Good books about music

That's pretty wild

The Good Times Are Killing Me by Lynda Barry is a powerful little illustrated novel about the relationships you have with friends, and with music as you first discover it as a teenager. I haven't read it in over a decade but I remember feeling it pinned that vivid obsession and thrill in a very poignant way. Turns out it's on Google Books if you can't find a copy or don't mind reading things online.

ok only part of it is ;_;

Yea, I remember years ago when her comic strip was in my local weekly that she periodically would include music references and story lines. I also saw her in the crowd at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Fest a time or 2.

The Luke Haines biography.

'The Fallen' by Dave Simpson.

A freebie given away by The NME in the mid-90's called Unknown Pleasures which contains reviews of writers favourite albums. You can pick up copies occasionally on Ebay for very little. depressing read in a way as it gives you a real insight into how much music journalism has deteriorated in the intervening years but contains the most perceptive pieces I have ever read on Chic and Cathal Coughlan.

Wow! Never heard of that. Who wrote the Chic piece?

It was Melody Maker, not NME. Some of the essays used to be floating around the web, and there used to be an ILX thread about it.

Here ya go

Melody Maker's "Unknown Pleasures"

Here ya go

Melody Maker's "Unknown Pleasures"

― I'm into SB (Noodle Vague), Saturday, 2 January 2010 22:07 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

Thanks for the link. Lost my copy a while ago.

Paul Lester did the Chic one. Never heard of him. Will seek out. Thanx!

The Chic piece was by Paul Lester.

It's online somewhere but I'm not sure where.

Xpost. I have it saved on an old computer. Will find and post tomorrow. It's good.

Oooh you're awesome! Thanx!!!!!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B000S548Y6/ref=sr_1_olp_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262473588&sr=1-9

Appetite for Destruction

anyone here read this guys stuff before? any good?

Whether it's hanging around with Marillion's Fish in Berlin, seeing Whitesnake fail to ignite 1985's Rock in Rio, talking through old times with Jimmy Page in his Berkshire pile or following Ozzy Osbourne to Moscow, there isn't a rock luminary that Wall hasn't cross-examined or kept the flame burning with at some point over the last thirty years. Here, amongst several pieces, he catches Lars Ullrich just on the cusp of world domination; has dinner with Ritchie Blackmore on the eve of a Deep Purple comeback; and is up all night in LA with W. Axl Rose. Appetite for Destruction gathers together Wall's journalism for Kerrang!, for whom he was the star writer in their eighties heyday. It also features brand-new introductions to all the pieces, written with maybe less hair but also the benefit of twenty years' hindsight.

About the Author

Mick Wall was the founding editor of CLASSIC ROCK magazine. He's the author of numerous music titles, including books on Iron Maiden, Don Arden, W. Axl Rose and Black Sabbath. He ghosted XS ALL AREAS: the autobiography of Status Quo, and is a former DJ on Capital Radio. In the 1980s he was the chief writer for KERRANG! His most recent book is a biography of Led Zeppelin: WHEN GIANTS WALKED THE EARTH.

I'm slowly working my way through Princess Noire: The Tumultuous Reign of Nina Simone by Nadine Cohodas

Cohodas did a ton of research for the Nina Simone book but quote after quote after quote from concert reviews in both major media and the African-American press kinda wears one out after awhile.

Anybody reading the latest books with Elvis Costello lyric references in the title:

Brett Easton Ellis' fiction sequel to Less than Zero. Imperial Bedrooms (I think he added an 's') is out.

Jennifer Egan's novel A Visit From the Goon Squad is out.

The latest novel from the acclaimed author of The Keep unfolds in the music worlds of punk-era San Francisco and contemporary New York. As the characters grow out of their early rebelliousness, their attention turns from performance to money-making. Egan charts the fluctuations of fortunes and friendships, exploring various notions of change and stability.

Do not know if these books are good, or necessarily about music, but figured they would fit under this thread better than over on ILE or something.

I never read Less than Zero or saw the movie. Dropping Costello references seems to big for 40-something writers. I haven't seen it, but apparently there's a scene in Treme where musician Kermit Ruffins (I think that's who it is) is told that Elvis Costello is in the audience and wants to meet him and he does not care (and then gets scolded by someone for not caring).

Not sure if "goon squad" is a reference to an Elvis Costello lyric.

Just picked up and enjoyed "We Never Learn", by Eric Davidson from ye New Bomb Turks. Fine anecdotes about, for lack of a better word, garage-punk bands from the late 80s-late 90s or so. He uses the word "gunk-punk". Despite that, a good read, good pics, fun stuff. Especially if you're a fan of Crypt Records, Sympathy For The Record Industry, etc. Good related website here: http://www.weneverlearnbook.com/

I've been reading Michael Moynihan's Lords of Chaos and definitely have mixed feelings about it. I'm not sure I totally accept his thesis that the rise of violent Satanism, Paganism, and Black Metal is some Hegelian rebellion against the Scandinavian social welfare state.

Did I read the same book? For me it's just a bunch of sociopaths saying 'Christianism is alien to Scandinavian culture'.

And am I the only one who thinks this book is well-balanced and that's why Varg hates it?

Really The Blues by Mezz Mezzrow is a great autobiography.
Early jazz stories from was an associate of Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Bix Beiderbecke - his lasting contribution was to introduce good w33d to NYC. Bonus, sometimes it gets so slangy that you need to refer to the "hipster glossary" in the back.

"Talking Music: Conversations with Five Generations of American Experimental Composers" (amazon)

There are two books out about Bomp magazine, put together by Mrs. Shaw, that are interesting. Also, its still hard to go wrong with Guralnick's 'Feel Like Going Home.' Bill Harkleroad's book on Beefheart & the Magic Band is reputed to be excellent & if I can ever find it for a price that wouldn't require taking out a 2nd mortgage I'm gonna snag it.

Got this baby on order, have a sneaking feeling it's gonna be ace:

http://www.faber.co.uk/site-media/onix-images/thumbs/12591_jpg_280x450_q85.jpg

this thread is pretty long for no one to've mentioned dean wareham's 'black postcards.' great insider insight into the life of a critical darling ambivalent about sales and the 80s/90s/00s music industry he finds himself in. it's almost as good as dylan's 'chronicles,' and a lot more forthright and (seemingly) honest. i read it a few months after mick wall's illuminating zeppelin bio, 'when giants walked the earth.' the two texts are almost like mirror images of each other

xp
very excited for that! but Faber's US distribution is terrible. yesterday some crazy person was selling it on Amazon for over $2000.

This Rob Young book is so good it has me purring with pleasure. I'm 100 pages in and he hasn't even got going on folk music in earnest yet. Instead he's making me want to check out Vaughan Williams, Holst and Bax, which is no mean achievement.

Keith Richards' "Life"

Any other 2010 items?

Terry Teachout's Pops (Louis Armstrong bio) is great and extremely readable at a quick-paced 300 pages.

OTOH an 800 page Frank Sinatra bio that stops in 1953 strikes me as too detailed - anybody read this?

^^Frank by James Kaplan

Christgau offered a mixed take on the Teachout book (and on Teachout himself)(see link below) earlier in the year that was discussed or mentioned somewhere here on ilx. Am wondering now if reading this book, is like reading a George Will book on baseball? Your (coleman) take suggests I need not worry which is good to know.

http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/Rock-Roll/Pops-as-Pop/ba-p/2578

Mark Anthony Neal's Soul Babies: Black Popular Culture and the Post-Soul Aesthetic has some really good writing on R. Kelly...

xpost

I'm no fan of Teachout's neoconservative theatre criticism to put it mildly and Pops is surprisingly balanced w/little or no politicized axe-grinding. even better than Xgau is willing to admit IMO.

If you like Van Morrison, the Greil Marcus book was very good.

I just knew of his Dylan collection book, Bob Dylan by Greil Marcus: Writings 1968-2010, but yep Listening to Van Morrison is out too.

Sean Wilentz' book on Dylan, Bob Dylan in America came out in 2010 too. I haven't read any of these yet!

What do you guys like/want for coffee table books?

The Jazz Loft Project by Sam Stephenson

Who Shot Rock and Roll: A Photographic History, 1955 to the Present by Gail Buckland

Jazz by photographer Herman Leonard

Sacred Steel

The Boombox Project

Alex Ross' new book (Listen To This) is good so far.

Just bought Husker Du: The Story of the Noise-Pop Pioneers Who Launched Modern Rock . Haven't cracked it yet.
That's uh some title.

^it's tru, tho.

This Rob Young book is so good it has me purring with pleasure. I'm 100 pages in and he hasn't even got going on folk music in earnest yet. Instead he's making me want to check out Vaughan Williams, Holst and Bax, which is no mean achievement.

― margana (anagram), Wednesday, August 25, 2010 7:10 AM (3 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

really, really want to read this. Vaughan Williams is really good too.

Amused/bemused that the Rob Young book is featured in the Toast catalogue.

And Party Every Day: The Inside Story of Casablanca Records by Larry Harris

this was so much better than I expected, as advertised an insiders account of disco era excesses and the subsequent near-collapse of the record industry.

oops published in nov 09 but worth a look regardless

i want to read that. i need all disco books.

OK so I just finished Wald's How The Beatles Destroyed Rock ’n’ Roll: An Alternative History of American Popular Music and if you go into it with the latter half of the title more in mind rather than the attention-grabbing former, it's really a very fine book. It could definitely stand pruning and the six-page epilogue, "The Rock Blot and The Disco Diagram," is a mess (if not an offense - thanx for the parenthetical mention of gays in relation to disco). But he does a great job of recreating some of the ways in which music was actually lived and how they've been distorted by recording-based histories.

As for The Beatles, well, we already knew that they kinda sorta destroyed rock 'n' roll (as opposed to rock) in addition to laying waste to Tin Pan Alley and Johnny Mercer (although they only kinda sorta did that too).

Here's his basic theory and how he ties The Beatles to the rest of the book:

"(The Beatles) had led their audience off the dance floor, separating rock from its rhythmic and cultural roots, and while the gains may have balanced the losses in both economic and artistic terms, that change split American popular music in two. When similar splits had happened in the past, the demands of satisfying live audiences had always forced the streams back together, but by the end of the 1960s live performances had lost their defining role on the pop music scene. So the Beatles and the movement they led marked the end not only of rock ’n’ roll as it had existed up to that time but also of the whole process explored over the course of this book, in which white and black musicians had evolved by adopting and adapting one another’s styles, shaping a series of genres—ragtime, jazz, swing, rock ’n’ roll—that at their peaks could not be easily categorized by race." 246

― Kevin John Bozelka, Sunday, August 2, 2009 4:47 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark

this book is A++

so many books to read

any good stuff coming out in the next few months?