Good books about music

Terry Graham's Punk Like Me finally arrived after a lengthy delay. I payed into the Kickstarter dcampaign about 5 years ago.
Have read first couple of chapters and it seems pretty decent. Traces his path as a musician from childhood through to him walking outon the Gun club in 1984. Must get through thsi. Quite good so far.

Dr John Under A hoodoo Moon his memoir which its taken me about 20 years to get a copy of. He's just tried smack for teh first time after one of his guitar mentors lost patience with him continually asking about it. He's also a possibly prepubescent teen at the time.
Again really well written and i wish I had more time to devote to it. It's my transport book currently.

Blondie by lester Bangs. very odd as a mass media coffee table book on a popular band.
Loving it, gives a lotof insight into the background etc. & the New York scene of the time.

Nothing But The Blues: The Music and the Musicians. Lawrence Cohen
Great coffee table book on the blues which I picked up for €3 from a local charity shop.
I want to read this through after having just read Elijah Wald's book on the Delta Blues

read the two elijah wald books that i ordered recently: escaping the delta and how the beatles...

they were both really great reads. for quite some time lately i had actually been trying to find good books describing the many shifts occurring in 1920s popular music (the early blues and 'hillbilly' markets, advent of electric recording, influence of film etc.). others i had found before wald's writings were either too focused on recordings, which were just one (non-dominant) facet of the pop music industry, or interpreted the landscape from a non-contemporary lens that i found suspect. by contrast, wald very clearly put a lot of effort into providing a broad and comprehensive overview of pop music that emphasized how the eras' musicians made their living, how consumers and amateur musicians (people were often both especially in the early days) enjoyed music, how other industries became big players in pop music as technology shifted, etc. i especially appreciated that he touched upon the role of dance in pop music, which was particularly indispensable for his chapter on the early 60s. i also enjoyed the clear effort he made to convey how people conceptualized, categorized, and thought about pop music in its various forms at the time instead of trying to retrospectively slot things into dubious boxes that barely even make sense today, as many histories unfortunately do.

there were some moments that were clearly a little more speculative than others. one in particular: he describes the mid-50s period when songs like "patricia", "purple people eater", "tom dooley", "at the hop" and "volare" were all hits getting major exposure through radio, but suggests that, well, probably no one actually liked/bought all those records, different as they were, but they certainly would have heard all of them! but then there's a footnote attached to that statement which literally says that multiple readers of the manuscript told him that at the time they actually enjoyed and owned most of those records he mentioned. i find it so odd that he didn't bother to reformulate that paragraph a bit given that he had some decent indication of being slightly off-base! but moments like that are not common, as most of the time he was careful to cite his speculations of typical behavior/taste with carefully interpreted contemporary sources.

anyway, do read them if you've been curious and would be interested in broad but informative/detailed surveys of those periods.

Yeah, Wald is fantastic and I love both those books.

I'm currently reading Graham Lock's Forces In Motion: The Music and Thoughts of Anthony Braxton, which is a combination tour diary and mega-extended interview transcript with Braxton; Lock spent two weeks traveling with him on tour to write it, and it's giving me a clearer understanding of how he thinks, how he feels about his own work, what he's trying to accomplish and why, and so much more (it's giving me a much better understanding of other AACM dudes, too, just based on Braxton's thoughts about them). It seriously is unlocking Braxton's music for me in a way that's perfectly timed, since I've been in a real mood to listen to a lot more of his stuff lately.

Just finished the Song Machine, which was informative and a good overview of current music trends, but lacked something I can't quite put my finger on...I think maybe i thought the track and hook vs melody and lyrics was perhaps underexplored.

anyway, I have read a lot of the pre-war Blues books and Escaping the Delta is probably the best. In search of the blues was criticized in some quarters, but that's a book that asks some tough questions as well, and I thought it made it's case well:
https://www.amazon.com/Search-Blues-Marybeth-Hamilton/dp/0465018122

Wald is one of my favorite music historians. Huge fan of “Beatles”

i liked the song machine too! the narrative it sketched out was pretty compelling, it made some very solid/intriguing points about how pop evolved over the years he covered, and the details he uncovered in interviews were often fascinating.

one thing that was a bit distracting about it was that there were a lot of minor factual errors. almost all were harmless to the broader points/thesis, but it did leave me wondering just how thorough his research outside of his own interviews actually was (not to mention how so many people who looked over the manuscript failed to notice). and in some cases it seemed he was ignoring some information in service of a more compelling narrative. (like, saying tricky stewart had never scored a big hit before the mega-smash "umbrella" sure makes the story more exciting, but it just wasn't true!) and in general his blind spots were in the predictable directions (overemphasis on rock, little awareness of hip hop that wasn't inspiring pop that would come later, etc.).

BUT nevertheless it was a very compelling read! i was a little apprehensive about it at first, because i remember its release precipitated some really silly/wrong-headed reviews in the press.

Nothing on Trouble Boys here--must be something on one of the Replacements threads. I'm about 100 pages in. I like that Westerberg tried to write a song once that sounded like Wishbone Ash's "Blowin' Free." Love that Creem's Rick Johnson was an influence. The stuff on the Replacements/Husker Du rivalry is good. Where did I hear about them first...almost positive it would have been via Christgau's Sorry Ma blurb.

Possibly the most depressing music book I've ever read

does anyone have any post #100 (or so) recommendations from the 33 and 1/3 series?

Really enjoyed Terry Graham's Punk Like Me which covers the LA punk scene and time in the Gun club.

Possibly the most depressing music book I've ever read
― Number None

Just on the epilogue--it is, in a way. And exhausting.

I always took the sideshow aspect of the band to be just that, something that existed apart from the records--I didn't realize the extent to which it was the central fact of their lives. The first couple of records, sure; they're young, and they're getting attention, act out. But 200 pages and four or five albums later, why are they still pouring beer over their heads and pointlessly ruining vans and sabotaging every step forward with two steps back? I understand their hostility to any industry people who tried to change them and didn't know anything about them. By they seemed outnumbered in the book by industry people who actually loved the band and wanted to help them. I know that's a simplification of complicated lives--they're really afraid of success, their addictive and sometimes abusive backgrounds, etc.--but like I say, exhausting. I'll never not love my favourite Replacements songs (played the "I'll Be You" video for my class today and it sounded as great as ever), but halfway through, I wanted to be reading about R.E.M. or some other band who boringly tried to stay focused and more or less do the right things.

i've had morley's "words and music" on my coffee table for *years* now and i've barely cracked it

has anyone read it? any good? plax?

a few i can cosign

john szwed's sun ra biography
caetano veloso's tropical truth

and i've never gotten tired of the uh rough guide to reggae. really!

another one i've had for years but not read - "the aesthetics of rock". surprisingly little discussion on that one on this thread.

One additional thing on the Replacements book. I think I got one good laugh for the longest stretch: when the band told Benmont Tench to tell Tom Petty how much they loved his song "Running Down a Drain."

Any word on This is Memorial Device yet?

I have the Morley book, didn't read it cover to cover, but read a good chunk. Can't say it really stuck with me though. Lots of talk about Kylie Minogue. Couldn't really relate a lot to his POV.

hard-line poptimism?

i bought it cause i heard it had some good writing on electronic music (kraftwerk, moroder, new order, human league etc)

Perhaps, he strikes me as someone who likes very specific things and gives thgem primacy way out of proportion with their place in the overall musical landscape. Also, the quirks and eccentricities of his writing tend to overshadow the subject matter.

ah that's interesting

i was planning to approach it not as informative nonfiction but as critical theory, maybe? but i guess i haven't enjoyed reading critical theory for a long time now

I could see all the odd stylistic stuff being some kind of pop music Deleuzian project, but it didn't really hit for me.

I'm curious about this Aesthetics of Rock one, not familiar with it.

honestly i just couldn't resist the cover

https://www.amazon.com/Aesthetics-Rock-Capo-Paperback/dp/0306802872

the Morley is more of a book-length ZTT sleevenote than analysis or critical theory

Any word on This is Memorial Device yet?

Borrowed a copy from the local library here in Glasgow recently. It is basically Bolano's Savage Detectives recast as an oral history of 'outsider' Scottish music in the early 1980s - as entertaining, and as limited, as that sounds. Too many of the voices start to sound like the author, but maybe that's the point. Keenan has good fun with made-up band names, albums, limited edition cassettes etc. It did made me want to visit Airdrie, which is quite an accomplishment in its own way.

It did made me want to visit Airdrie, which is quite an accomplishment in its own way.

:-O Please tell me you will not go to Airdrie.

I've been to Coatbridge - also featured in the book - I think I can handle Airdrie in the daytime (I asked a friend up here what Airdrie was like and he just said, "rough place"!)

“Shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize.”

Valerie Wilmer's ultra-essential jazz book As Serious As Your Life has been reissued.

Next question: what about this biography of Larry Norman, who I never heard of until I saw the book in the store

The great irony of Norman's career, Thornbury says, is that secular musicians like Bono and Pixies' Black Francis embraced his message, but the Church largely rejected it.

https://www.npr.org/2018/03/25/596450516/why-should-the-devil-have-all-the-good-music-larry-norman-s-battle-for-and-again

Not sure i want to read a whole book about the guy.

Have to admit the Black Francis blurb intrigued me.

464 pages lol

https://www.residentadvisor.net/news.aspx?id=41428

Viv Albertine has a new memoir out. Doesn't sound like it has much (if anything) to do with music this time around, but worthy of note based on her first book

Jessica Hopper has a new memoir out too, Night Moves -- haven't seen it, would read

The book I bought about Akron punk kinda sucks, not very well written
The new CAN book by Rob Young (and Irmin Schmidt) is GREAT so far but I haven't had much time to read it :(

psyched for the CAN book ...
just finished the Astral Weeks book that just came out (which covers a lot more ground than just van morrison). highly recommended.

Was wondering about that one.

What’s the Wire book Tom D was going on about on other thread?

the astral weeks book is really more of a history of late 60s counterculture in boston — lots of cool connections.

Oh Read & Burn

Do the Velvets make an appearance in that book, Tyler?

There's a long chapter about the Velvets, the Boston Tea Party, and Jonathan Richman in the Astral Weeks book. Lots of crazy stories.

Memphis writer Robert Gordon's latest Memphis Rent Party is a collection of old stuff and new stuff, and old stuff that never got published. I liked the readings he did from it in DC (about Furry Lewis, James Carr, Tav Falco and more) . He also showed rare video of Furry Lewis and of Mudboy & the Neutrons.

Just got an email this morning abouyt an oral history of SWANS coming out at the end of June
http://jawbonepress.com/swans-sacrifice-and-transcendence/

"Swans: Sacrifice And Transcendence
The Oral History
Nick Soulsby

Published June 26 2018
ISBN 9781911036395
6 x 8.5 in (150 x 215 mm)
336pp inc. 16pp photo insert
$22.95 / £14.95

‘I’m no stranger to failure, and I’m aware it can arrive at any minute—as it often has. You have to keep things close to your chest and be aware of what’s really important: the work, not everything around it. If you have faith in the work, then the people will come … it’s an artistic imperative, it has nothing to do with public perception or career or any of that crap.’

‘The name, Swans, it’s synonymous with who I am, but it’s how it’s achieved and it’s achieved by people—those people need to have total commitment to making this sound and to making it utterly incisive and uncompromising. The work is everything and it has to—at least at the time—appear, to me, to be stellar. That’s the prerequisite. It’s an intangible thing where it really speaks and has some truth within it.’
—Michael Gira

Over a span of some three and a half decades, Michael Gira’s Swans have risen from chaotic origins in the aftermath of New York’s No Wave scene to become one of the most acclaimed rock-orientated acts of recent years. The 1980s’ infamous ‘loudest band on the planet’ morphed repeatedly until collapsing exhausted, broken, and dispirited in the late 1990s.

Swans returned triumphantly in 2010 to top end-of-year polls and achieve feted status among fans and critics alike as the great survivors and latter-day statesmen of the underground scene. Throughout, Gira’s desire has remained to create music of such intensity that the listener might forget flesh, get rid of the body, exist as pure energy—transcendent—inside of the sound.

Through these pages, the musicians responsible tell the tale of one of the most significant bands of the US post-punk era. Drawing on more than 125 original interviews, Swans: Sacrifice And Transcendence is the ultimate companion to Swans and their work from the 1980s to the present day.

Nick Soulsby is the author of Thurston Moore: We Sing A New Language (2017), Cobain On Cobain: Interviews & Encounters (2016), I Found My Friends: The Oral History Of Nirvana (2015) and Dark Slivers: Seeing Nirvana In The Shards Of Incesticide (2012). In 2014 he curated the compilation No Seattle: Forgotten Sounds Of The North West Grunge Era 1986–1997 with Soul Jazz Records, and he also wrote the oral history of the band Fire Ants for the reissue of their 1993 EP Stripped."

Obvioulsy can't tell how good it is until I read it but looking forward to finding out.

Have started Rob Young's All Gates open which I'm enjoying. I didn't know much about the band members' early lives before. Young seems to have things centring on Irmin Schmidt with other members gradually being introduced.

& Daniel Spicer's Anadolu Psych which has had me listening to more music from the area. Just got the Finders keepers Ersen compi through the door today.

Yeah I'd like to read xp Robert Gordon's latest, posted about it and the album on Alex Chilton thread:

Robert Gordon, who wrote the thread-relevant It Came From Memphis, put together a listening companion of the same name, has now coughed up the book x album both titled Memphis Rent Party: Chilton shows up on a couple tracks, Jim Dickinson sings "I Want To Be A Hippie," (and some guy named Jerry Lee Lewis crashes the party)---tasty take here:https://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/freaky-roots-memphis-rent-party-reveals-hidden-charms/Content?oid=11838795

I read that post, thought "Robert Gordon? Isn't he dead?" then realized I was thinking of Robert Palmer.

I thumbed through that book yesterday, likely I'll wind up reading it. I had thought this was the rockabilly Robert Gordon, but turns out not.

Nope. This Robert Gordon's "It Came From Memphis" is a must read, plus he has a Stax book and movie docs too.

I have that It Came From Memphis CD, but I wasn't aware of the accompanying book. Will have to seek that out, too. Seems like he's taking the southern music baton from Stanley Booth?

Gordon's new one is great — and he adds plenty of supplemental context to the already-published articles (some of which is just as interesting). the stuff about James Carr is haunting.

Charles Hughes' Country Soul is also a must read

That Stubbs book Mars By 1980 sounds great. I don't know how I missed his 2009 book, Fear of Music: Why People Get Rothko But Don't Get Stockhausen. It's something I've thought about often.

"Modern art is a mass phenomenon. Conceptual artists like Damien Hirst enjoy celebrity status. Works by 20th century abstract artists like Mark Rothko are selling for record breaking sums, while the millions commanded by works by Andy Warhol and Francis Bacon make headline news. However, while the general public has no trouble embracing avant garde and experimental art, there is, by contrast, mass resistance to avant garde and experimental music, although both were born at the same time under similar circumstances - and despite the fact that from Schoenberg and Kandinsky onwards, musicians and artists have made repeated efforts to establish a "synaesthesia" between their two media. Fear of Music examines the parallel histories of modern art and modern music and examines why one is embraced and understood and the other ignored, derided or regarded with bewilderment, as noisy, random nonsense perpetrated by, and listened to by the inexplicably crazed. It draws on interviews and often highly amusing anecdotal evidence in order to find answers to the question: Why do people get Rothko and not Stockhausen?"

My theory has always been that just because some people say they get avant visual art, doesn't mean they actually understand it. It has more to do with money and status, there's always collectors with money who will buy whatever they think might rise in value, or give them status as they flaunt pieces at dinner parties or whatever. It has little to do with appreciation. There's no financial gain for pretending to understand or collecting avant garde music.

Finished the Can book, loved it.
http://fastnbulbous.com/rob-young-all-gates-open-the-story-of-can/