Entertainment Books

Book SynopsisThe fifties, though a quiescent period in many ways, was one of the most fervent decades in jazz history. The landmarks of modern jazz were firmly planted and, it could be argued, nearly all directions the music has taken since then can be charted back to recordings, groups, or individuals from this era. In this series of profiles, Joe Goldberg examines the lives and the music, the crucial events and dominant forces of a decade of great music and conflicting esthetics: Miles Davis''s recording of Kind of Blue Gerry Mulligan''s pianoless quartet Cecil Taylor''s percussive keyboard experiments John Coltrane''s and Sonny Rollins''s marathon saxophone solos MJQ''s blending of classical structure and jazz improvisation Ornette Coleman''s Free Jazz. From Mingus to Monk to Blakey, it was an age of giants. Perhaps never before or since in jazz history have so many wildly idiosyncratic jazz innovators been contemporaries. Joe Goldberg was there and what his ears heard has become here a lastin

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn analysis of the process of composition, learning and performance of the Southern folk blues of black America. This musical form has not previously been examined in such a scrupulous fashion. This book was the winner of the University of Chicago Folklore Prize.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis comprehensive survey of jazz piano, beginning with a brief history of the instrument within the jazz tradition and concluding with interviews that present twenty-seven pianists in their own words, is both wonderfully anecdotal and a serious piece of jazz history. Lyons has assembled a giant concert of piano voices,Bill Evans, Herbie Hancock, Teddy Wilson, Oscar Peterson, Keith Jarrett, Randy Weston, Cecil Taylor, Horace Silver, Dave Brubeck, Sun Ra, McCoy Tyner, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Chick Corea, and many others. The pianists are candid, intense, and always opinionated. Yet their responses are infused with a keen appreciation for fellow musicians, their contemporaries, and those who came before,Walter, Tatum, Ellington. For pianists everywhere, whatever their individual style, this book will speak to and for you as it expresses the thoughts of its many great artists.

Read more less

Book Synopsis"In 1972, Stonehill Books published David Dalton's Janis, a multimedia extravaganza that incorporated interviews, quotes, photographs, lyrics, Rolling Stone Clippings, sheet music, a record of rapping"

Read more less

Book SynopsisNotes and Tones is one of the most controversial, honest, and insightful books ever written about jazz. As a black musician himself, Arthur Taylor was able to ask his subjects hard questions about the role of black artists in a white society. Free to speak their minds, these musicians offer startling insights into their music, their lives, and the creative process itself. This expanded edition is supplemented with previously unpublished interviews with Dexter Gordon and Thelonious Monk, a new introduction by the author, and new photographs. Notes and Tones consists of twenty-nine no-holds-barred conversations which drummer Arthur Taylor held with the most influential jazz musicians of the ''60s and ''70s,including:Table of Contents* Introduction to the Da Capo Edition * Dexter Gordon * Miles Davis * Randy Weston * Ornette Coleman * Philly Joe Jones * Don Byas * Ron Carter * Johnny Griffin * Charles Tolliver * Eddie Lockjaw Davis * Erroll Garner * Leon Thomas * Max Roach * Dizzy Gillespie * Carmen McRae

Read more less

Book SynopsisHere at last is an introduction to film theory and its history without the jargon. Noted film scholar V. F. Perkins presents criteria for expanding our understanding and enjoyment of movies. He employs common sense words like balance, coherence, significance, and satisfaction to develop his insightful support of the subtle approach and of the unobtrusive director. Readers will learn why a scene from the humbler movie Carmen Jones is a deeper realization of filmmaking than the bravura lion sequence in the classic Battleship Potemkin. Along the way Perkins invites readers to re-experience with clarity, directness, and simplicity other famous scenes by directors like Hitchcock, Eisenstein, and Chaplin. Perkins examines the origins of movies and embraces their use of both realism and magic, their ability to record as well as to create. In the process he seeks to discover the synthesis between these opposing elements. With the delight of the fan and the perception of the critic, Perkins

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe first autobiography of a jazz musician, Louis Armstrong''s Swing That Music is a milestone in jazz literature. Armstrong wrote most of the biographical material, which is of a different nature and scope than that of his other, later autobiography, Satchmo: My Life in New Orleans (also published by Da Capo/Perseus Books Group). Satchmo covers in intimate detail Armstrong''s life until his 1922 move to Chicago but Swing That Music also covers his days on Chicago''s South Side with King Oliver, his courtship and marriage to Lil Hardin, his 1929 move to New York, the formation of his own band, his European tours, and his international success. One of the most earnest justifications ever written for the new style of music then called swing but more broadly referred to as Jazz, Swing That Music is a biography, a history, and an entertainment that really swings.Table of ContentsPart One * Jazz and I Get Born Together * In the Trail of The Dixieland Five * What is Swing? * Up the Mississippi * St. Louis Blues * Stormy Weather * With King Oliver on the South Side * To Broadway with Fletcher Henderson * Aint Misbehain Sends Me * California, Here I Come * Highseas and High Cs * Record Fans and Hot Clubs * Swinging Through Europe * Jam! * IHope Gabriel Likes Our Music Part Two: Music Section * Introduction to Swing * Armstrong in the Upper Register * Rhythmic Counterpoint * Swing Interpolation * Melodic Counterpoint * Rhythmic Obbligato * Melodic Obbligato * Examples of Swing on Ten Instruments

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhen originally published in 1974, Ekkehard Jost''s Free Jazz was the first examination of the new music of such innovators as Sun Ra, Ornette Coleman, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Jost studied the music (not the lives) of a selection of musicians,black jazz artists who pioneered a new form of African American music,to arrive at the most in-depth look so far at the phenomenon of free jazz. Free jazz is not absolutely free, as Jost is at pains to point out. As each convention of the old music was abrogated, new conventions arose, whether they were rhythmic, melodic, tonal, or compositional, Coltrane''s move into modal music was governed by different principles than Coleman''s melodic excursions Sun Ra''s attention to texture and rhythm created an entirely different big bang sound then had Mingus''s attention to form.In Free Jazz, Jost paints a group of ten style portraits,musical images of the styles and techniques of John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor,

Read more less

Book SynopsisBy 1982 Francis Ford Coppola had won five Academy Awards at the same time he was over 20 million in debt following the disastrous failure of One from the Heart. This astute biography critically examines Coppola''s singular vision and why it makes such paradoxes not only possible but prevalent in his long turbulent career. At the age of 32 Coppola became a superstar in Hollywood with The Godfather, which rapidly climbed to the top of the all-time box-office hits. Two years later he won the coveted Palme d''Or at the Cannes festival for The Conversation. His savage epic of the Vietnam War, Apocalypse Now, established him as the most daring, brilliant filmmaker of his generation. This book not only goes behind the cameras to track the creative and financial turmoil involved in his productions, but offers perceptive analyses of his films, including all three parts of The Godfather and the visually stunning remake of Dracula. Based on three years of research and exclusive intervTable of Contents* Introduction * The Italian Connection * The Studio Grind * Independence and the Dream of Zoetrope * The Godfather * Picking Up The Conversation * Back to Corleone * Lost in the Jungle * Blows to the Heart * Back to Back in Tulsa * Playing The Cotton Club * From Rip van Winkle to Peggy Sue * Tragedy and Revival * TuckerThe Dream Triumphant * Back to the Future * Filmography

Read more less

Book SynopsisParker Tyler (1904-1974), one of the few great American film critics, was intimate with and enormously respected by many of the underground and experimental filmmakers of his time. In this book, Tyler evaluated the Underground in general and the seminal films in particular, covering the history and scope of the genre with insight and verve. Like Tyler''s Screening of the Sexes: Homosexuality in the Movies is one of the masterpieces of cinema literature.Table of Contents* The Underground Taboo Versus the Taboo on Reality * The Exploding Peephole of the Underground * Toward Exhibition and Exhibitionism * Popularizing Peepshows: the Infantile Gimmick * No Establishment at All? * Underground Climb: from Exhibitionism to Art * Underground Infantilism: Surfacing Superstars * Superstar Space: the Playroom * Can the Technician Escape the Pad? * The Pad Can Be Commercialized * Performing Children, Performing Madmen * The ParanoiacCritical Kick * The Pads Predecessor: an Archetype * Underground Film Is Primitive Film * Where the Rub Is * The Abstractness of the Avant-Gardes * The Avant-Garde Laboratory * Dotting the Eyes of Distortion * Psychedelic Anamorphosis and Its Lesson * Dotting the Eye of History * Film Aesthetics: Rampant and Purist * The Plot Thickensbut Seriously * The Plastic Pulse Ticks On * In the Pad: Plastique versus Surplot * Hard-core History * The Esthetics of Film History * The Population Explosion and the Remedy * Basic Film Forms * Hisotyr and Manifesto * The Shape of Things to Come? * Coda

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis"One of the greatest Italian filmmakers, Federico Fellini (1920-1993) created such masterpieces as La Strada, La Dolce Vita, 8 1/2, Juliet of the Spirits, Satyricon, and Amarcord. His prodigious body o"Table of Contents* Rimini, My Home Town * Sweet Beginnings * Miscellany IIm a liar, but an honest one. * Letter to a Marxist Critic * Letter to a Jesuit Priest * Via Veneto: dolce vita * Notes On Censorship * The Bitter Lifeof Money * With 8 in Moscow * Miscellany IILike a puppet-master who falls in love with his puppets * Why Clowns? * Comic-Strip Heroes * Whom Do You Most Admire? * Miscellany IIII See No Dividing Line Between Imagination and Reality * The Birth of a Film

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Jimi Hendrix Experience had one of the most dazzling and sensational careers of any band. Their roller-coaster ride through a schedule of sell-out tours and frantic recording sessions left them crazed with sex, drugs, stardom, and exhaustion but at the same time they produced some of the most explosive, inventive, and inspired music ever heard. Now, for the first time, Experience bassist Noel Redding tells the whole story. He lucidly and wittily describes the making of the band''s startlingly innovative music how their phenomenal stage act, featuring Hendrix playing with his teeth and setting his guitar on fire, engendered a state of mass hysteria in the audience and the scarring aftermath of legal hassles and corporate duplicity. Frank, funny, rich in anecdotes, and full of insights into Hendrix, his genius, and the way it has been exploited, Are You Experienced? is a no-holds-barred account of an unforgettable band and a musical legend.Table of Contents* Dreams and Schemes * Managers, Money and Music * Evreux to Monterey to The Monkees * Round Two * Round Three * Last Straw * Win Some, Lose Some * Redding vs the World * Yameta or Bust * Are You Experienced? * Afterword

Read more less

Book SynopsisTo be young, good-looking, healthy, famous, comparatively rich and happy is surely going against nature. When Joe Orton (1933-1967) wrote those words in his diary in May 1967, he was being hailed as the greatest comic playwright since Oscar Wilde for his darkly hilarious Entertaining Mr. Sloane and the farce hit Loot , and was completing What the Butler Saw but less than three months later, his longtime companion, Kenneth Halliwell, smashed in Orton''s skull with a hammer before killing himself. The Orton Diaries , written during his last eight months, chronicle in a remarkably candid style his outrageously unfettered life: his literary success, capped by an Evening Standard Award and overtures from the Beatles his sexual escapades,at his mother''s funeral, with a dwarf in Brighton, and, extensively, in Tangiers and the breakdown of his sixteen-year marriage to Halliwell, the relationship that transformed and destroyed him. Edited with a superb introduction by John Lahr, TheTable of ContentsThe Diaries * London December 1966May 1967 * Tangier MayJune 1967 * LondonAugust 1967 Appendices * The Edna Welthorpe Letters * Chronology * List of Published Work

Read more less

Book SynopsisAlthough Frank Capra (1897–1991) is best known as the director of It Happened One Night, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, You Can''t Take It with You, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Arsenic and Old Lace, and It''s a Wonderful Life, he was also an award-winning documentary filmmaker as well as a behind-the-scene force in the Director''s Guild, the Motion Picture Academy, and the Producer''s Guild. He worked with or knew socially everyone in the movie business from Mack Sennett, Chaplin, and Keaton in the silent era through the illustrious names of the golden age. He directed Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Jean Harlow, Claudette Colbert, Bette Davis, and others. Reading his autobiography is like having Capra sitting in your living room, regaling you with his anecdotes. In The Name Above the Title he reveals the deeply personal story of how, despite winning six Academy Awards, he struggled throughout his life against the glamors, vagaries, and frustrations of Hollywood for the creative freedom to make some of the most memorable films of all time.Table of ContentsStruggle for Success * Its About Time, You Bum * Great Week for Screwballs * Comedy and the King * Baby Face * Columbia the Germ of the Ocean * The Sound and the Fury * In Search of the Holy Grail * Bitter Times and Bitter Tea Struggle with Success * Winning the Grail * Burn the First Two Reels * The Common Bond * If You Could Only Cook * You Cant Take It with You * If You Have to Think About It, Forget It * Film Power vs. Freedom of Film * Five Endings in Search of an Audience The Great Struggle * Why We Fight * F.D.R., Mr. P.M., & W.W. II An Entirely New Ball Game, With Entirely New Rules * Giver Me Liberty * Balabans Law * Self-Exile * Stars over Hollywood * Pocketful of Troubles

Read more less

Book Synopsis"This anthology of essays, interviews, and autobiographical pieces provides an invaluable overview of the evolution of contemporary music--from chromaticism, serialism, and indeterminacy to jazz, vernac"Table of ContentsEuropean Music Before 1945 * From Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music Ferruccio Busoni [18661924] * From Monsieur Croche the Dilettante Hater Claude Debussy [18621918] * Three Brief Epigrams Erik Satie [18661925] * From Notes Without Music Darius Milhaud [18921974] * Man and Music Ernest Bloch [18801959] * From Dialogues and a Diary Igor Stravinsky [18821971] * Why is Schoenbergs Music so Hard to Understand? Alban Berg [18851935] * The Influence of Peasant Music on Modern Music Bla Bartk [18811945] * From A Composers World Paul Hindemith [18951963] * From Autobiography, Articles, Reminiscences Serge Prokofiev [18921953] * Music and the Times Dmitri Shostakovitch [19061975] * From The Making of Music Ralph Vaughan Williams [18721958] * On Winning the First Aspen Award Benjamin Britten [19131976] Experimental Music and American Developments * Preface to 114 Songs Charles Ives [18741954] * From New Musical Resources Henry Cowell [18971965] * The Creative Mind and the Interpretive Mind Aaron Copland [19001990) * FolksongAmerican Big Business Roy Harris [18981979] * On Waiting for a Libretto Samuel Barber [19101981] * From The State of Music Virgil Thomson [18961989] * The Musical Impulse Roger Sessions [18961985] * The Liberation of Sound Edgard Varse [18851964] * Experiments in Notation Harry Partch [19011974] * Space as an Essential Aspect of Musical Composition Harry Brant [1913 ] * Who Cares if You Listen? Milton Babbit [1916 ] * Some Random Remarks about Electronic Music Otto Luening [19001996] * Shop Talk by an American Composer Elliot Carter [1908 ] * Thinking Twice Stefan Wolpe [19021972] * Towards a Re-merger in Music Chou Wen-Chung [1923 ] * Grand and Not So Grand Jack Beeson [1921 ] * The Changing ComposerPerformer Relationship: A Monologue and a Dialogue Lukas Foss [1922 ] * John CageInterview with Roger Reynolds John Cage [19121992] * Composers, Performance and Publications; Music, Electronic and Performed Richard Maxfield [19241969] * Morton FeldmanAn Interview with Robert Ashley, August, 1964 Morton Feldman [19261987] * Charles WuorinenAn Interview with Barney Childs Charles Wuorinen [1938 ] Postmodernism and Recent Concerns * Five Revolutions Since 1950 Karlheinz Stockhausen [1928 ] * Dreaming of Things to Come... Michael Tippet [1905 ] * Gyrgy LigetiAn interview with Joseph Husler, 1968/69 Gyrgy Ligeti [1923 ] * On the Third String Quartet George Rochberg [1918 ] * Third Stream Third Stream Revisited Gunther Shuller [1925 ] * Some sound Observations Pauline Oliveros [1932 ] * Music as a Gradual Process Steve Reich [1936 ] * T. J. AndersonAn Interview with Elliot Schwartz T. J. Anderson [1928 ] * Maximum Clarity Ben Johnston [1926 ] * On Criticism Cornelius Cardew [19361981] * Sofia GubaidulinaAn Interview with Dorothea Redepenning, 1992 SOfia Gubaidulina [1931 ] * I am Sitting in a Room (1969) Alvin Lucier [1931 ] * Anthony BraxtonAn Interview with Graham Lock, 1988 Anthony Braxton [1945 ] * Composing a Viable (if transitory Self): Brian Ferneyhough in Conversation with James Boros Brian Fenneyhough [1943 ] * From Something About Music William Bolcom [1938 ]

Read more less

Book Synopsis"When The Paris Diary exploded on the scene in 1966 there had never been a book in English quite like it: Its intimate combination of personal, literary, and social insights was unprecedented. Rorem's"Table of ContentsThe Paris Diary * Paris May-July, 1951 * Hyres July, 1951 * Fez, Morocco August, 1951 * Paris September-December, 1951 * Marrakech, Morocco January-February, 1952 * Paris 1952 * Paris 1953 * England, Germany, and Italy 1953 and 1954 * Paris 1954 * Hyres and Italy 1954 and 1955 * France Again 1955 * Aboard the S.S. United States October 1955 The New York Diary * Aboard the S.S. United States October 1955 * New York Spring 1956 * Around the Mediterranean Summer 1956 * Paris and New York, Autumn 1956 * Letter to Claude: New York and Paris March-May 1957 * Paris, Italy, Hyres, Paris, New York Summer-Autumn 1957 * New York Spring-Summer 1958 * New York and New England Summer-Autumn 1958 * Pennsylvania and New York Autumn 1958 * New York, Saratoga, Buffalo 1959-1960 * Saratoga, New York, Buffalo, New York 1960-1961

Read more less

Book SynopsisHuddie Ledbetter (1889-1949), known to millions of fans simply as Leadbelly, was arguably the most famous black singer in American history. His close musical associations included such towering figures as Blind Lemon Jefferson, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and John and Alan Lomax. He helped lay the foundations for blues, modern folk music, and rock''n'' roll. This definitive biography draws on a wealth of new archival material, interviews, and previously unknown recordings to detail Leadbelly''s proud, tumultuous, and often violent life.

Read more less

Book SynopsisAs Nat Hentoff says, Hearing Bix for the first time was like waking up to the first day of spring. Bix has always inspired such acclaim, for he was an unmatched master of the cornet. Ralph Berton was privileged enough to have been a fan,and younger brother of Bix''s drummer,just as Beiderbecke''s genius was flowering, before he died in 1931 at age twenty-eight. Listening from behind the piano, tagging along to honky-tonks and jam sessions, Berton heard some of the most extraordinary music of the century, and he brings Bix and his era alive with a remarkable combination of the excitement of youth and the perspective of the five decades that followed,decades that confirmed Bix''s place in the pantheon of jazz.

Read more less

Book SynopsisYears after her death Maria Callas remains one of the most renowned and compelling of all divas. Although much has been written about Callas the prima donna, the consummate stage magician, and the tragic lover of Aristotle Onassis, this is the first account of Maria the woman by someone who was close to her. Stancioff, a longtime friend, shares memories of the Maria who gave impromptu concerts of Beatles hits and Mexican ballads of the Maria who starved herself to conform to the image of a celebrity but would go into rhapsodies about a plate of pasta. And to her own warm reminiscences, Stancioff adds the insights of Maria''s friends, colleagues, and family. The figure that emerges is intriguing, infuriating, mystifying,and endlessly fascinating.

Read more less

Book SynopsisTo this day, wherever great rock music is being made, there is the shadow of Bob Dylan, said Bruce Springsteen at the induction of Dylan into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988. Or to quote John Rockwell, Anyone who didn''t live through the sixties simply cannot realize how important his albums seemed then they defined a community. Dylan is a musical, literary, political, and religious icon whose lyrics and mystique have spawned countless articles and books. The Dylan Companion is a generous helping of the best, most pungent, and most insightful commentary on Dylan from all phases of his career right up to the present: personal recollections and professional assessments from the likes of Ken Kesey, Greil Marcus, Joan Baez, Andrew Motion, Lester Bangs, Kurt Loder, Allen Ginsberg, Pauline Kael, Geoff Dyer, Simon Winchester, and Robert Christgau,over fifty pieces celebrating the sixty-year-old performer who somehow manages to stay forever young.

Read more less

Book SynopsisNewsday has said that Nick Tosches casts brilliant black light. The San Diego Reader has said that Tosches''s best sentences uncoil like rattlesnakes and strike with a venom that spreads poison through all the little Sunday-school ideas you''ve held dear. And Rolling Stone has said that Tosches can write like a wild rockabilly raveup. He can be elegant as a slow blues. The Nick Tosches Reader is the author''s own selection of his best work over the past thirty years, including fiction, poetry, interviews, rock writing, investigative journalism, and criticism. First published in major magazines, obscure underground periodicals, and his own best-selling books, many of these selections deal with rock''n'' roll and cultural icons,but there are also pieces on everything from William Faulkner to organized crime to heavyweight boxing, including the Vanity Fair feature that gave rise to Tosches''s major new book on Sonny Liston, published by Little, Brown. Here is a unique and darkly Trade ReviewNew York Times Book Review, 7/15/10 "If you want to learn about the power and dangers of rock 'n' roll, check out Mary Gaitskill's incomparable novel Veronica or Marianne Faithfull's cackling memoir or The Nick Tosches Reader."

Read more less

Book SynopsisBack in the early 1940s, late at night in the clubs of Harlem, a handful of jazz musicians began to experiment with a style that no one had ever heard before. The music was fast, complicated, impossible to play for many of the older musicians,but it soon became the lingua franca of jazz music. They called it bebop, and as the years went by, it became even more popular. Today it reigns as perhaps the best-loved style of jazz ever created. Ira Gitler conveys the excitement of this musical birth as only someone who was there can. In The Masters of Bebop, Gitler traces the advent of what was a revolution in sound. He profiles the leading players,Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillepie, Max Roach,but also studies the style and music of the first disciples, such as Dexter Gordon and J. J. Johnson, to reveal bebop''s pervasive influence throughout American culture. Revised with an updated discography,and with a new chapter covering bebop right up through the end of the twentieth century, The Masters

Read more less

Book SynopsisCertainly no singer has been more mythologized and more misunderstood than Billie Holiday, who helped to create much of the mystique herself with her autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues . Now, finally, we have a definitive biography, said Booklist of Donald Clarke''s Billie Holiday , by a deeply compassionate, respectful, and open-minded biographer [whose] portrait embraces every facet of Holiday''s paradoxical nature, from her fierceness to her vulnerability, her childlikeness to her innate elegance and amazing strength. Clarke was given unrivaled access to a treasure trove of interviews from the 1970s,interviews with those who knew Lady Day from her childhood in the streets and good-time houses of Baltimore through the early days of success in New York and into the years of fame, right up to her tragic decline and death at the age of forty-four. Clarke uses these interviews to separate fact from fiction and, in the words of the Seattle Times , finally sets us straight. . .evokin

Read more less

Book SynopsisCrosby, Stills, Nash & Young have been hailed as The American Beatles and Folk-Rock''s Mount Rushmore. They launched a trail-blazing acoustic-electric sound in 1969 and have been captivating listeners with their music ever since. Coming together as refugees from three seminal''60s bands-the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield and the Hollies-the combined talents of David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and Neil Young have influenced several generations of musicians while proving to have enduring appeal to fans of all ages. As rock and roll''s first supergroup, CSNY generated an enormous amount of media scrutiny-from their galvanizing appearance at Woodstock to multi-platinum, chart-topping albums such as Deja Vu, from David Crosby''s miraculous recovery from life-threatening addictions to the band''s resurgence for enormously successful concert tours. Now, noted CSNY historian Dave Zimmer distills the best of the journalism on these four remarkable artists, ranging from group portraits to i

Read more less

Book SynopsisJane''s Addiction''s 1988 breakthrough album, Nothing''s Shocking , had a seismic impact. With a bracing combination of metal, punk, and psychedelia, coupled with lead singer Perry Farrell''s banshee-ina- wind-tunnel vocals, Jane''s Addiction helped put alternative music on the map. The band helped pave the way for the mainstream success of bands like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Nirvana. Along the way, Jane''s Addiction released another classic album, Ritual de lo Habitual (with the hit Been Caught Stealing), founded the Lollapalooza festival, and openly celebrated a bacchanalian lifestyle that blurred all lines of gender and sexuality. Drawn from original interviews with the band, their friends, and their musical colleagues, Whores takes readers through Farrell''s early sonic experiments with Psi-Com and the formative days of Jane''s Addiction to their drug-addled break-up and controversial reunion with 2003''s Strays . Along the way it provides a candid, often disturbing glimpsTrade Review"At each other's throats before they'd written a single song, Jane's Addiction's history was a drug-sick, sex-fuelled soap opera fleshed out by artist, gangsters, hucksters and prostitutes. Mullen draws jaw-dropping tales from all in their messy orbit while keeping their inspirational music front and centre. Horrifying, but utterly compelling". Q Magazine - 4 star review "Whores is different. Yes, there's overdoses, orgies, Hell's Angels, transsexual sex, heroin and on-stage punchups here, but all the chaos and bacchanalia is balanced with a little reflection. NME"

Read more less

Book SynopsisSwing has never gone out of style. It was the music the Greatest Generation danced to--and went to war to. And no musician evokes the Big Band era more strikingly than Tommy Dorsey, whose soaring trombone play and hit tunes influenced popular music for a generation. Tommy Dorsey (1905-1956) led a rich and complex life. Beginning with his childhood in the coal mining towns of Pennsylvania, we follow the young trombonist''s journey to fame and fortune during the Jazz Age. Tommy, with his brother Jimmy, created one of the most popular bands of the era and played with such giants as Bing Crosby and Glenn Miller. They also launched the career of a skinny young singer named Frank Sinatra. But Tommy''s volcanic personality eventually split the band and Tommy went off on his own. Drawing on exhaustive new research and scores of interviews with the musicians who knew him best, Levinson delves into Dorsey''s famously eccentric lifestyle and his oversize appetite for drink, women, and perfection. The first biography on Dorsey in more than thirty years, Tommy Dorsey is a dazzling portrait of the Big Band''s brightest star--his tumultuous life, his turbulent times, and the unforgettable music that made him a legend.Trade Review"This is the best biography of a big-band leader I have read in years... The picture it paints of Dorsey the person is not always pretty...but it rings true...He covers the full arc of Dorsey's career in a way that previous books about him have not." Crescendo and Jazz Magazine"

Read more less

Book SynopsisBlack Tooth Grin is the first biography of Dimebag Darrell Abbott, the Texas-bred guitarist of the heavy metal band Pantera, who was murdered onstage in 2004 by a deranged fan,24 years to the day after John Lennon met a similar fate. Darrell Abbott began as a Kiss-inspired teenage prodigy who won dozens of local talent contests. With his brother, drummer Vinnie Abbott, he formed Pantera, becoming one of the most popular bands of the ''90s and selling millions of albums to an intensely devoted fan base. While the band''s music was aggressive, Dime was outgoing, gregarious, and adored by everyone who knew him. From Pantera''s heyday to their implosion following singer Phil Anselmo''s heroin addiction to Darrell''s tragic end, Black Tooth Grin is a moving portrait of a great artist.Trade ReviewThe Bookseller, 3/2/09 "This long-awaited account of a hard rocking life cut short has real cult sleeper potential." Booklist, 6/1/09 "Crain describes the career of an accomplished and influential guitarist...Crain's iteration of the man and his career...is a fitting memorial." Texas Monthly, June 2009 "[Crain] captures the essence of the band's virtuoso guitarist, who was revered by musicians and fans alike for his outrageous skills and everyman persona." Dallas Morning News Texas Pages blog, 5/30/09 "Chronicle[s] Abbot's life and career with careful detail and just the right amount of appreciation."

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn 1978, Greil Marcus asked twenty writers on rock-including Dave Marsh, Lester Bangs, Nick Tosches, Ellen Willis, and Robert Christgau-a question: What one rock-and-roll album would you take to a desert island? The resulting essays were collected in Stranded , twenty passionate declarations to such albums as The Rolling Stones'' Beggars Banquet , the Ramones'' Rocket to Russia , Something Else by the Kinks, and more. Universally revered as the ur-text of rock journalism, Stranded is an indispensable classic.Trade Review"(This) collection of essays (is) by turns thoughtful, compelling, sexy, hilarious, quirky - and surprisingly true to the basic impulse of rock and roll." New York Review of Books "Each chapter of Stranded is thoughtful, superbly focused, precisely written. There exist very few comparable efforts." Washington Post"

Read more less

Trade ReviewChicago Tribune, 10/11/16 "Wilson's book documents scattered memories and streamlines them into a series of impressions and anecdotes...Offer[s] valuable if unsettling insights into the personal dynamics inside an American band." AXS, 10/13/16 "Wilson goes beach-combing through the past, panning the sands of time for the socio-psychological seashells that gave rise to America's most successful singing group--and launched Wilson's lifetime bout with mental illness...Here Wilson recounts the good, the bad, the ugly, and the beautiful in the straightforward conversational tone of a mature, experienced man reclining in his Lay-Z-Boy, albeit tempered with his boyish enthusiasm (and melancholy)." Dallas Morning News, 10/14/16 "An unflinching portrait." New York Journal of Books, 10/11/16 "Immediate, informal, and confessional...Behind the wholesome image of shy boys and cute girls in a world of eternal sunshine, the Beach Boys inhabited a much darker reality. Brian Wilson nails it in his latest memoir." The LA Beat, 10/13/16 "One of the most honest and forthcoming autobiographies ever written by a musician...As you start to read, you really feel less an observer, and more of a participant in [Wilson's] journey...If you only read one book this year, it should be Brian's book." Publishers Weekly, 9/12/16 "[A] charming and powerfully written memoir that will engage a readership beyond the multitude of Beach Boys fans...Despite his fame and success, Wilson comes off as a genuinely modest and gentle soul...Wilson's emotional authenticity is beguiling as he takes readers deeply into his mind, voices and all, to describe his unique manifestation of musical genius." No Depression, 9/16/16 "Wilson's memoir offers a more sober glance at the spiritual and physical forces that haunt artists and that often drive them to produce the beautiful, sad, and relentlessly affecting music we often embrace...Wilson's memoir eventually grabs us at a deeper level than Love's. If you're looking for fun, fun, fun, pick up Love, but if you're searching for a more introspective, in my room, experience, pick Wilson." Canadian Living, 9/22/16 "In this tell-almost-all memoir, Brian Wilson candidly reflects on his struggles with family, substance abuse and mental illness and digs deep into the inspiration and meaning behind his music. It's a must-read for any fan of The Beach Boys--or the '60s pop scene, in general--with big-name music icons of the era (Phil Spector, Carole King, Paul McCartney) featuring in many of the stories." Record Collector, Issue 459 "His recollections of the abuse he suffered at the hands of life-coach Eugene Landy and his father are told with such blunt economy that they are quite crushing. Wilson's equally candid and plainspoken about his work...There's a good deal of myth-busting." Goldmine, November 2016 "Wilson's memoir is streaked with melancholy...Wilson fans will find it a compelling book." Huffington Post, 10/12/16 "Wilson takes you on a journey into the life of a creative genius, exploring his turbulent life and creative influences and how, regardless of his inner and outer demons, there is always hope...I Am Brian Wilson: A Memoir isn't the kind of book you can read in a day. Like a summer vacation, you want it to last forever...As a memoir, honest and insightful. But it's very much a memoir of a musician. From reading this book, you'll gain a deeper appreciation for the man behind some of the world's greatest hits and for music in general." Forbes.com, 10/11/16 "Wilson sets the record straight...His voice definitely comes through...It is a wonderful insight into a troubled genius." Rolling Stone, 9/27/16 "Excellent...I Am Brian Wilson is soulful and earnest--like spending quality time with a gentle sage with an endearingly erratic attention span...Wilson is heartbreakingly blunt about his mental breakdowns and suffering at the hands of his father. He has startling insights into the music."--Rob Sheffield Time magazine, 9/29/16 "Disarmingly personal." Minneapolis Star Tribune, 9/29/16 "When you read his new memoir...you'll get an even deeper exploration into the mental illness and the rebound, the villains and heroes in his life." Wall Street Journal, 9/30/16 "As plain-spoken as its title. Here the band's presiding genius wanders over the terrain of his life as a son, father, husband and supremely gifted musician...Tell[s] us much that we didn't know...Suggest[s] how we might best view the artistic life--any life, really." Loud and Quiet, October 2016 "In I Am Brian Wilson, Wilson is unflinching in his rendering of the euphoric highs and chaotic lows that have made up the last seven decades. His and the Beach Boys' story has been told many times before and is one we may think we know already, but it has never before been voiced with the clarity, honesty and insight on offer here." A New York Times, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly Best Seller! Vanity Fair, September 2016 "I Am Brian Wilson slipstreams through the past like a message in a bottle...It has moments of personal testimony that are poignant and indelible." New York Post, 8/11/16 "1960s Beach Boy on mental illness, sorrow, drugs, destabilization, demons, turbulence and discord." Booklist, 9/1/16 "Music journalist Greenman helps keep this meandering memoir coherent and poignant." CNN.com, 8/24/16 "Plenty of authors have written about this Beach Boy and now he'll get his say." Rolling Stone, 9/8/16 "Wilson tells his own story: his battles with his abusive father, the pressure to score hits in the Sixties, and his long struggle with mental illness." Billboard, 9/3/16 "Wilson delves into his battle with mental illness and how he created the band's pioneering sound." The Scotsman, 10/15/16 "As much about Wilson's reclusive existence in the 1970s and '80s as it is about the heyday of his band...This is no misery memoir, however--the tone throughout is almost breezy; difficult subjects are dealt with honestly, but never in such detail as to become uncomfortable...I Am Brian Wilson succeeds in shedding new light on Wilson's remarkable life." Herald Scotland, 10/14/16 "This autobiography of one of the most creative minds in 20th century popular music is clearly worth the reading, but the fact that it turns out to be an eloquent witness for a 21st century approach to mental illness may ultimately be its greater value." St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 10/14/16 "[An] essential read for Beach Boys fans." Foreword Reviews, 10/20/16 "With the release of his memoir, I Am Brian Wilson, those who love the music and wonder about the man are afforded access into his thoughts and insights. In nonlinear and candid prose, Wilson discusses his music, yes, but also his battles with mental illness, his career highs and lows, and sprinkles these accounts with peeks into his fascinating worldview. The work is empathetic and raw; there is humility here, and ingenuity as well." Esquire.com, 10/11/16 "A fascinating peek into the life and creative process of one of the 20th Century's most lauded songwriters and record producers...[An] intriguing glimpse into what makes one of rock's true legends tick." Parade.com, 10/10/16 "[Wilson] bares his heart and soul...He recalls the many personal and professional highs and the plentiful painful lows of his life and career." Publishers Weekly, 10/10/16 "In I Am Brian Wilson: A Memoir, the founder of the Beach Boys speaks candidly about his musical inspirations and mental illness...A wonderful gift to [his] fans." Houston Chronicle, 10/9/16 "In this honest and nonlinear memoir, one of rock 'n' roll's greatest composers talks honestly about both his musical triumphs and his struggles with mental illness and substance abuse...For fans of the music, Wilson does dig deep into the inspirations and recording of albums." Psychology Today, 10/11/16 "[Wilson's] extraordinary journey is intimately described in his new memoir." Library Journal, 10/6/16 "Wilson's memoir digs deep, with fierce honesty from the opening pages." The Arts Desk, 10/16/16 "It's intriguing to get a Wilson's-eye view of his own legend--it's one of the great tales of the music business, after all...All the key elements of Brian's life are here...Where the book really lights up is when Wilson talks in detail about music. There are fascinating descriptions of the recording of "God Only Knows", the Pet Sounds, Surf's Up and Holland albums and the difficulties he had with the SMiLE material...When he analyses the influence of the Beatles, the Stones and Phil Spector, it evokes the extraordinary intensity of the mid-Sixties musical eruption that the Beach Boys were caught up in." Toronto Star, 10/15/16 "The book jumps through time, the drugs, the mental illness, the music, the love and the pain. It has charming asides." Maclean's, 10/16/16 "[The] book pulls no punches: Wilson openly discusses his five decades of mental issues, his struggles with an abusive father, drugs, alcohol and weight, his debilitating fears and his failures (and successes) as a husband, dad and bandmate." The Arts Fuse, 10/11/16 "Pleasures await the Wilson/Beach Boys fan, as Wilson recounts the making of the Beach Boys album (Pet Sounds) and song ('Good Vibrations') he's proudest of and enthuses over his favorite non-Beach Boys album (the Beatles' Rubber Soul) and song ('Be My Baby,' produced by Phil Spector), his favorite classical composer (Bach), and his influences...Wilson speaks at length about his mental illness, how it robbed him of the joy and optimism his music provided for so many people." ABC News Radio, 10/11/16 "Wilson talks candidly about his struggles with mental illness and drugs, while giving fascinating insight into the creation of many of The Beach Boys' beautiful, catchy and complex songs." New York Magazine's Vulture, 10/11/16 "The Beach Boys leader's story is well told by now, but reading his often blunt retelling is harrowing, especially as he describes years swaddled in drugs and alcohol, and controlled by the notorious Dr. Landy. But as much as the book delves behind the so-called madman, it also gets behind the genius. Wilson and writer Ben Greenman lay the story out simply and with limited sensationalism, including fascinating sections where Wilson recounts his creative process and the work behind so many classic songs." The Australian, 10/22/16 "Freakishly, genre-transcendingly good: a rock memoir of genius, if ever there was one...Brilliantly unusual, like Wilson himself...It gets his unique inner world on to the page intact...It's also illuminated, along the way, by sudden lightning-flashes of insight into the world of mental illness." National Post, 10/18/16 "The book's voice [is] plainspoken, earnest, prone to both anxieties and boyish excitement...[and] true to the man." The Guardian, 10/16/16 "A beguilingly honest account of what it is to be Wilson." Phoenix New Times, 10/17/16 "Reading I Am Brian Wilson is like having a conversation with Brian Wilson...It feels authentic...It's imperfectly flawless...This is the story of a hero as well as an artist, a genius, and a musician. He frankly portrays his mental illness from the beginning to his lowest depths to the heights he's at today...Famous people from the music world make appearances...In 300 pages Brian Wilson tells a tale that's as fascinating as any of his American sagas, a book that reads as much as a confessional as it does an act of catharsis." VICE's Noisey, 10/16/16 "Tells the harrowing, heartbreaking story of the life of Brian." "Fascinating and intensely personal...The utter lack of pretense in the prose captures that familiar slightly flat, slightly sad, often rhapsodic voice with true authenticity...I Am Brian Wilson would fail as the Brian Wilson story if it did not deal with the darker corners of his life, and Wilson wanders through these areas fearlessly...Love, music, and an immensely sincere man's true voice are what you should expect and what I Am Brian Wilson delivers."-Psychobabble, 10/21/16 "An unconventional but fascinating read...One gets a terrific feel for Brian Wilson as a person and how he both thinks about and is affected by music. This is one true joy of the book...In all, I Am Brian Wilson is as interesting a book as you'd want it to be. It's not a linear history. It's not a juicy tell-all. But it is a beautiful view into the brilliant and sometimes troubled mind of a true genius of American music."-Under the Radar, 10/25/16 "Candid and tragic, yet in the end exquisitely triumphant and love affirming, I am Brian Wilson is the last (and only) word on Brian's all-too-written-about and over-analyzed past."-Elmore, 10/25/16 "A book almost the opposite of Love's: forgiving, chaotically associative."-New York Review of Books, 10/26/16 "A candid, heartfelt autobiography about a pop-music icon who managed to overcome dark influences that might have defeated someone less resilient."-New York Times Syndicate, 10/11/16 "The book is kind of like his music-gentle, spiritual, lyrical-and provides the expansive commentary that Brian does not usually provide in interviews...It's also funny as hell in places...An altogether lovely read."-The Suburban, 10/29/16 "He has worked with a ghostwriter, but anyone who has seen his spectacular solo shows or seen him interviewed will recognise the voice immediately: vulnerable, faltering, pained, unexpectedly funny...There is a candour and even a childlike openness to how he describes the battling voices in his head and the self-doubt and self-imposed pressure...Wilson's memoir has a weepily beautiful mellowness and a real poignancy that shines through the acrimony and wasted years."-Sydney Morning Herald, 11/5/16 "The enigmatic Wilson documents the poetic lyricism, inspiration and creativity behind his vast discography while at the same time showing a man who is over-time coming to terms with his past...Extremely candid...You aren't going to find any other story like that of Brian Wilson's. Very rarely if ever will you find a person with Brian's notoriety be as truthful and forth coming as he is in this book."-Media Mikes, 11/1/16 "Join the genius behind The Beach Boys as he takes a stroll down memory lane, revealing never-before-heard details about his upbringing with brothers Carl and Dennis, as well as his struggle with mental illness, drug use and more. In I Am Brian Wilson, the legendary surf rocker discusses how these hardships shaped the man he is today, and how he's learnt to forgive those who wronged him."-Over Sixty, 11/3/16 "A frank and revealing portrait of a troubled and popular music pioneer...Worth reading if you are a fan of the Beach Boys, or enjoy reading about how even extreme mental difficulties can be faced, and if not overcome, at least lived with." -Portland Book Review, 11/2/16 "The Beach Boys frontman has a fascinating story...He recounts the ups and downs of his life with candor." -InStyle.com, 11/1/16 "[An] alternatingly sad and inspiring memoir." -Downtown Magazine, 11/17/16 "Beach Boys fans finally get the scoop from the man himself...Provide[s] a crucial blueprint of the rise and fall of one of America's most interesting pop musicians. Wilson carefully answers questions that many die-hard fans have been wondering for years and doesn't shy away from exploring the darker, less glamorous side of being in one of the most famous American bands of all time."-Memphis Flyer, 11/17/16 "The 312-page book...convey[s] Brian Wilson's way of thinking-mostly gentle, conciliatory, a little disjointed and tinged with resignation."-Stockton Record, 11/17/16 "The Beach Boys legend once thought he just wasn't made for these times, but in his new memoir, he reflects on his brilliant career and his successful struggle against his personal demons." -Los Angeles Times "[Wilson] depicts mental illness candidly."-Austin Chronicle "In this candid testament, Wilson examines sources of his creative inspiration and reveals his mental and spiritual struggles, his highs and lows." -RTE "Filled with perspective and wisdom."-Music Is My Sanctuary, Top 10 Music Books of 2016 "A patchwork of memories covering childhood through stardom with The Beach Boys, dark years of mental illness and the comeback he has enjoyed in recent years." -Milwaukee Shepherd Express "[Wilson] tells it his way, and that makes it better than any history I've read of the Beach Boys to date. His no-holds-barred admissions of his mistakes and triumphs are revealing and engaging...The book is also peppered with surprises." -San Francisco Book Review "[Wilson] weighs in on his extreme highs and lows." -SouthCoast Today undefined-iHeartRadio "A strange kind of surfing through the Beach Boy's interior life."-The Guardian "[Wilson] tell[s] his story in his own way...For Wilson admirers it's a gift from Brian, that, more than anything reveals a sweet, mentally troubled man for whom making music is like breathing for the rest of us." -Lincoln Journal Star "A page turner...If you're at all a fan, you need this book." -Vintage Guitar "Offer[s] some fascinating glimpses under the hood."-New York Times Book Review "[A] must-read for any Beach Boys fan, packed with never-before-seen personal photos and incredible anecdotes." -Over Sixty "[Wilson] tells his story with incredible intensity, candidness, and humor...It is as if we are having an extended and intimate conversation with Wilson...There has been a veritable avalanche of autobiographies and memoirs from aging rockers in recent years as they begin to contemplate their place in rock history. I Am Brian Wilson takes its hard-earned place in the front of these books. It is not to be missed." -Washington Independent Review of Books "Touchingly modest...From the start you know you're in for something special...Honest and affecting." -The Spectator (UK)

Read more less

Book SynopsisA collection of lyrics and autobiographical commentary by singer Mark Lanegan, with a preface by John Cale and a foreword by Moby With a voice that Pitchfork has called as scratchy as a three-day beard yet as supple and pliable as moccasin leather, former Screaming Trees and Queens of the Stone Age vocalist Mark Lanegan draws frequent comparisons to masters like Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen. Lanegan''s voice is one of the most distinct and recognizable in rock, but his talents aren''t limited to his vocal skills. Lanegan''s lyrics are on par with the best of them, exploring with Blake-like insight the stark and scorched emotional terrain that exists somewhere beyond sadness, addiction, trauma, and spiritual longing. With a body of work that now includes seven albums with the Screaming Trees, eleven acclaimed solo albums, three albums of duets with Belle and Sebastian''s Isobel Campbell (including the Mercury Prize-shortlisted Ballad of the Broken Seas), and collaborative albums and singles with the likes of Queens of the Stone Age, Moby, Soulsavers, Twilight Singers, and countless others, Mark Lanegan occupies a singular space in rock music. Now, for the first time ever, the reclusive singer presents a comprehensive look at his lyrics, the stories behind them, and the making of his albums. I Am the Wolf is a rare and candid glimpse into the inner workings and creative process of a legend.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less