well for songs like Tomorrow Never Knows from Revolver and She’s Leaving Home on Sgt. Peppers. Like any good biography he has you rushing back to the shelf to pull out the album for a new listen.

This is not only a good Beatles biography but a fascinating cultural history of that short period of time that made such a lasting impression. It has social and spiritual insights into understanding these four lads who shook the world and how on earth they did it.

Back