Rating: 
Summary: This might bug you.
Review: My favorite part of this book is the word *guitar*, which is closely associated with the name George Harrison in the George Harrison Discography on pages 212-231. The Discography actually starts on page 207, with his solo albums in 1968, 1969, 1970, "The Concert for Bangladesh (1971)," 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1979, 1981, 1982, 1987, "Traveling Wilburys: Volume One (1988)," 1989, 1990, and "George Harrison Live in Japan (1992)." There was no need to mention that he played guitar on those albums, or in the famous Beatles group before that, because almost everybody thought that mainly he was there to play guitar. There were a few surprises for me after that: "James Taylor (1969) George sang harmony on the song `Carolina on My Mind,' GOODBYE Cream (1969) George co-wrote and played guitar on the song `Badge.' " (p. 212). Somehow I never noticed that on DONOVAN RISING (1973), "George wrote a verse for the song `Hurdy Gurdy Man' that was not in the original version of the song." (p. 220).Most of the things that I remember from the book BEHIND SAD EYES were events in the personal life of George Harrison that I hadn't thought much about before. The thing about George and Pattie, Pattie and Eric, with George thinking, "I thought that was the best thing to do, for us to split, and we should have just done it much sooner. But I didn't have any problem about it." (p. 110). In a society that tunes in mainly to the psychological needs of each individual, that kind of thinking is much easier for a writer to identify and portray than the kind of temper exhibited by Ringo after George started singing love songs for Maureen one night, when Ringo and Maureen invited George and Pattie to their home for dinner, and "Pattie, totally mortified at this latest embarrassment, burst into tears and locked herself in Ringo's bathroom." (p. 121). There is no index, and the chapter titles are not much good at locating particular incidents that you might be interested in, but the book is a guide to how certain people see life, and the media have grown on a need to find this kind of information.
Rating: 
Summary: Buy Rolling Stone's "HARRISON" book instead!
Review: The guy from Scottsdale, Arizona has the right idea but the wrong book to buy instead of this shallow, predictable effort -- which further promotes how most authors fail to grasp the significance of George Harrison as a musician, songwriter and humanitarian. If you want a George Harrison biography, DON'T buy the Beatles Anthology. That is about the BEATLES! To celebrate Harrison's work, buy the new Rolling Stone hardcover tribute book, titled "HARRISON."
The Scottsdale reviewer's suggestion indicates many fans out there still disregard George Harrison the solo artist, something the mass media also tends to do. (After all, this is a "It's All About Paul" world.) Authors like Shapiro keep people in the dark about George by always focusings on his shortcomings. By the way, it is hard to lend credence to a writer who rips Harrison's solo efforts, and yet praises John Lennon as having the only solo catalog that had no dips. This shows Shapiro's pro-Lennon bias and underscores the media's off-the-mark fascination that Lennon was the group. A fair portion of Lennon's post-Beatles work was inferior (Some Time in NYC for one). Yes, all of the ex-Beatles had poor albums, but Harrison did have much to offer musically from time-to-time throughout his career. Take the time to get to know him, as a man and not a Beatle. The only way to do that is through the Rolling Stone book. It is well worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: check facts before rush to publish
Review: The writer tells us "Norwegian Wood" is on Revolver. A great deal is made of Harrison's off and on drug use and infidelities, most of which comes from Giuliano's biography, Dark Horse. Introducing the writing of I Me Mine, Shapiro briefly touches on other biolgraphies that sickened George with their sensationalist attention to scandalous topics but this book is no better than any with its rush to be published since Harrison's passing. So many factual inaccuracies along the way make a Beatles fan reader wonder whether any knowledgeable editor even proofed the copy in its dash to the bookstores. Harrison's profound spirituality is tossed off with many mentions of Krishna but not a single exploration of his religious beliefs. Likewise, and embarrassingly so, there are no musical critical comments other than passing references to record releases and a large (but error filled) discography appendix. Only news here is that Delaney Bramlett told Shapiro that he wrote "My Sweet Lord" and that Harrison never gave him co-writer's credit, at the least.
Rating:
Summary: BUY "ANTHOLOGY"
Review: There is not one word in this book that I haven't read a hundred times. I kept reading on, desperate for ANYTHING new.....but no. After ordering this in advance of it's release date, I hungrily anticipated post-Beatles insights. A bitter disappointment. Nothing but same old same old we could all recite. Trust me, go to Amazon home page, click on "Books" and put the Beatles "Anthology" into your shopping cart now...
Rating: 
Summary: Does this guy have an editor?
Review: This book has lots of grammar and spelling errors. I repeatedly wondered if the author had an editor to check the errors. And some facts are wrong. For example, I think he says "Rubber Soul" was released in 1966, or "Norwegian Wood" was on "Revolver," or something like that. The only good parts are the chapters on his solo career. And the discography.
Rating:
Summary: Good for an airplane ride
Review: This cursory Harrison biography was clearly cranked out in something of a hurry so that there would be more books on the shelf about Harrison following his recent, premature death. It contains the numerous factual errors and unsupported assumptions that so often plague books written by professional book-writers and journalists who have done some research but are not intimately familiar with the subject matter. We glide through Harrison's complex life at a brisk pace, stopping occasionally to note his generosity or his personal failures and struggles with fame. To its credit, the book is not especially tawdry, and takes some stabs at insight into Harrison's character, though again it would take a deeper Beatles scholar than this to succeed in any such endeavor.
Rating:
Summary: George deserves better
Review: This is a mindlessly bad book, I'm only giving it a generous 2 stars because of the chapters on George's solo career. Amazingly, George has yet to attract a quality biographer or someone who will put in diligent research to capture his essence and character. Shapiro conducted one (you read it correctly) interview and has no understanding whatsoever of the Beatles or their incomparable history together. The errors are contiunous throughout, some of the minor, some of the them not, but their collective weight dooms this travesty. Everything in the book up until 1970 is merely re-hashed from previous, superior, Harrison biographies. There's nothing new, no novel analysis, nothing. The same trite stories we've heard since 1963 are repeated, with the mistakes intact. Shapiro does improve somewhat after the Beatles demise and George's solo career is not glossed over. Still, there is an absence of any depth throughout. What did George think of Lennon's assassination, how did that tragic event unfold in George's mind? You'll get no answers here, except to say George was paranoid about his security after 1980. What about George's relationship with Clapton after Eric married Harrison's ex-wife, Pattie? Again, nothing. George Harrison was one-fourth of the greatest musical group in the history of man. That alone makes him a compelling subject, but you'd never know it from reading this dismal book.
Rating:
Summary: Do NOT buy this book
Review: This is one of the worst Beatle books I've ever read.
The inaccuracies are shameless.
The writing is poor and spotted with grammatical errors.
The vision is superficial and doesn't ad one bit to the Beatles story.
It is incredible that there is not one good biography of George Harrison.
Unfortunately I bought this without waiting for the Beatlefan review of the book. I could have saved the money.
If you are a Hard Beatle fan looking for something new and fresh, I recommend buying Beatles Gear here...
Rating:
Summary: the star is for the photographs!
Review: this was undoubtedly one of the worst biographies i have ever read...and i have been walking this earth for a while. if george were still around i know what he would say....RUBBISH!
do yourself a favour and pass this one by.
Rating:
Summary: Marc Shapiro explores the dark side of "the quiet Beatle"
Review: 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. 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 group's 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. But Shapiro holds Harrison to a higher moral standard. He describes Harrison's 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 Harrison's 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. 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 us 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 group's record producers, however, decided that many of Harrison's 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. But he 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-Beatle's "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, Harrison's cancer resurfaced; he faced the end with dignity and peace. BEHIND SAD EYES is Shapiro's 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. And 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. The author continues to pat himself on the back later in the introduction when he states, "You've been here before, But, you've never been here this way." Shapiro's treatise is full of gossipy tidbits many readers will enjoy; whether his words reach the Beatle's über-fans is another story. --- Reviewed by Ron Kaplan
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