In the Sixties [Paperback]

In Swinging London of the 1960s, Barry Miles was always in the right place at the right time. He was like that character in Woody Allen's Zelig, always present at pivotal moments in history, off at the edge of the picture. It's a wonder his face isn't among those on the cover of Sgt Pepper because Miles was at the photo shoot. Paul McCartney was one of his best friends - Miles ghost-wrote McCartney's autobiography Many Years from Now - and Miles co-owned the hip Indica Gallery where Yoko Ono pursued John Lennon. ("Pursued" because although Yoko claimed to have never heard of the Beatles, that's how Miles observed it.) In the pre-Yoko period when Lennon was living in the woody stockbroker belt outside London, Miles was introducing McCartney to avant-garde music, underground theatre and politics, counter-culture literature.
But the inside stories about the Beatles are only a small part of what makes this such a fascinating memoir. Miles also befriended William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, writing several books about them and other Beat authors. He co-founded the legendary underground newspaper International Times, and was involved in the UFO - London's first psychedelic venue, where Pink Floyd got their start - and most of the other watershed events of the period, almost anything at the cutting edge: drugs, rock'n'roll, high art, pop culture, banned books.
When the '60s began Miles was a teenage art student in Cheltenham, living in squalid flats that were centuries old, throwing parties in which bohemians fought off teds, bopping to jazz and smoking pot. By the end of them he's living in New York's Chelsea Hotel working for the Beatles Zapple Records (the short-lived avant-garde wing of Apple), hanging out with Leonard Cohen, Charles Bukowski, Richard Brautigan, Timothy Leary, Frank Zappa and a teenage Patti Smith.
But it is London that he writes most evocatively about: when dissolute heirs of the aristocracy and art world shared the sacraments of rock'n'roll, hashish and LSD with pop culture ratbags such as Mick Jagger and Marianne Faithfull. When establishment barriers on sexuality, drugs, and freedom of speech meant the streets literally became a battleground. ('Street Fighting Man'? Miles talked with Mick on the topic the night before the song was written.)
Although Miles played his part in history, he doesn't make himself the hero of his stories; he is a humble recordist, matter-of-factly sharing his memories rather than indulging his ego. (Being a good listener probably helped him befriend such notorious ego-maniacs.) So engrossing is his account of this world that I got out my London A-Z map to follow his path through this fabled psychedelic universe.

Miles uses his considerable writing skill and vantage point as a member of the underground to give a closely observed view into avant-garde London of the sixties. Miles communicates a real sense of the possibilities, the experiments, the energy, along with the amateurism and the disasters that were all characteristic of the time. There is a sense of what it was like to be in the middle of a small group of people who were able to influence the world, and who were not necessarily aware that they were doing so. Paul McCartney was his friend and occasional patron, so the occasional insights into the Beatle world are enlightening, and show how they were able to reflect and broadcast the cultural inputs around them to a much wider stage. The contrast Miles shows from the beats, (William Burroughs, Alan Ginsberg and co.) who were "counter" and the rising popular culture (Hendrix, psychedelia, etc.) is dramatic. Miles makes accessible an intimate view of a small community which created cultural reverberations we still feel. Hang on, not to over intellectualise: This is a fun book. You won't get this perspective anywhere else, and it is worth having.

How refreshing, after so many books that either 'imagine' the Sixties or fail to remember much about them at all, to find a book written by someone who WAS there but still remembers. The reviewer who compares Miles to Zelig is spot on, I think. You might only have a vague awareness of who he is, but he seems to have been connected in one way or another to most of the key players of the decade. This fascinating book covers so many topics. The mostly short but always interesting chapters cover such things as the eccentric photographer, journalist, researcher and political activist John "Hoppy" Hopkins, the cult bookshop Better Books, William Borrough's and Allen Ginsberg's visits to England, the activities of Peter and Jane Asher, druggy evangelist Michael Hollingshead, the writer Charles Bukowski, The Pink Floyd's early years, The Fugs, John and Yoko, Brian Jones, Paul McCartney's burgeoning artistic interests, the International Times, UFO, the notorious drug-chasing (and more) policeman Sgt Pilcher, Frank Zappa's visits to the Indica gallery in London, glimpses of assorted Suzy Creamcheeses, a stay at the Hotel Chelsea, some difficult encounters with Allen Klein, the formation of Apple and Zapple and many, many, more. For students of the Sixties, The Beatles, the Underground, the Beats and various other aspects that made the decade so rich and distinctive, this is definitely worth reading.