Customer Reviews

The Bee Gees: Tales of the Brothers Gibb

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

How can you possibly write a biography about one of the most successful rock bands of the last four decades and get it all right? Writers Bilyeu, Cook and Hughes (along with Brennan and Crohan and many others) have managed to achieve the impossible. With uncountable interviews and years of research, this team has placed the Gibb family and all their triumphs and tragedies into perspective.

Starting chronologically with the pre-marriage days of Barbara and Hugh Gibb in the 1940's up to the present, continually active Bee Gees, we are presented with every viewpoint, memory and recollection of the three brothers and their freinds and acquaintances. The highs and lows of the Bee Gees and Andy Gibbs' careers are not glossed over or over-emphasized. They are told with 'matter-of-fact' honesty and sincerity; a refreshing exercise in storytelling. The read is fast and crisp with a personal edge lacking anything close to newscopy.

After the conclusion, there are numerous, wonderful appendixes including more comments from folks close to the Gibbs, a complete album and singles discography, a cover versions list and a bibliography with book, magazine, newspaper and Internet Web Sites.

All the beauty marks and all the scars are here. It just makes the Gibb family more human. They may be ordinary people, but they have had extraordinary lives.

Sad but true. The Bee Gees did an amazing lot in four decades, writing songs for themselves and others that topped charts in every corner of the globe from the 1960s to the 1990s. But for most people, even those who know the Beatles didn't originally record "To Love Somebody" and "New York Mining Disaster 1941," they were the ultimate purveyors of pop music's guiltiest pleasure, disco.

For 667 pages, "The Ultimate Biography of the Bee Gees" offers a somewhat more rounded take on who the Bee Gees really were and what their music was about. Not that it will change much. This is not a book for anyone but the sincerest Bee Gee fan. The first 300 pages are like a massive loyalty test: Can you plow through pages of choppy narrative, contextless quotes, and drawn-out references to nearly every person who sold the Gibb brothers an ice cream or recorded one of their songs?

The Bee Gees were made up of three very creative and somewhat unstable people who never would have spent much time with the others except for the sometimes inconvenient, more often redeeming fact of their brotherhood. Each was a real character onto himself. Since the quintet of authors behind this book didn't have access to the Bee Gees when writing this in the late 1990s, they rely on press clippings and fail at providing adequate attribution, editing, or context.

So we get long transcript-like statements from Music Maker articles and the like, say from Barry about not liking Robin's wife Molly. There's no follow-up to say how or if that was ever resolved. All three brothers, talking long ago in various forums, throw up a number of wild comments. These are often long and sometimes contradictory, with little attempt at contextual insight from the authors. The narrative is weak throughout the book; it really lacks a central voice or point of view. Especially early on, it reads like an artless clip job, because in essence that's what it is.

The book picks up right when the Gibbs tap into R&B. Being able to interview studio insiders like producer Arif Mardin and keyboardist Blue Weaver first-hand make a difference. The next 100 pages are the most readable in the book, but as it deals with the Helium Years (their 1975-79 disco heyday), that only serves to feed the white-satin stereotype many will have of this band going in. Also, I'm more than a little concerned about the factual integrity of a text that refers several times to the singer of the Gibb-penned hit "Grease" as "Franki" Valli.

The authors do try to cram every fact they can into the book, but the result is cumbersome and at times unreadable, especially at the beginning. I'd say this is two stars for fans, one for everyone else. Here's hoping that now that the Bee Gees story is at an end with Maurice's sudden death last year, some writer will come along to give it the class-A treatment it deserves. I'll just hang on to this while I'm waiting.

Tales of the Brothers Gibb achieves its purpose, being a great bio-graphy about the life of a family dedicated to music, a journalistic account of their sharp "up and downs" in the public's preferences and final, long-awaited redemption, when a new generation of fans and artists, who never danced their hits on discos, decided that they were a legend.

The book fails to deliver, though, one of the promises made in the first pages, where the authors state that the main focus will be in the musical aspect of their lives. There is not that much discussion about the chords, harmonies, musical significance of their works or a detailed anylisis of the great albums, as it should be. The Bee Gees are, after all, more about music than anything else.

But that shouldn't stop us from enjoying a good biography or even from learning many, many facts about the music, about the way it was made, about the historical context that gave birth to Odessa or Main Course. I can only begin to imagine now what a song like "Really and Sincerely" must mean to Robin. Or Robert Stigwood's insane obsession with the Beatles, which the Brothers Gibb suffered too and still suffer. A very unhealthy obsession that led them to make unforgivable mistakes like their Sgt. Pepper movie and album.

The book is also too "clean" because the Bee Gees always appear like saints, and I somehow suspect they are not. The part dedicated to Australian years is too long and the final stage of their career (1981 and up) is too short, but I enjoyed the book a lot anyway.

And it gives us all a very important lesson: No matter how bad it looks, be always like the Bee Gees and never give up.

I had already ordered the book when I started reading some of the reviews on here. Some people did not like that the authors wrote about the Bee Gees family or about their younger brother Andy. I tend to disagree with this popular mode of thinking. In order to understand their success and failures, it was their families that were always there for them. The support and love of their families is what molded and shaped them into the successfull and well-rounded individuals they are today. I truly enjoyed getting a glimpse into what life is really like for the Bee Gees.

This book was very well written and researched. In many cases, it will give many views from different parties to a particular story. And if the authors felt that some of the stories were embellished or untrue, they would further research the stories and give their opinions to what really may be the truth.

This book may not give die hard Bee Gees fans any new information but it is a great book for those just discovering their music. It is a very realistic book that not only follows their success but show each Bee Gee as an individual person, not just as a group.

I read the book carefully and the it's a real shame that the authors did not spend more time on research! Many reviewers complained about lack of information of Bee Gees main asset, their music, I regret to say that it's true. Now, should we wait for a Bee Gees Anthology? Official, Authorized and Informative?

This book is a disorganized, poorly researched piece of drivel, generally. Filled with direct lifts from uncredited sources, it gives the impression that the subjects of the book were recently interviewed. The book is totally unauthorized and no one connected with the Gibbs would have anything to do with it. The quotes are uncredited and undated so that forty year old quotes are used as if said yesterday. There was no fact checking, because they couldn't interview the Gibbs. It is shamefully misrepresenting itself as a complete history, when in fact it is no such thing because there are so many mistakes and fallacies. Don't bother.

I found this book to be a very detailed and comprehensive look at the music of the Brothers Gibb, from their early years as a child act in Australia to their present day international success. The writers also touch on the trials and tribulations of one of pop music's most famous families and include many never before published photos. This is a serious and long overdue look at three of the most prolific songwriters and successful recording artists of our time. A must-have for every true Bee Gees fan.

This book is overhyped and delivers little. Most of what the book says has been taken from previously published articles and books, and with little or no credit given to the sources it used, and certainly no credit given to specific statements or passages. There is no way to independently verify the content or the truthfulness. The acquaintances who were interviewed are quoted with no checking for the accuracy of their statements so all statements are assumed totally true. Quotes from the Bee Gees may be thirty or more years old but they are presented with no time reference or source, making it seem as though the authors might have interviewed the Bee Gees when in reality the Bee Gees, their families, and close friends refused to cooperate. This book has no discography, no added insight to the Bee Gees or their songwriting. It is a waste of time and money.

I have just finished reading this wonderful book about the Gibb family. I found it very informative and fascinating. Even though Barry, Robin, Maurice and Andy were and still are famous entertainers, they had problems and triumphs and it just proves they are (were)human. Reading their story makes me feel that I know them. Reading about Maurice and Andy was especially touching, now that they are both gone. (But not forgotten). Anyone who wants to know more about the Gibb family and their music should get this book.

I really enjoyed this bio, although it is incredibly detailed! The authors seemed to be in love with the entire family and friends. There was heaps of information that I never knew about (like the childhood delinquencies, the lawsuits, the drug use, etc.). The book really gets into the nitty-gritty detail. Not a read for magazine dwellers, but more like an encyclopedia that reads well.