Reviews

[An] intelligent study of the Beatles...McKinney crunches the facts and pulps the possibilities before tossing everything into a great metaphysical soup, and his book carries sentences not unlike those Norman Mailer used to write forty years ago in the "Village Voice".--Andrew O'Hagan"New York Review of Books" (05/27/2004)

[McKinney] is very good indeed on tracking the Beatles' collective footprints through the sands of the collective unconscious. He's a pleasure to read on the Marcos debacle and the 'butcher' photograph (in a chapter entitled 'Meat'): his deconstruction of "Help!" is little short of masterly...This is the work of a critic bold enough to cite 'Happiness is a Warm Gun' as 'the defining song of the Beatles' greatest album.'--Charles Shaar Murray"Mojo" (06/01/2004)

McKinney, born in 1966, never experienced the [Beatles] phenomenon firsthand. His perspective grants him freedom to see new combinations, to consider and even dismantle the existing critical apparatus; in doing so, he jolts his subject back to bristling life...If this is a history, it's a poetic one, driven by smart, breathless connections rather than a need to gather all the facts.--Ed Park"Village Voice" (10/15/2003)

Using literary techniques of montage and free association not unlike those found in the Beatles' more psychedelic songs, McKinney spins a fabulous, fabulist psychic and social history of the band...A detailed, exhaustive and creative look at the Beatles that challenges readers to hear them with new ears.--Seth Rogovoy"Newsday" (01/04/2004)

You'll find it hard to resist the urge to leap up and play whatever song [McKinney's] dissecting; though you may think you're sick of 'Happiness Is a Warm Gun, ' Mr. McKinney will convince you otherwise. Any fan under 40 may be a phony Beatlemaniac, but new generations continue to wrap their heads around The White Album, and "Magic Circles" is a welcome reminder of why that record remains continually fresh.--Brett Sokol"New York Observer" (10/20/2003)

artifacts of that collective dream--the butcher cover, the Paul-is-dead rumor--he's also terrific at maximizing the excitement of a Reeperbahn stand or a mysterious bootleg, and always renders the music in three dimensions.

culture comment as it is biography. In either role it's a fascinating study of a time--and a band--worth remembering.

exhaustive and creative look at the Beatles that challenges readers to hear them with new ears.

he jolts his subject back to bristling life...If this is a history, it's a poetic one, driven by smart, breathless connections rather than a need to gather all the facts.

used to write forty years ago in the "Village Voice,"

why that record remains continually fresh.

ÝAn¨ intelligent study of the Beatles...McKinney crunches the facts and pulps the possibilities before tossing everything into a great metaphysical soup, and his book carries sentences not unlike those Norman Mailer used to write forty years ago in the "Village Voice." -- Andrew O'Hagan "New York Review of Books" (05/27/2004)

ÝMcKinney¨ is very good indeed on tracking the Beatles' collective footprints through the sands of the collective unconscious. He's a pleasure to read on the Marcos debacle and the 'butcher' photograph (in a chapter entitled 'Meat'): his deconstruction of "Help!" is little short of masterly...This is the work of a critic bold enough to cite 'Happiness is a Warm Gun' as 'the defining song of the Beatles' greatest album.' -- Charles Shaar Murray "Mojo" (06/01/2004)

From the very first lines of "Magic Circles," you know you're in for a different sort of ride...Devin McKinney's "Magic Circles" is as much pop culture comment as it is biography. In either role it's a fascinating study of a time--and a band--worth remembering.

McKinney, born in 1966, never experienced the ÝBeatles¨ phenomenon firsthand. His perspective grants him freedom to see new combinations, to consider and even dismantle the existing critical apparatus; in doing so, he jolts his subject back to bristling life...If this is a history, it's a poetic one, driven by smart, breathless connections rather than a need to gather all the facts. -- Ed Park "Village Voice" (10/15/2003)

With a white-hot prose style and a poet's instinct for metaphor, independent scholar McKinney exhumes, interrogates, and otherwise energizes the Fab Four in all their musical glory and mythic resonance. Born too late (1966) for phase one Beatlemania, he brings to the job a necessary detachment, a willingness to puncture pieties, and finally a script-flipping thesis: The Beatles were the '60s. If he gets surprising mileage out of the most lurid artifacts of that collective dream--the butcher cover, the Paul-is-dead rumor--he's also terrific at maximizing the excitement of a Reeperbahn stand or a mysterious bootleg, and always renders the music in three dimensions.