Allen Klein: The Man Who Bailed Out the Beatles, Made the Stones, and Transformed Rock & Roll

by Fred Goodman

The story of notorious manager Allen Klein, revealing new, behind-the-scenes details about some of the biggest rock bands in history

Allen Klein was like no one the music industry had seen before. The hard-nosed business manager became infamous for allegedly catalyzing the Beatles’ breakup and robbing the Rolling Stones, but the truth is both more complex and more fascinating. As the manager of the Stones and then the Beatles—not to mention Sam Cooke, Donovan, the Kinks, and numerous other performers—he taught young soon-to-be legends how to be businessmen as well as rock stars. In so doing, Klein made millions for his clients and changed music forever. But Klein was as merciless with his clients as he was with anyone else, earning himself an outsize reputation for villainy that has gone unchallenged until now. Through unique, unprecedented access to Klein’s archives, veteran music journalist Fred Goodman tells the full story of how the Beatles broke up, how the Stones achieved the greatest commercial success in rock history, and how the music business became what it is today.

Genres: Music, Biography, Nonfiction, History, Rock N Roll, Pop Culture

320 pages, Hardcover

First published June 23, 2015

Reviews

[Tosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Allen Klein" by Fred Goodman (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

There are the artists, and there are the people behind the artists. I have always been fascinated with the figures behind the artists. Like the Wizard in the "Wizard of Oz," I suspected that if you pull the theatrical curtain open, not only would the artist be exposed, but also the mechanics or system that places the artist front and center. The beauty of such a system is that the consumer has a much-designed 'idea' what or who the artist is - but in fact, sometimes the wizard who is pulling the strings backstage is often the most fascinating figure in the narrative. They say the devil is in the details, and I'm not sure if Allen Klein is Satan or not, but surely he can find Satan in a business contract.

The subject matter of accounting practices is usually not that interesting to those who love the world of pop music, but in the hands and mind of writer Fred Goodman. He makes these individuals reach Shakespeare's height in drama and comedy. Allen Klein, a hardcore Jewish New Yorker, who had a Charles Dickens poverty typical childhood, had a deep understanding of numbers and what it can mean to a business or a relationship. For him, it is not the money that is important, but the game itself. Which is negotiating, arguing, and the results that can lead to power. Allen Klein had one major goal. To become the Beatles business manager. Goal number two: to become the Rolling Stones business manager. Which didn't make Mick Jagger happy to be in the number two bracket. Nevertheless, Klein became part of the music business as the world of the Brill Building was starting to take place. An early champion of Sam Cooke, and actually got his business together, he eventually attached himself to the 1960s British invasion by having the genius record producer Mickie Most as a client. That eventually led him to the world of The Rolling Stones and The Beatles via the route of Andrew Loog Oldham. The Stones co-manager and record producer, was the entrance way or door to the top of the British music world. What Klein did was make America part of the territory for the Stones upcoming invasion.

Books about businessmen are rarely interesting, but what we have here is a fascinating man who was quite creative in his business practices, and had an understanding of the role of the artist. He has always been pro-artist, in their fight against the corporation, in other words, the record label. Although Klein doesn't come off as a 100% hero, he is nevertheless a figure of great importance in the life of the Stones and The Beatles. The rise and mostly fall of Apple Records is told in great detail, and also the breakup of The Beatles. For anyone who is raised in Beatle-history, it's a very sad narrative. Klein would have preferred to manage The Beatles, but in the end, he had only 3 out of 4 members. Still, not a bad percentage in the field of accounting.

Fred Goodman is a very good journalist, and he can tell the story of numbers very well. Because in truth, this is not a story of accounting, but the characters surrounded in that world. And here we have Sam Cooke, Phil Spector, Oldham, Brian Epstein, as well as the Stones and the Fab Four. With characters like that, including the main subject matter of this biography, and being in good hands of Goodman, this book simply cannot fail.

[Don Gorman · Rating 2 out of 5]

(2) I have read a couple of Goodman's books and this one is right in line with the others. Interesting, well researched and fairly dry. The subject of this one, a legend in the music business, makes for some really good trivia information about the Stones and the Beatles. A fair amount of the direction of this book was covered in the Bert Berns biography but once again, the star power of the artists Klein represented makes it an important read for us true music nuts. It is hard to follow the money flow and the way Klein was able to deal with the labels and the entire music and publishing industry is really wild. To think that he created an annuity for so many is a true testament to his business savvy. Always portrayed as a really bad guy, this biography paints a much more likeable picture of Allen klein.

[Melting Uncle · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the manager of Sam Cooke, the Beatles (69-70), and the Rolling Stones (65-70), Allen Klein was one of the giants of the 1960's music business. Possibly THE giant? Essentially Klein helped artists renegotiate deals so that they would make significantly more money. His negotiation style was aggressive and near bullying, unheard of at the time in England. As a result, both the Beatles and the Stones were financially much better off after Klein straightened out their business affairs. The only catch being that Klein took a big piece of the pie for himself, accruing substantial wealth over the years.

Fred Goodman's bio of Klein is very well written and engaging. I was recommended and lent this book but it took me a while to get around to reading it. Maybe I thought it would be more interesting to read about the actual musicians Klein worked with. As it turns out, following the Klein trail leads down many fascinating side paths with a huge cast of fascinating side characters (Alejandro Jodorowsky, Donovon, Bobby Womack, Yoko ono, Bobby Darin) and of course a very up close look at the individuals who created some of the most legendary music of the era. The battle between the Beatles over who would manage (Eastman or Klein) shed a lot of light on who they were as people and why the band broke up. Similarly, Mick Jagger is revealed as true business obsessive despite his attempts to appear hands-off... betting with the chairman of CBS Records in a Paris cafe over who could compute the estimated value-added tax on Stones albums sold in Europe (p.146).

Which reminds me... at times, the book can get very bogged down with detail regarding the exact terms of record deals, contracts, etc. These passages read almost like tax documents and might be a little rough going for those not involved with the law/business of the entertainment industry. However, the book is stronger for being more thorough and Fred Goodman should be commended for presenting such careful analysis of the deals Klein was involved with. The book was in part written at the request of Klein's family to rehabilitate Klein's reputation after years of bad press and negative gossip from disgruntled Beatles fans.

Allen Klein was disliked by many. Paul McCartney wrote him a letter that began "Dear Fuck Klein" shortly before he stopped speaking to him altogether. He was the subject of John Lennon's 1974 song "Steel and Glass". He gave himself a big piece of the pie but in the process created a much much larger pie to take a slice of. He was motivated by helping his clients even though he benefitted greatly. With the release in the 80's of the long archived Sam Cooke - Live at the Harlem Square Club, Klein's love of the music shines through in Goodman's description. So to characterize Klein as evil or opportunistic is unfair since the artists he worked with benefitted greatly from his decisions. He was an obsessive reader of contracts, hard working, and knew the business better than so many others in the industry. This is what allowed Klein to negotiate better deals for artist who were not getting paid enough because of bad deals from previous management (Brian Epstein) or record labels who were operating in an outdated model that didn't include as much money for artists as we would now see as fair. Klein's innovation was to shift the paradigm of the music business so that the artist had greater bargaining power and could demand significantly more from their label than had been the norm in the 50's and earlier.

And one last thing I don't want to forget- Allen Klein grew up and Newark, NJ, and was in the same graduating class as Philip Roth, who was the only person to sign Klein's yearbook.

[Dave Schwensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve been looking forward to reading this book because Allen Klein has been depicted for so long as a sinister character in the history of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. His name will forever be associated with the darker aspects of these bands, such as the breakup of the Beatles and controlling the Stone’s music publishing, but there are always two sides to every story. This book tells that story, but with mixed results.
*
First of all it is very well written. The detective work the author put into the research was detailed and more in-depth than what I had expected. Klein’s childhood that included five years in an orphanage and his lifelong need to never be left alone or be perceived as inferior defines his journey. It also sets the tone for his adult personality, how he handled business dealings and his personal life. Whether it was a rival, a client or a mistress, he would never assume a back seat in negotiations and the end results.
*
Klein was an accountant with big dreams. His bulldog style for going over contracts and numbers for singer Sam Cooke opened his mind to a new style of doing business between artists and record companies. Though it seems he was a “Robin Hood” type of character earning deserved financial rewards for creative artists, he also looked out for himself. The pop music clients he worked with were happy to be rich. They only got mad when they realized Klein was getting richer.
*
My review is not meant to be an attack on Allen Klein. You need to read the book and make your own decision. I think some people will feel it is bias in his favor, since Klein’s son initiated the writing and made mountains of private business documents available to the author. For this reason I feel it is a bit one-sided in the family’s favor. But it is clear throughout that some of the artists will forever be thankful for Klein’s help (Bobby Vinton), while others will always associate him with the dark side of the music business (Paul McCartney). And if they were on the wrong side of his endeavors, he took personal joy and every legal loophole available to make them pay for their perceived disrespect. He bragged that his house was “paid for by Mr. Jagger” and when George Harrison abandoned him from defending his plagiarism case over “My Sweet Lord,” Klein bought the publishing for the song in question, “He’s So Fine,” and ended up the winner against his former client. His personality dictated if you left him alone or disrespected in any way, he would make you pay.
*
This is a good book. It’s easy to read and entertaining, especially when the author digs into the behind the scenes dealings with Sam Cooke, The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. Instead of simply listing contract terms and “the small print” that gave Klein his clout over both record companies and artists, it reads as good storytelling and is as interesting as the inside gems about the top rock stars he worked with. Are there insights and opposing views missing? I think so. But until someone else comes up with the darker side of Allen Klein from his rivals point of view, this is the best opportunity we have to understand the man that will forever be ingrained into the history of the two greatest rock and roll bands in popular music.

[Jeffrey Bumiller · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are at all interested in the business side of the world of music, you will love this book. In addition to being a pivotal figure in the world of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, Allen Klein's Life and Career intersect with other amazing artists: Sam Cooke,Marianne Faithful, Yoko Ono, Bobby Womack, Andrew Loog Oldham, and Alejandro Jodorowsky, to name just a few. I knew nothing about Allen Klein before reading this book, after reading it, I find myself wondering why it took so long for me to get clued in about such an important figure in music history. READ THIS!

[John Spiller · Rating 4 out of 5]

For such a consequential figure in the music business, Allen Klein is largely an afterthought today. At the height of his notoriety in the late 1960's and early 1970's, Klein managed the business affairs of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. If you have read any detailed biographies of the Beatles of the Stones, Klein is typically portrayed as an loutish New York jew who enriched himself at the expense of his ostensible clients. With the cooperation of one of Klein's children, who gave him access to extensive archival material, Fred Goodman sets out to set the record straight on Allen Klein, warts and all. While Goodman's writing is solid and the book is filled with numerous entertaining anecdotes, I think that he went a little too far in trying to justify or excuse Klein's fairly abhorrent behavior.

Klein's dealings with The Rolling Stones are a case study on how he operated. Goodman observes that prior to hiring Klein, the Stones had entered into a number of contracts regarding their publishing and songwriting rights that were fairly exploitative. Klein insinuated himself with the Stones by promising them an astronomical sum (in Dr. Evil voice, "One Million Dollars"). Klein had a reputation for insisting on auditing record companies to find money that record companies retained that rightfully belonged to the artist. Goodman points out that Klein actually didn't really recover much by way of record company audits. Instead, he re-negotiated grossly unfair contracts to just slightly unfair contracts with one important caveat, Klein cut himself into the action. In the guise of tax minimization, Klein set up corporations whereby he gained ownership of extremely valuable songwriting and publishing rights. He likewise used confidences gained from his position as business manager to buy up rights from people who were in financial binds.

Even by Goodman's indulgent reckoning, Klein enriched himself at the expense of his clients. Klein regularly engaged in what would today be called breaches of fiduciary duties. Goodman uses rhetorical flourishes to minimize the manifest conflict of interest in Klein's dealings. He points out that artist were regularly screwed by record companies. He portrays the artists themselves -- George Harrison in particular -- as spoiled ingrates who failed to appreciate the beneficence of Klein's dealings, so they got what they deserved. In effect, Klein saved the artists from themselves. No matter how you slice it, Klein exploited his clients for his benefit.

While Goodman made good use of Allen Klein's business records, I found it interesting that he did not interview Ronnie Schneider, Klein's nephew, who not only worked for Klein, but also served as tour manager for the Stones. A minor quibble, to be sure, but still a curious omission.

I enjoyed Goodman's book, but I ultimately did not buy his portrayal of Klein as an ultimately likable person with a certain roguish charm.

[Paul Spence · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very readable account of Klein's life and his impact on the music industry. I used to dread the Beatles books coming to the point where Klein, Lennon and Yoko meet. This is much broader in scope.

The book is aimed at rock fans, so there are plenty of stories about the various artists. But the unique feature is the finances. It all started with accounting, reviewing records of sales by Klein. You can believe the claims or not, but since Klein, all major artists have “lawyered up” and are getting their deserved profits. Although the game has once more changed due to downloads. Klein in the very end did approve selling Stones tracks to iTunes.

Many Beatles fans have read about the EMI Epstein Beatles deals. This book is very good at explaining rock finances. None of the bands owned any of their work. The Beatles owned just a bit. Somehow, Oldham et al had secured some rights. The Stones and the manager owned the tapes and songs, they leased them to Decca for use. He in fact sold them to Klein. This is what ABKCO owns now. The Nanker Phelge North America deal was a bit of a ripoff (see below), but did not give Klein ownership of the works. The deal with Oldham did. The ABCKO deals with record companies combined with the Oldham deal gave Klein full power over Stones albums up to 1971.

The Klein book outlines all the stock market dealings but does not give full dollar amount details. The Nanker Phelge (of North America) company was indeed in Klein's name. The Stones’ US earnings went there. The Stones were to be paid in stock over 20 years to make the income capital gain. If the US income had been sent to the Stones in the UK, they would have paid 90% tax, worse than the Klein deal.

Klein offered to help clients hedge taxes. Donovan was persuaded to spend a year in Japan to avoid tax that year but only lasted 7 months.

Klein's companies had stocks but he did not play by the rules, so the SEC was never happy enough with them to make it a traded company. They remained privately owned for most of the time. He could bully record companies but the stock market and rich investors had plenty of lawyers and bankers.

With the record companies the threat by Klein was always the same, they would walk out on some technicality. For instance, Ray Davies was only 19 when he signed his first record contract.

A lot of history with the Stones is covered. The early 70s allowed them to escape Klein. It was with 40 Licks that Klein and the Stones came to agree: they wanted money and relevance and the tour disc for the Stones.

If there is one good deed to remember, it is the recovery of film and tape to compile Rock and Roll Circus.

[Roberta Korus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating story of a complicated yet pioneering man.

[Zella Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really intriguing bio of one of the most notorious figures in music history. The author is pretty balanced in his presentation of Klein, who's usually treated as a sinister footnote in the story of the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, Sam Cooke, and more.

As Goodman notes, Klein actually made very profitable, innovative deals for his musician clients and didn't necessarily cheat them in the conventional sense. He was a staunch believer in record labels not taking advantage of his clients. He always just made better deals for himself that he didn't disclose/fully explain (namely in insinuating himself into the publishing rights and manufacturing deals for his clients). This inevitably always led to nasty surprises whenever his professional ties to his clients eroded. Case in point: Klein's heirs still own the copyright on all the pre-1971 music from the Rolling Stones, which the band has fought and fought in court, to no avail.

Klein himself also had an interesting life in his own right, clawing himself out of a childhood of poverty (and a stint in an orphanage) to become highly influential and wealthy, despite experiencing prejudice from the music establishment for his working-class Jewish roots, and a complicated personality that could be equal parts generous and mercenary. Goodman does an excellent job of depicting how the brash, litigious personality that allowed Klein to be a successful negotiator and businessman also led to his downfall.

I knocked off a star because, though Goodman's discussion of Klein's business wheelings and dealings is very thorough and fairly accessible, all things considered, it can make for very dense, dry reading. The chapters that were less rooted in numbers and byzantine business deals were easier for me personally to follow and appreciate.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Of the contributing causes to the Beatles break-up, the most psychologically unerring cause is simply the social class factor that Lennon-McCartney had settled on women, very different ones at that, and this substitution in the boys' primary erotic attachment (which had been to each other) allowed all the other divisive factors to come to the fore.* Around the time of the Sgt. Pepper's launch party in May, 1967, McCartney met (again?) the photographer who had been backstage at their Shea Stadium concert in August 1965, Linda Eastman. By the Fall, Brian Epstein was dead, and the Beatles, cutting singles in the aftermath of their February 1968 India trip, were getting ready to launch Apple Records out of Apple Corps, in NYC and London. In the spring 1968 McCartney and Eastman hooked up again. That Apple Corps became McCartney's way of dealing with his own depression, bereft in response to Epstein's death, might have had the de-facto effect of his convincing his bandmates, more alarmed than was McCartney at Apple's having become a hippy crash-pad, that McCartney's drift toward the Eastman family was not a strain on the business-end of the band's partnership. There are only two ways to explain McCartney's recalcitrance toward the recording of the next Beatles record (The Beatles recorded in late '68), as well as the socio-cultural phenomenon of Apple Corp becoming a financial sink-hole, necessitating a renewal in the band's financial planning, but now, so McCartney hoped, on his new in-laws-to-be's terms. One is that he was marrying up, and he expected his bandmates to see the sense in that and join up; two is his depression, of a type often the derivative of erotic re-attachment, i.e., love. The recalcitrance specific to hiring Allen Klein as the band's financial manager can be explained in the Eastman family's own Jewish background, but that's a much more complex socio-cultural picture that neither McCartney nor his fans could have been aware of.

The meaning of Apple Corp., the meaning of the hype around Monterrey and the Summer of Love (Sgt. Pepper's its gleaming event), the meaning of its subsequence, can all be reduced to the simple statement that John Lennon hated businessmen. However, he kept a clear eye out for the pop competition, and in the aftermath of Epstein's death, the Rolling Stones (half-owned, at this point, by Allen Klein) had a better contractual, as well as short-term financial, situation than the Beatles. I take it that some few gestures of characterization dispel the myths around Lennon, and one of these that, having avoided taking a meeting with Allen Klein that Klein had been trying to schedule for two years, because in general Lennon avoided businessmen, it suddenly occurred to him that Klein would be the businessman to save him from the culture of businessmen (genteel, anti-semitic, Eastmanesque) he truly hated. So in late January 1969, during the studio recordings filmed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, in which McCartney and Lennon sing "Two Of Us" into each other's eyes, Lennon took a meeting with Allen Klein, and then invited him to a band meeting at which the McCartney-Eastmans took their initial, but subsequently proliferating and litigious, stand against Allen Klein.

As subsequent litigation would bear out, this meeting was fairly straightforward. Lennon was proposing the Beatles hire Klein to straighten out their contract with EMI-Capitol, disentangle Northern Songs (Lennon-McCartney's publisher) from its holdings in Epstein's estate, and manage the band's financial situation. McCartney counter-proposed the Eastmans. We are fifty years out from this meeting, however, it doesn't take a brain scientist to predict which way George & Ringo would go. The only question is, what was McCartney thinking? and the answer is, he was depressed. He was seven weeks from being married, he didn't want to play in this band any longer, or at any rate he didn't yet realize his bandmates had no particular stake in his marrying up. They come to the same thing.

When a band votes, and the vote is 3-1, that generally suggests how the thing should go, but a year later Klein lost in the Eastman's court case against him. McCartney wanted the band's business to be put into the safe-keeping of a receiver-ship, as the price for Klein's continuing to manage them; so that McCartney's moneys would not need to pass through Klein's accounts.

Fred Goodman shrewdly chose Allen Klein to be the subject of his continuing saga in the chronicles of the American Music Business. His idea was that Klein is the figure on whom American rock music scaled the industry up to the level of the superstar artists the Rolling Stones & The Beatles. The claim is complex, because others (Clive Davis to David Geffen) are perhaps equally responsible for the industry's shape in the post-Monterey context. Klein, coming from an accounting background, though not a CPA, but accustomed to finding revenue streams where no one knew to look for them, went to bat for the young musicians who were learning to not be ripped off for the first time. Goodman had access to Klein's documents, the first music journalist with that access. His biographical work here recovers the important role Klein played in the formation of the present-day music industry.

*Among the reasons from 1970 for my youthful understanding of cause in the Beatles break-up: We thought it was Yoko. This was not entirely wrong, but our emphasis on her was of course racist. She was something we did not understand, so were willing, at least initially, to call out. Two things interest me in this nine-year old's view: that we aggrievedly needed to believe in a cause; and that it was shortly dispelled in one's reading through Lennon's ideological apologists -- i.e., rock critics. Rock critics were not subject, as I was, to anti-Asian mystifications in our longing to see the Beatles together. Example on offer if any needed that just because some view is an ideology doesn't mean it's not in substance right. Yoko's presence in the band's midst may ultimately have contributed to the split in the song-writing team's creative moment; but no more so than Linda's, such that any truth to the causality shows up causality as a truth-inquiring mechanism of the mind.

[Paul Brewer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fred Goodman's book falls short of being a biography, but provides an interesting perspective on the years of the British Invasion's musical revolution in the United States. Much of the book's action is in fact located in London, as Allen Klein's pursuit of The Beatles involves a strategy of looking for contacts in the British music scene.

The focus of the book is constricted by the nature of Klein himself. He appears to have been something of a workaholic, mastering all the details of a contract and of tax laws in order to secure the best possible deal for his client -- after, of course, looking after himself. It's hard to make long evenings poring over such details interesting, even in a short book, and the results of these efforts are crucial to the trajectory of Klein's life. So the treatment of such things as Klein's faux-Xanadu in Riverdale and his apparently colourful love-life get rather minimal coverage.

I found a lot of useful information here for my project, nonetheless, and if you are interested in the years during which The Beatles broke up, this book has a great a description of the business background to that. And, more generally, it covers an aspect of the music scene that might be overlooked by fans.

[Allan Heron · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable, balanced and informative overview of the career of Allen Klein and the means by which he became so successful and so feared and/or disliked.

It's good to get an understanding of the deals that he put together, and how they benefited his clients. Klein never had any clients whose financial position was not greatly improved by his involvement.

That even applies to both Jagger and McCartney who disliked Klein. In both cases it was an instinctive rather than rational response. Jagger has more grounds for complaint given that the Stones essentially became #2 in Klein's mind once the Beatles were on board. McCartney just appears petulant.

At heart, Klein was an artists manager as his careful oversight of the Stones 60's demonstrates. There are loads of negatives to the man but he was usually the one to suffer from them.

Essential reading for anyone who wants to get beyond the stereotyped image of Allen Klein.

[RebL · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at one of the major behind-the-scenes players of the early rock n' roll era. I'm sure most readers will come for the Beatles, but really he was involved with them so briefly that there's not a lot going on there. The real meat of the story is Klein's dealings with Sam Cooke and his estate, and with the Rolling Stones. He got in on the Stones on the ground floor, something which I had not realized. All I had heard in the past is that Mick Jagger had introduced Klein to the Beatles, after which breakups and lawsuits ensued. Obviously that turned out to be a oversimplification.

The best part of the book is seeing how the contracts between the artists and the record companies are made and manipulated. The peek behind that curtain is fascinating!

The worst part of the book is that Herman's Hermits got a number of mentions and I had "Henry The Eighth I Am" stuck in my head for a few days.

[Nathan Phillips · Rating 4 out of 5]

An unexpectedly interesting biography of a complicated figure in rock & roll's history, who aggressively sought royalties for several artists starting with the late Sam Cooke and then served as the controversial business manager of the Rolling Stones and later the Beatles, whose breakup he is widely regarded as having a role in causing. The book doesn't really exonerate him of his misdeeds, but Goodman's approach is well-rounded and critically sharp, managing to make a strong case for how contracts, financial arrangements and tax shelters are relevant to the lives and careers of various beloved musicians; and how, for better or for worse, Klein seemed to "be there" for a number of major episodes in the culture of the last half of the twentieth century. It's a fairly quick read and a breezy one, but that doesn't mean it's either perfunctory or superficial, and I got a lot of good context out of it.

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a surprisingly enjoyable book that opens a very large and fascinating window into the business affairs of major bands from the 60s and 70s, notably the Beatles and Rolling Stones, managed by industry executive Allen Klein. I had never heard of him until this biography came up in my Goodreads feed as a 'recommended' selection. His life story, rising from an orphanage in New York to the height of the global music industry power, is interesting on its own. But the best parts of this book reveal the many management and money dramas behind some of the most popular songs and albums recorded over the last 50 or so years. If you enjoy hearing stories about treacherous legal and business dealings that all too often play out behind the shiny veneer of rock star glory, you'll love this book.

[Hank Pharis · Rating 2 out of 5]

(NOTE: I'm stingy with stars. For me 2 stars means a good book or a B. 3 stars means a very good book or a B+. 4 stars means an outstanding book or an A {only about 5% of the books I read merit 4 stars}. 5 stars means an all time favorite or an A+ {Only one of 400 or 500 books rates this!).

The great news is that I can listen to a book a day at work. The bad news is that I can’t keep up with decent reviews. So I’m going to give up for now and just rate them. I hope to come back to some of the most significant things I listen to and read them and then post a review.

Allen Klein managed some of the most famous rock and roll artists including the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. The primary interest here is understanding better how bitter the break up of the Beatles was.

[Tiny Red Dragons Radio · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are at all interested in the business side of the world of music, you will love this book. In addition to being a pivotal figure in the world of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, Allen Klein's Life and Career intersect with other amazing artists: Sam Cooke,Marianne Faithful, Yoko Ono, Bobby Womack, Andrew Loog Oldham, and Alejandro Jodorowsky, to name just a few. I knew nothing about Allen Klein before reading this book, after reading it, I find myself wondering why it took so long for me to get clued in about such an important figure in music history. READ THIS! (This review originally appeared on my personal Good Reads page: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/9...)

-Jeff

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Goodman provides a good biography of the man who managed both the Stones and Beatles arguably two of musics greatest acts. The detail around major deals with these bands is insightful and fills in a few details which you may not be aware of. Outside of this intrigue the book is a history lesson in how record companies made all the money while artists struggled to be paid their dues. A must read for serious fans of these two bands and an interesting read for biography readers who like stories of people who overcome adversity to become successful.

[John Lyman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I generally prefer autobiographies to biographies but this one was extremely well written and maintained my interest throughout. Another music biz enigma, he was clearly a very intelligent, focused, driven man who helped the biggest of the big get more of what they deserved. Kind of reminds me of Bill Graham, loathed and feared by many, loved by many as well. Definitely worth reading, it gives an inside look at the Stones and Beatles, financially at least.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting bio. Sad to read that Mr. Klein had alztimers when he passed. This bio was not preachy it just got to the point, warts and all. The rock groups of this time were taken advantage of but when they lawyered up they were pointing fingers and insults at those that got the groups a bigger share of the moneys. Every one suing and blaming. Sad. This man made no excuses for what he did or said and that was the strength of Mr. Klein. It is a good bio. Later. Keep Reading.

[Brian White · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was interesting. I don’t know much about the business side of rock and roll but was interesting to learn the impact Klein had on it. I knew he got a bad rep from his dealings with The Beatles and the Bangladesh concert but it was interesting to get the authors perspective. The book is fairly dry but a good CoVid read

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

The life story of the Beatles business manager. I thought I would like it but it goes like play-by-play and WAY in-depth. I kept tuning it out unknowingly from boredom. It coulda been interesting but didn't finish.

[Aaron Badgley · Rating 4 out of 5]

You may not like the man, but this is one brilliant biography. Well researched and extremely well written. Very readable.

[Kevin]

to-read

[Shawn Persinger · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Surprisingly insightful and objective.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not quite sure how to review this book. Allen Klein was a businessman, not a rock star. He made his name as ruthless accountant / auditor who "found" money for his early music industry clients and later was a pioneer in negotiating artist-friendly recording contracts. Therefore, this is a biography of an odd, interesting, successful and notorious businessman. If that is your kind of thing, you should read it.

However, most people know his name via his very troubled relationship with the Rolling Stones. Much of the book does concentrate on his mutual love / hate relationship with the Stones and the Beatles as well as a deep dive into his record company, ABKCO. If you are a Stones fan, you have heard much of this before although there are some interesting insights into the nitty gritty of their business relationships with Klein, Eric Easton and Andrew Loog Oldham. In fact, this book goes into detail on the Klein / Oldham relationship and winds up supplying a fairly thorough biography of Oldham as well. The author also offers
some interesting insight as to how 1970's ABKCO-released Stones albums like Metamorphosis and Hot Rocks came about.

Much of the Beatles-related content focuses on the fractious Apple-era business representation conflict between the 3/4's allied with Klein (John Lennon, George Harrison, Ringo Starr) and Paul McCartney with the Eastman family (future father-in-law Lee and future brother-in-law John). There are also some interesting tidbits that shed some new light (at least new to me) on John's relationship with Yoko and his near-involvement with George's Concert For Bangladesh.

The author, Fred Goodman, is up-front in explaining that he we was offered this project by Klein's son, Jody Klein, who was uncomfortable with how his father was portrayed in the press after his death in 2009. Goodman was given unfettered access to Klein's records, associates and ABKCO documents and yet keeps his journalistic integrity intact by not delivering a white-wash. This is a warts-and-all account.

My main beef with this book is that the most likely audience for this account of Klein's life is hardcore-stones fans and yet he does not answer burning questions easily discovered by a cursory review of the main message boards such as IORR, ROCKS OFF and SHIDOOBEE:

1. What unreleased Rolling Stones treasures are left in the ABCKO vaults?

2. Insight into the rapprochement between the band and Allen Klein that led to the 2002 ABCKO remasters and the career-spanning Forty Licks compilation?

3. Insight into the 2009 Get Your Ya Ya's Out 40th anniversary box set release. Did Jody spearhead this or was Allen still involved this late in the game?

4. The story behind the scrapped Bill Wyman-selected Black Box compilation from the ABCKO perspective.

5. Can we expect to see more previously unreleased ABKCO material in the future?

If Goodman were a Wall Street Journal business writer he could be excused for some of these lapses but as a former Rolling Stone editor, WTH! I am glad I read this book, though I would not call it riveting. Fundamentally, this is a biography of an accountant; a colorful accountant but an accountant all the same.

[William Dury · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating book for boomers who, late in life, have become interested in how businesses actually work. It is helpfully illustrated with examples from rock star heroes from many years ago, now either embarrassingly old or dead.

Allen Klein has a bad reputation, some of it deserved. He was indisputably a bully; the charge that he stole from his clients is not literally true. He delivered the monetary results he promised; he just didn’t inform them of how much HE was going to make. His brief incarnation for tax issues is evidence only that if the government wants to put you in jail, it will.

This biography generally gives Klein the benefit of the doubt, which seems reasonable after fifty years of bad press. He was important in the record business because he demonstrated that the record companies didn’t really do anything. He was right. They eventually collapsed like the old studio system in the film business. Pop music exploded in the late fifties and early sixties. The musicians were treated as novelty acts, and exploited ruthlessly. Goodman says The Rolling Stones management contract with Easton and Oldham probably would not have stood up in court because as managers and royalty recipients they were “double dipping,” and that Jagger and Richards were underage when they originally signed it. Klein realized early on that artists routinely were cheated of even the small amounts they were due under these one sided contracts. Nobody cared because careers lasted about twenty minutes. As artists hung on and got more sophisticated (Mick) they realized they didn’t need Klein, either.

Klein got his clients (including Sam Cooke, Bobby Vinton, Donovan, Beatles, Stones, Ray Davies) better deals and money legitimately owed them. On the other hand... He staggered payments to The Stones over twenty years to ease the tax burden. In the meantime, he invested the money and KEPT THE PROFITS? Am I reading this right? That, if true, can’t be anywhere close to legal. He must have profited along with them, taking a portion of the earnings, as was his due.

He was the main point of contention in The Beatles break-up, though not the cause. After Brian Epstein died, McCartney wanted his in-laws to manage them and George, Ringo and John opted for Klein. To blame him for The Beatles break-up is like blaming the lawyers for your parents’ divorce. It wasn’t Yoko’s fault either. These things just run their course.

A fascinating story of fallen gods from long ago.

[Kathryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Every time I read a Beatles-related book I find most players run hot or cold with critics. You either adore somebody or you loathe them. We can guess how assorted Beatles and personnel fall in the spectrum, and when it comes to Allen Klein you find a figure just as (or perhaps more) polarizing than Yoko Ono. Long story short, Klein was a money man on a mission: to manage the most popular band in the world. One could argue he obsessed over the idea of being their right-hand man, so much that he couldn't appreciate what he had with The Rolling Stones, no slouches themselves.

In the Afterword of Allen Klein: The Man Who Bailed Out The Beatles, Made the Stones, and Transformed Rock & Roll the author mentions the desire of Klein's family to clear the air, so to speak. Going into this book, all I knew of Klein was his work with the Stones and that three out of four Beatles wanted him to replace the late Brian Epstein. We may forever argue over who broke up the band, but if you read enough of the Beatle chapters here you may give Yoko a break and lean toward the theory of self-implosion. Klein's alleged reaction to Epstein's death as mentioned here could leave you cringing.

I'm not here to review Klein's character, though. Allen Klein the book, overall, is informative and detailed, and may find an audience in readers interested in the financial workings of the music industry. Klein's life work is a tangle of royalties and subsidiary rights and similar legalese, and promises to musicians with less business savvy to get the money they deserve. It used to baffle me to read of rock stars claiming to be broke, but as Goldman breaks down how music publishing works, and how managers earn their share, I understand it. Maybe those who dream of fortune should put down the guitars and get accounting degrees.

I found the book is most interesting when the story focuses directly on Klein's interaction with the musicians he manages: Sam Cooke, John Lennon, Mick. At times the narrative splintered into tangents, delving here into Andrew Oldham's story, then over there to talk about somebody else. While it interested me, another reader might think there wasn't enough about Klein to make a book. Once Klein loses Lennon as a client, his story seems to wrap up rather quickly.

Allen Klein is a book for hardcore Beatles and/or Stones fans, readers who likes to crunch numbers and crave a side of classic rock gossip.

ARC received via NetGalley

[Jim Milway · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of interesting inside information on the Rolling Stones and the Beatles, especially the band's breakup and the ridiculous money pit, Apple. But, I found the business side of the story hard to follow and I am keen on business. I wonder if the author himself really understood the business details. Maybe I just have to read it again. All in all a good read, however.

[Darcia Helle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love music. I love to read about music, particularly the budding rock scene of the sixties and early seventies. The handful of players who changed all the rules fascinate me. I expected to love this book. Sadly, I was mostly bored.

While this is marketed as a biography, it is largely a study of business and economics. The content revolves around finances and contracts. Clearly this was important to Klein and his clients, though it does not make for interesting reading. My sense of Klein as a person came mostly through his contractual dealings, which showed me his intense drive to succeed at all costs. He certainly was a key player in changing the music industry, though the excitement of that was largely overshadowed by all the talk of contractual and corporate law.

The content doesn't flow well. Goodman veers off into mini biographies of other key players within the industry at that time. While interesting, much of this is of little to no relevance to Klein's story.

I was most intrigued by Klein's relationship with the musicians he represented, though this made up only a small portion of the book. His obsession with the Beatles bordered on insanity, a single-minded drive to represent a band that, by this time, had already stopped touring and was a breath away from splitting up.

If dry facts and business dealings of the music industry interest you, then you will likely love this book. If you're looking for a story with substance, like me, you might find this one lacking.