Music Books
 

I don't know if we're had a thread on this, but what about music books?
I have rather a large collection of them. Anyone else?
Recommendations?

You mean sheet music? Or books about etc?

What the feckless dago ponce said.

Books about bands, genres etc.

Bob Stanley - Yeah Yeah Yeah is a terrific book about pop music which I and others have wanged on about quite a bit on here.

Simon Napier Bell's books are jolly entertaining if not necessarily well-written/100% true. I'll need to have a look at the bookshelves to see which ones of his I own.

Just bought a few of the 33 1/3 series on Television, Tom Waits and Can. Gather they're a bit variable - some good reads and some a bit dryly academic.

Just about the only book on Television I've ever found is 'Sonic Transmission', which is so-so.

Lloyd Bradley - Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital does what it says on the tin as does his Bass Culture: When Reggae Was King.

Good call. I have two, they are very amusing. Dee Dee Ramone’s book is very good, too.

Tony Fletcher's Bunnymen book, 'Never Stop', is entertaining, and Julian Cope's autobiographical stuff is hilarious.

Serge Gainsbourg: A Fistful Of Gitanes: Sylvie Simmons

Louis Barfe - Where Have All the Good Times Gone?: The Rise and Fall of the Record Industry - I would for the first time ever be interested to hear El Ag's opinion on this.

edit - His Turned Out Nice Again about British light entertainment is also terric

Jon Savage’s “Teenage” is erudite and witty. My two favourites this year were about or by drums and drummers, Mike Edison’s gonzo biog of Charlie Watts, Sympathy for the Drummer, and Paul Hanley’s book Have a Bleeding Guess, about doing his O Levels and recording Hex Enduction Hour while touring the world with the Fall in 1982.

Just checked and the ones I have are Black Vinyl, White Powder and Ta-Ra-Ra-BOOM-De-Ay. He is a rascal.

I enjoyed Mötley Crüe's The Dirt: Confessions of the World's Most Notorious Rock Band when it came out but suspect I would feel a bit icky reading it now.

Do you know Tony, btw? He’s been on here a few times.

I messaged someone here who I thought was him, but claimed not to be the same person!
I met him on an Ian McCulloch tour in 1989/90.

Luke Haines' 'Bad Vibes'.

Bill Brewster and Frank Broughton's Last Night a DJ Saved my Life: The History of the Disc Jockey and The Record Players: The Story of Dance Music Told by History’s Greatest DJs are terrific if you like that sort of thing, although the latter contains traces of Savile.

Sylvia Patterson's I'm Not With the Band is an absolutely smashing book about life in music journalism. Mark Ellen's Rock Stars Ruined My Life! is not. It is shit.

I think he called himself Illeagle Alien on here.

Oh yeah. Sylvia’s book is great. Mingus’s autobiography is something else, too.

It's great book. I used to know Bill Brewster back in the day, he also worked on the early versions of WSC.

I was recommended Redemption Song about Joe Strummer yesterday. Anyone read it?

I have Black Vinyl, White Powder - are these two different books, or did I get a special version for by music execs?

Cowboys and Indies is good on the business side.

Simon Armitage, Gig

Roy Wilkinson, Do it for your Mum

Will check that out.

Ha! No - it is my memory failing me between bookshelf and laptop. Perhaps I was thinking of that not very good Bowie record?

Both brilliant books :p

My Life and The Paradise Garage by the late Mel Cheren is a good read as well

David Sheppard
On Some Faraway Beach: The Life and Times of Brian Eno

I dunno if I'm more impressed that you used to know Brewster or that he was part of When Saturday Comes.

Grimsby fan.

Crosstown Traffic: Jimi Hendrix and postwar pop - Charles Shaar Murray

Yep its not bad.

Guitar Zero - Gary Marcus

Jacques Brel -- The Biography by Alan Clayson

Meet Me In The Bathroom, about the New York music scene in the early 00's was really good.
Mike Skinner's autobiography is a favourite, but I struggled a bit with the audiobook version (even though I read the book twice).
How Not To Run a Night, Peter Hook. About the Hacienda club in Manchesters.
Sylvia Patterson was good too. I'm sure there are a few more but those were the ones that immediately stuck out.

Cash: The Autobiography is one of the most depressing things I've ever read.

I believe my company makes a fleeting appearance in that book, are Vampire Weekend in it?
We also feature more extensively in Dean Wareham's Black Postcards, which is well worth a read, Dean is a genuinely talented writer.

:I used to go to Palace games with Tony and some other mates in the late 70s, then I went to "uni" and we lost touch. I ended up in France and he in NY, I believe.

He’s in upstate New York. There’s a good biography about those days, 70s Palace and Jamming fanzine, “Boy About Town”. You might be in it!

Boy About Town: A Memoir by Tony Fletcher (2013-09-23) https://www.amazon.es/dp/B00FK8R9TC/..._YoyeFbYEC1D3C

For BBSers who are not on the lam in the Costa del Crime: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Boy-About-T.../dp/0434021679

Yeah, that's a terrific book. I lent my copy to a chum of Pidster's and unsurprisingly I've never had it back.

I got halfway through Hook's Substance but gave up for some reason, so I'll have to give it another go.

I forget who it is your company is?

Yeah they are... the book is all about the excess, of sex and drugs of New York, and then it get's to Vampire Week and it's just about how focused they were on being successful!

Touching from a distance by Ian Curtis' wife is another that I loved, and what the film Control was based on.

I think I might have done similar. Couldn't get into it at all.

It is very, very long.

The 2 part biography of Sinatra is excellent
Bruce Springsteens recent memoirs are great too.

Both perfect books to read whilst turning pink and pretending you are hiding out on the Costas after being one of the 3,000 people involved in the Brinks Mat robbery.

Head On was brilliant about his time with Teardrop Explodes. Just love his stories about the US tour and Gary Dwyer's antics. Hilarious

I enjoyed Ben Folds' autobiography A Dream About Lightning Bugs.

It definitely didn't take itself too seriously and he was quite refreshingly honest about the times he has been a dick, especially to the women in his life.

Barefoot in Babylon was interesting

Unfaithful Music and Disappearing Ink - Elvis Costello

i read Steve Jones - Lonley Boy recently its mildly amusing.

I really enjoyed reading Life by Keith Richards, and Ozzy by Ozzy Osbourne which was laugh out loud funny in parts.

No-one Here Gets Out Alive - The Doors

ditto on no-onehere gets out alive
Also Dear Boy - the life of Keith Moon - heard 'happy jack' the other day , Moon's drumming at its craziest reflecting his life.

I remember being very taken indeed with Up-Tight, the story of the Velevet Underground, when I was 18. But I was the kind of 18 year old who would be impressed by anything about the Velevet Underground. Little Richard, Quasar of Rock was the same.

Yep love the Julian Cope books... so funny...

David Cavanagh's My Magpie Eyes are Hungry for the Prize is good for the rise/failure of the indies through the 80s. I really like Lipstick Traces,but can see it would be a bit marmite. The Luke Haines books on Britpop are very entertaining, partly because he is so bitchy about everyone. David Stubbs' stuff on krautrock is good, and Simon Reynolds' Bring the Noise and Retromania. I've never really warmed to that big Bob Stanley book, although I dip into it from time to time.

Is Excellent!:p

You bitch

:p

Added to my wishlist

Guy Peelleart / Nik Cohn's art book Rock Dreams is a fantastic thing. If you've not seen it, it's an art book with snippets of text where various singers, bands etc are mostly shown in imaginings of their songs or personas - The Drifters are under the boardwalk, Rod Stewart is a hooligan, etc. I had it in the late 70's only to find my younger brother had taken it apart and used it as posters. Fortunately it was reissued by Taschen.

Is there a good biography of Gil Scott Heron?

I've not found one when I've looked in the past. There's a real story there to be told in depth.

I've found this?

Attachment 53962

It's a scottish heron. Best I could do at short notice.

Heroic effort.

Just starting the Jon Savage book on Joy Division. Decent pedigree, so will see.

I enjoyed it immensely. Summers comes across as a bit of a tool.

How is that Scottish?

It’s not.

He certainly does in his own book, which is dreadful. No self-awareness whatsoever.