Tom Waits, Cheap Trick, David Bowie and Buddy Emmons get written up, Duran Duran are in focus, hip-hoppers share life lessons and plenty more: Welcome to the fall book season.
Song Noir: Tom Waits and the Spirit of Los Angeles
By Alex Harvey
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Song Noir examines the formative first decade of Tom Waits’ career, when he lived, wrote, and recorded nine albums in Los Angeles: From his soft, folk-inflected debut Closing Time in 1973 to the abrasive, surreal Swordfishtrombones in 1983. Starting his songwriting career in the ’70s, Waits absorbed L.A.’s wealth of cultural influences. Combining the spoken idioms of writers like Kerouac and Bukowski with jazz-blues rhythms, he explored the city’s literary and film noir traditions to create hallucinatory dreamscapes. Waits mined a rich seam of the city’s low-life locations and characters, letting the place feed his dark imagination. Mixing the domestic with the mythic, Waits turned quotidian, autobiographical details into something more disturbing and emblematic, a vision of Los Angeles as the warped, narcotic heart of his nocturnal explorations.”
This Band Has No Past: How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick
By Brian J. Kramp
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “ ‘This band has no past’ was the first line of the farcical biography printed on the inner sleeve of Cheap Trick’s first album, but the band, of course, did have a past — a past that straddles two very different decades: from the tumult of the ’60s to the anticlimax of the ’70s, from the British Invasion to the record industry renaissance, with the band’s debut album arriving in 1977, the year vinyl sales peaked. This Band Has No Past tells the story of a bar band from the Midwest — the best and weirdest bar band in the Midwest — and how they doggedly pursued a most unlikely career in rock ’n’ roll. It traces every gnarly limb of the family tree of bands that culminated in Cheap Trick, then details how this unlikely foursome paid their dues — with interest — night after night, slogging it out everywhere from high schools to bars to bowling alleys to fans’ back yards, before signing to Epic Records and releasing two brilliant albums six months apart. Drawing on more than 80 original interviews, This Band Has No Past is packed full of new insights and information that fans of the band will devour. How was the Cheap Trick logo created? How did the checkerboard pattern come to be associated with the band? When did Rick Nielsen start wearing a ballcap 24/7? Who caught their mom and dad rolling on the couch? What kind of beer did David Bowie drink? And when might characters like Chuck Berry, Frank Zappa, Don Johnson, Otis Redding, Eddie Munster, Kim Fowley, John Belushi, Jim Belushi, Elvis Presley, Leslie West, Groucho Marx, Robert F. Kennedy, Patti Smith, Andy Warhol, Lou Reed, The Coneheads, Tom Petty, Harvey Weinstein, Michael Mann, Linda Blair, Eddie Van Halen, Elvis Costello, Matt Dillon and Pam Grier turn up? Read on and find out.”
Bowie at 75
By Martin Popoff
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “In Bowie at 75, veteran rock journalist Martin Popoff guides you through all of David Bowie’s 27 studio albums, as well as a curated selection of earworm singles. From his eponymous 1967 debut LP and ending with Blackstar, released just two days before his death, Bowie is regarded as one of the most influential musicians and performers of the previous five decades, during which he constantly redefined himself. In examining 75 touchstones, Popoff gives you a unique view of Bowie’s career arc from folkie to the breakthrough single Space Oddity to his flamboyant glam-rock alter ego Ziggy Stardust and beyond. Illustrated with live concert and candid offstage photography as well as memorabilia including gig posters, single picture sleeves and more, this incredible package also includes a gatefold Bowie timeline, a gatefold painting depicting A Party of Bowies, a previously unpublished 8×10 glossy print, and a pullout by famed gig poster artist Frank Kozik. The result is a stunning tribute to one of the most influential and admired stars in rock history — in a milestone year.”
Duran Duran: Careless Memories
By Denis O’Regan
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “With chart hits charts like Girls on Film, Hungry Like The Wolf, Rio and The Reflex — accompanied by their pioneering music videos — Duran Duran cemented their place as indisputable icons of the ’80s New Romantic music scene. Having sold over 100 million records, they continue to be one of the U.K.’s most popular bands. Eternally evolving, always innovating, their fanbase spans the globe. Containing hundreds of exquisitely restored photographs taken mostly during the North American and Japanese legs of the band’s record-breaking 1984 Sing Blue Silver tour, Careless Memories provides an unparalleled visual history of Duran Duran’s ascent to the top, with commentary from the band members themselves. Denis O’Regan joined the band in France, where they were filming their New Moon On Monday video, and stayed with them until the end of the tour. His unprecedented access to the band gives the Careless Memories book an insight into the lives of Simon, Nick, John, Roger and Andy as they won hearts around the world. It documents the excitement of the shows and the hysteria and mayhem that surrounded them. For Duran Duran fans, Careless Memories is a 224-page backstage pass that captures the band at the peak of their powers and their fame.”
Natkin: The Moment of Truth
By Paul Natkin
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Every photographer knows the moment of truth, and every picture tells a story. Over the past four decades, Paul Natkin has had a front-row seat for music history, attending over 10,000 shows and concerts to chronicle the excitement and excess of the music industry. Since the 1970s, he has photographed most of the major music stars of the last half of the 20th century, shooting album covers for Ozzy Osbourne and Johnny Winter and countless magazine covers. The Moment of Truth is Natkin’s documentary as a witness to the music industry during his illustrious 40-plus years as a photographer and fan.”
Diary of a Rock and Roll Tour Manager: 2,190 Days and Nights with the South’s Premier Rock Band
By Willie Perkins
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Diary Of A Rock And Roll Tour Manager chronicles the triumphs and tragedies of the day-to-day touring of The Allman Brothers Band from 1970 to 1976, detailing their rise from obscurity to the absolute pinnacle of rock super stardom. Tour manager Willie Perkins shepherded the band from their lowly beginnings in smoke-filled bars to six-figure payoffs before hundreds of thousands of fans in outdoor venues. He was there for the tragic, untimely accidental deaths of both Duane Allman and Berry Oakley, the ugliness of drug and alcohol abuse, and the love for the music and true brother and sisterhood among band, crew, management, and family members. Here, Perkins writes in detail about the efforts involved in the touring and recording career of The Allman Brothers Band in their early and most productive years. He introduces the reader to some of the colorful promoters who produced the concerts and the interesting historical venues where they performed, many of which no longer exist.”
Buddy Emmons: Steel Guitar Icon
By Steve Fishell
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The acknowledged maestro of the pedal steel guitar, Buddy Emmons lent his unparalleled virtuosity to over five decades of hit recordings and set standards that remain the benchmark for musicians today. Steve Fishell’s merger of biography and memoir draws extensively on in-depth interviews with Emmons and the artist’s autobiographical writings. Emmons went from playing strip clubs to a Grand Ole Opry debut with Little Jimmy Dickens at age 18. His restless experimentation led to work with Ernest Tubb and Ray Price — and established him in a career that saw him play alongside a who’s who of American music. Fishell weaves in stories and anecdotes from Willie Nelson, Brenda Lee, Linda Ronstadt, Pat Martino and many others to provide a fascinating musical and personal portrait of an innovator whose peerless playing and countless recordings recognized no boundaries. A one-of-a-kind life story, Buddy Emmons: Steel Guitar Icon expands our view of a groundbreaking artist and his impact on country music, jazz, and beyond.”
Drumsville!: The Evolution of the New Orleans Beat
By Robert Cataliotti
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Drumsville! The Evolution of the New Orleans Beat traces the history of drums and drumming in the Crescent City, exploring more than three centuries of the instrument and the art form that transformed New Orleans into the musical powerhouse it is today. Created as a companion to the New Orleans Jazz Museum exhibit of the same name, Drumsville! examines the drummer’s role in the evolution of brass bands, Black masking Indians, traditional and modern jazz, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and funk.”
Extreme Music: From Silence to Noise and Everything In between
By Michael Tau
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Expand your aural and sensory experiences with Extreme Music, an exploration of tomorrow’s sounds (and silences) today. Michael Tau had spent years obsessed by the extremes of musical expression. Extreme Music: Silence to Noise and Everything In Between is the culmination of decades of research into the sounds (and silences) that comprise the outer limits and conceptual expressions that stretch the definition of music. Tau defines and categorizes these recorded sounds into sections that allow fans and newcomers to explore the fascinating world of musicians who defy convention. He explores a wide range of extremes including volume, speed, and vulgarity to packaging, recording methods, unplayable media, outdated technologies, and digital pioneers. He asks and answers the questions: Are all sounds music? Is silence music? Is a plate of rotting food once cataloged, packaged and sold by a distributor qualify as music? Extreme Music includes over 100 interviews with makers and musicians as Tau uses his background in psychiatry to help readers understand what motivates people to create and listen to non-mainstream music. As a fan of multiple avant-garde musical genres, Tau uncovers the pleasures (and sometimes pain and frustration) found at the outer fringes of music. Extreme Music is the ideal guide for curious seekers, die-hard fans, and cultural investigators. Features images and curated links to samples of music.”
A Kiss Across the Ocean: Transatlantic Intimacies of British Post-Punk and U.S. Latinidad
By Richard T. Rodríguez
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “In A Kiss Across The Ocean, Richard T. Rodríguez examines the relationship between British post-punk musicians and their Latinx audiences in the United States since the 1980s. Melding memoir with cultural criticism, Rodríguez spotlights a host of influential bands and performers including Siouxsie and the Banshees, Adam Ant, Bauhaus, Soft Cell, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Pet Shop Boys. He recounts these bands’ importance for him and other Latinx kids and discusses their frequent identification with these bands’ glamorous performance of difference. Whether it was Siouxsie Sioux drawing inspiration from Latinx contemporaries and cultural practices or how Soft Cell singer Marc Almond’s lyrics were attuned to the vibrancy of queer Latinidad, Rodríguez shows how Latinx culture helped shape British post-punk. He traces the fandom networks that link these groups across space and time to illuminate how popular music establishes and facilitates intimate relations across the Atlantic. In so doing, he demonstrates how the music and styles that have come to define the 1980s hold significant sway on younger generations equally enthused by their matchlessly pleasurable and political reverberations.”
Life Lessons from Hip-Hop: 50 Reflections on Creativity, Motivation and Wellbeing
By Grant Brydon
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Respected journalist Grant Brydon has interviewed some of the biggest names in hip-hop, from J. Cole to Pharrell Williams. In Life Lessons From Hip-Hop, Grant fuses music journalism and self-help, digging into his archive of interviews from the past decade — as well as exclusive new interviews with the likes of Joey Bada$$, Dreezy, Baby Tate, Wiki and more — to reflect on the things that some of the most creative and successful artists of our generation have imparted on him about how to live a more fulfilling life. With chapters covering motivation, creativity, authenticity, reinvention, mental wellbeing and more, the words shared by these influential thinkers will help readers take on their own challenges and inspire simple changes that have major positive consequences.
