Music reviews and criticism Books

A unique, moving and dazzlingly researched exploration of the places, people, musicians, writers and filmmakers that inspired David Jones to become David Bowie, what we can learn from his life’s work and journey, and why he will always matter. When...

Set against the backdrop of Jim Crow, Night Train to Nashville takes readers behind the curtain of one of music's greatest untold stories during the era of segregation and Civil Rights.In another time and place, E. Gab Blackman and William Sousa "Sou"...

One of the music world’s pre-eminent critics takes a fresh and much-needed look at the day Dylan “went electric” at the Newport Folk Festival, timed to coincide with the event’s fiftieth anniversary.On the evening of July 25, 1965, Bob Dylan took the...

The first full-length history of rock journalism in AustraliaFor over fifty years, Australia has maintained its own rock press - a vibrant, passionate, sometimes volatile industry of dozens of papers and magazines committed to the coverage of the...

Irreverent, cultishly adored, and dearly missed, the music writers at cokemachineglow produced some of the greatest, weirdest, funniest, sharpest criticism of the 21st century, and have gone on to write for major publications.In that sweet...

Guiding us on this colorful book-length journey is one of the men who introduced reggae to America and helped rock the world with its syncopated beat, Roger Steffens. Through lectures, books, magazine articles, radio, and television, Steffens has shared...

Today, Metallica are known as consummate musicians, but it wasn't always that way. Their early career is marked by a gradual evolution from garage thrash to sophisticated, progressive heights an evolution driven by their bass player, Cliff Burton, who...

The best-known songs in the world are violent, sexist, and religious - so why do we celebrate national anthems when we should be rewriting them?The story begins in a London theatre in 1745, where the modern idea of anthems started out as triumphant...

THE STORIES BEHIND EVERY STUDIO TRACK FROM THE ONLY BAND THAT MATTERS.Established in 1976 at the fore London's punk rock insurgence, The Clash would outlast their peers while creating some of the most influential albums in rock 'n' roll history. Author...

Live at the Safari Club: A People's History of HarDCore is the uncensored oral history of a notorious underground punk venue in the nation's capital, told by the bands, fans, zinesters, promoters, graffiti artists, scenesters, senators' kids and...

Jessica Hopper's music criticism has earned her a reputation as a firebrand, a keen observer and fearless critic not just of music but the culture around it. With this volume spanning from her punk fanzine roots to her landmark piece on R. Kelly's...

Claude Debussy's Paris was factionalized, politicized, and litigious. It was against this background of ferment and change--which characterized French society and music from the Franco-Prussian War to World War I--that Debussy re-thought music. This book...

Drawing on a range of sources and fields, the rich life story of this polymathic composer.This groundbreaking biography offers fresh perspectives on the life, ideas, and music of French twentieth-century composer, organist, and ornithologist Olivier...

A critic's notebook on sparkle and spectacle. An Atlantic Edition, featuring long-form journalism byAtlanticwriters, drawn from contemporary articles or classic storytelling from the magazine's 165-year archive.A collection of essays on musicians,...

Like her much-loved heroine Emma Woodhouse, Jane Austen 'played and sang'. Music occupied a central role in her life, and she made brilliant use of it in her books to illuminate characters' personalities and highlight the contrasts between them.Until...

The White Stripes Complete Lyrics is a deluxe new 300+ page hardbound book documenting all of Jack White's original words written for the 6x Grammy Award-winning duo he and Meg White formed in 1997 through the release of their final album in 2007. The...

How the creative use of pop music in film-think Saturday Night Fever or Apocalypse Now-has shaped and shifted music history since the 1960s Quick: What movie do you think of when you hear "The Sounds of Silence"? Better yet, what song comes to mind when...

A Grateful Dead concert, Ray Robertson argues, is life.Like life, it can be alternately compelling and lackluster; familiar and foreign; occasionally sublime and sometimes insipid. Although the Grateful Dead stopped the day Jerry Garcia's heart did, what...

In 1906, Denver's Pietro Satriano and his 25-piece brass band became the first musical act to perform at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, then christened the Garden of the Titans. Over a century later, Denver is a must-stop for every nationally touring act, and...

Of the many Cold War radio DJs who broadcast to the USSR, Seva Novgorodsev must be near the top of the list. A masterful BBC presenter, Seva was considered a sage of rock 'n' roll. His programs introduced forbidden western popular music and culture into...

In extensive interviews with scene pioneers and mainstays including Chris Carrabba (Dashboard Confessional), Geoff Rickly (Thursday), Frank Iero (My Chemical Romance), Gabe Saporta (Midtown/Cobra Starship), and Max Bemis (Say Anything), veteran music...

Johnny Thunders: In Cold Blood is the definitive portrait of the condemned man of rock'n'roll, from the baptism of fire and tragedy that was the New York Dolls, through the junkie punk years of the Heartbreakers, to his sudden and mysterious death in...

On February 25, 1963, Columbia Records released The Barbra Streisand Album. The first song was "Cry Me a River," and with that a star was born. Barbra Joan Streisand had a zany personality backed by a talent that Stephen Sondheim once described as "one...

Are you obsessed with John Carpenter's iconic music for the Halloween series? Do you thrill to the unforgettable stabs of the Psycho score, or the pounding synth of Goblin's soundtrack to Suspiria? Do you find yourself being pulled into...

'Weird Al' Yankovic is one of music's most beloved figures. A skilled accordion player and songwriter, the California native is known for his meticulous parodies of popular songs, hilarious originals, and, of course, for upbeat polkas!For much of Al's...

An examination of NASA's Golden Record that offers new perspectives and theories on how music can be analysed, listened to, and thought about - by aliens and humans alike.In 1977 NASA shot a mixtape into outer space. The Golden Record aboard the...

A handwritten serial number inside a neglected Broadwood square piano built in 1807 launches a captivating quest to uncover the remarkable history of these now almost forgotten musical instruments.

Becoming Elektra tells the incredible true story of the pioneering Elektra Records label and its farsighted founder, Jac Holzman, who built a small folk imprint into a home for some of the most groundbreaking, important, and enduring music of the rock...

Now Is the Time to Invent offers a definitive portrait of the vibrant indie-rock scene that flourished in the mid-1980s and reached its creative peak in the 1990s. More than 60 profiles and interviews, taken from the pages of the acclaimed independent...

A new narrative for the emergence of human music, drawing from archaeology, cognitive science, linguistics, and evolutionary theory.What is the origin of music? In the last few decades this centuries-old puzzle has been reinvigorated by new...

Let legendary rock manager Simon Napier-Bell take you inside the (dodgy) world of popular music - not just a creative industry, but a business that has made people rich beyond their wildest dreams.This book describes the evolution of the music industry...

How have a group conceived as a shortlived commodity outlived so many of their contemporaries? Why are The Monkees still important, and what does this tell us about their music, their TV show, and our understanding of popular culture today?Despite being...

A guide to the music and multifaceted career of Canadian artists and songwriters Tegan and Sara.Through interviews with Tegan and Sara, their collaborators, journalists, and fans, this book explores the multifaceted career of one of music's most...

The 90s live on in this edgy offstage glimpse of the indie musical artists that shaped a decade.The music of the 1990s shaped more than one generation. It was the music Generation X came of age listening to and the songs millennials cut their teeth on...

Similar to how songs become familiar and welcoming earworms, these essays will imprint themselves on readers' minds.A Mind Full of Music contemplates and celebrates the mysterious, powerful, dynamic relationship between ourselves and the songs we love:...

Was John Lennon meeting Paul McCartney more significant than John Lennon meeting Yoko Ono? Rubber Soul or Revolver? Which Wings album was Paul McCartney's solo pinnacle?In 100 brief chapters, John M. Borack discusses and ranks the greatest...

Whether they're self-taught bashers or technical wizards, drummers are the thrashing, crashing heart of our favorite punk bands. In Forbidden Beat, some of today's most respected writers and musicians explore the history of punk percussion with personal...

Life in the Stocks: Veracious conversations with musicians & creatives is a collection of rock 'n' roll stories taken from the iTunes chart-topping podcast, Life in the Stocks-hosted by UK-based DJ, presenter, and writer, Matt Stocks (Ex-Kerrang!...

Featuring a foreword from legendary director Martin Scorcese, Woodstock: Interviews and Recollections combines stories, anecdotes, and perspectives from dozens of musicians and filmmakers about the making of the Academy Award-winning documentary...

"Womack and Kruppa present a thorough history of Harrison and Clapton's songmaking and recording sessions." -BooklistNewly revised and expanded, this paperback edition featuresexclusive material from the Malcolm Frederick Evans archives and draws on rare...

The Beatles Finally Let It Be includes the January 1969 rehearsals and recording sessions; the unreleased "Get Back" albums; "Let It Be" and "Let It Be...Naked;" along with American; British and Canadian perspectives. This volume also includes a detailed...

Few music groups have been able to sustain a fan base as passionate and dedicated as that of Pearl Jam, and this entertaining guide rewards those fans with everything they need to know about the band in a one-of-a-kind format. Packed with history,...

In the early 1990s, Swedish death metal revolutionized the international music scene. Suddenly, the mild-mannered Scandinavian country found itself at the forefront of a new movement with worldwide impact thanks to bands such as Entombed, Dismember, and...

When he first started working on Pet Sounds, Brian Wilson said that he was going to write the greatest rock album ever made. That album, released in 1966, fifty years ago, changed the face of popular music. From conception and composition to arrangement...

Part civic history and part memoir from this veteran scene-builder and co-founder of the acclaimed Wavelength concert series, Any Night of the Week charts the evolution of Toronto's diverse independent music scene in the latter half of the nineteenth...

Throughout the 1990s, Prince feuded with his record label, Warner Bros., over his rights as an independent recording artist--and made some of the most brilliant music of his career. During that time, Jim Walsh covered Prince for the St. Paul Pioneer...

A must-have for any guitar lover!This book introduces the reader to 250 guitars of all types from the early acoustic archtop designs of the Gibson L-5 in the last 1920s, through the National resonators of the 1930s, the hollow body electric Gibsons of...

An outstanding anthology in which notable musicians, artists, scientists, thinkers, poets, and more- from Gustavo Dudamel and Carrie Mae Weems to Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Paul Muldoon-explore the influence of music on their lives and workWhat happens when...