Rock historian planning a new British invasion

Winnipeg music historian and rock ’n’ roll aficionado John Einarson is looking for a little help from his friends to get his latest project off the ground.

Einarson, who has written nearly a dozen books on music history in the last 20 years, wants to plan an eight-day, seven night ‘British Invasion tour’ of the United Kingdom, taking time to stop off at various landmarks commemorating bands such as the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Yardbirds and others.

The idea stems from a trip Einarson took with his wife in late 2006, when he noticed that there was really no single authoritative tour that bridged the many smaller rock history tours people can take.

“There’s a lot of British Invasion landmark sights that you can see while you’re in the U.K., but if you don’t know what you’re looking for, there’s no one connecting package,” he said.

“It’s more that you can do one little tour, and if you find out about something else you can do it. And I thought that putting a package together that would cover all of that might have appeal to people like me, who grew up during the whole British Invasion thing from the ’60s and ’70s.”

Einarson has been working to plan this tour for several weeks now, and even has the interest of a travel agent, which means he only needs one more thing to get the tour under way: people.

“These type of specialized tours sell the best by word of mouth, and to keep the price affordable we need to get about 30 people or more,” said Kathy Loewen, a manager of group and specialized travel at Carlson Wagonlit Travel.

Einarson’s tour would begin in London, where travellers would take part in a number of tours and see a number of classic rock landmarks.

From there, the tour would progress to Liverpool, where the group would explore the history of the Beatles, visiting the Cavern Club, where the band first made its name, and looking at a number of tributes that have sprung up in that city over the last few years.

“Liverpool has finally come around to celebrating and championing and marketing the fact that the Beatles come from there,” Einarson said. “When I lived in England in the ’70s, there was nothing like this.”

Since Einarson has been studying the rock music history for so long, he feels his tour would be able to provide travellers with a somewhat unique experience, given his connections to other music historians.

“Because I’m a writer and I write about music history, I have a lot of connections with other writers, and on of them is Spencer Leigh, a BBC broadcaster in Liverpool who has done a number of books on music history, and in particular British music history,” he said.

“So one of the things that I want to do with the tour is sit down with everyone for a dinner with him, so everyone would have the opportunity to pepper him with questions.”

If you’re interested in getting involved with the tour, Einarson invites you to e-mail him at jeinarson@mts.net.