In a little under 400 pages, Winn covers every single recording featuring The Beatles in chronological order between 1957 and 1965. Whereas Lewisohn documented all of The Beatles' Abbey Road recordings in his excellent 'The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions', Winn tackles absolutely everything. Thus he includes home demo recordings, live concerts, interviews, TV and radio performances, field recordings, promotional clips and just about anything else you can think of that has been made available to listen to or view, whether officially or unofficially. In his foreword, Mark Lewisohn himself confesses that he keeps this book constantly on his desk and finds it to be an essential reference work.
Nevertheless, the book is immensely readable though perhaps not something you would necessarily want to sit down and read from cover to cover. Personally I find myself regularly delving into certain sections when I'm interested in a particular period or a particular recording.
As I mentioned, this volume covers the period 1957 to 1965. The second volume covers 1966 onwards and is entitled 'That Magic Feeling'.
If you are reading this post, I suspect that you have an interest in The Beatles. If so, I wholeheartedly recommend these two volumes.
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