Finished this last night. Very enjoyable.
What's the LATEST Book You've Read? MUSIC-RELATED ONLY!
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jefe1
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
Reading Thanks a Lot Mr Kibblewhite by Roger Daltrey
Very enjoyable so far
Very enjoyable so far
Enjoyed this a lot. Seems pretty humble, great sense of humor and a fantastic story.
Ebondazzar
New member
"How Music Got Free" by Stephen Witt.
Subtitled The End of an Industry, the Turn of the Century, and the Patient Zero of Piracy it tells the story of the invention (and the inventers) of the mp3-format and the beginning of music piracy. The author did a great job on research and was even able to track down the guy who startet the music piracy. It´s a documentation but written in the style of a novel. Just finished reading it for the second time.
Subtitled The End of an Industry, the Turn of the Century, and the Patient Zero of Piracy it tells the story of the invention (and the inventers) of the mp3-format and the beginning of music piracy. The author did a great job on research and was even able to track down the guy who startet the music piracy. It´s a documentation but written in the style of a novel. Just finished reading it for the second time.
M-K
300 Club - QQ All-Star
The Beatles - Get Back.
I had read a bio of Mozart last year and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was hoping for something similar here.
With great effort, I made it through the Forward and Chapter 1. Not sure I’ll go much further.
The 5- and 4-star Amazon reviews are dominant, so I didn’t pay much attention to the lesser reviews. Turns out I agree with them. This is a dry book.
Reminded me a bit of school history books that gave you the facts and a skeleton to hang those facts on, but no effort to actually make the story of those facts enjoyable.
With great effort, I made it through the Forward and Chapter 1. Not sure I’ll go much further.
The 5- and 4-star Amazon reviews are dominant, so I didn’t pay much attention to the lesser reviews. Turns out I agree with them. This is a dry book.
Reminded me a bit of school history books that gave you the facts and a skeleton to hang those facts on, but no effort to actually make the story of those facts enjoyable.
kap'n krunch
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
well, I guess this would be the correct thread for this one....
I already have the 1st edition, which was about $65 back in the late 80s when I was studying MP&E at Berklee and it was one of the "Bibles" to get and study, but it's still in Madrid so I found a 4th edition for about $20 in fleabay and I jumped at it...this one has some extra Surround info which is quite helpful and it makes for obligatory reading and reference....
I already have the 1st edition, which was about $65 back in the late 80s when I was studying MP&E at Berklee and it was one of the "Bibles" to get and study, but it's still in Madrid so I found a 4th edition for about $20 in fleabay and I jumped at it...this one has some extra Surround info which is quite helpful and it makes for obligatory reading and reference....
Springer Verlag is a very fancy cherman publisher. Lotsa medical and scientific titles.
A very enjoyable read. I'm so used to reading books by/about musicians who got their start in the 60's or 70's. It's interesting to read something by someone whose career got into full swing in the 90's. It was certainly a different industry at that time. And Ben is very entertaining, which is no surprise.
kap'n krunch
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
yeah, I noticed it was not the same publishing house than the 1st edition...
It's all connected... Music, health....
Springer Verlag is a very fancy cherman publisher.
More likely springer bought the previous one. or they both were consolidated by someone else.
Neil Peart Ghost Rider Travels On The Healing Road. It arrived last year on the day a loved one died. I did not pick it up to read for 9 months.
Its a fine read
Its a fine read
Art Pepper-Straight Life. What a harrowing tale of drug abuse leading to years of jail time, not to mention his sexual escapades. Not for the faint of heart! He does share some decent musical escapades as well, which were interesting.
jhw59
400 Club - QQ All-Star
Leon Russell: Master of Space and time... Extremely well researched and a great read so far. Leon was a monster musician.
kap'n krunch
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
has anyone bought
Alan Parsons Art & Science of Sound Recording Book???
I have the book Biography of a Phantom: A Robert Johnson Blues Odyssey on my Amazon wishlist. Just came out this week.
Today I read something that was just as interesting as this book might be... the making of it.
The first article is from Ted Gioia:
https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/a-scandal-is-taking-place-in-american
In that article talking about the controversy around the book (have we had the wrong Robert Johnson all these years, and the author’s mental health issues that might have affected his writing), he points to this article:
https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/mack-mccormick-quest-to-find-real-robert-johnson/
Both articles are worth a read.
Today I read something that was just as interesting as this book might be... the making of it.
The first article is from Ted Gioia:
https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/a-scandal-is-taking-place-in-american
In that article talking about the controversy around the book (have we had the wrong Robert Johnson all these years, and the author’s mental health issues that might have affected his writing), he points to this article:
https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/mack-mccormick-quest-to-find-real-robert-johnson/
Both articles are worth a read.
Alex Pappademas (text) and Joan LeMay (illustrations), Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and Other Sole Survivors from the Songs of Steely Dan (University of Texas Press, 2023--part of their American Music Series).
I'm just gobsmacked by this. It may not be everybody's thing, but I've got a weakness for music writing that blends speculative non-fiction, cultural studies, and personal essay. This is the smartest, most simpatico writing about Steely Dan I've ever read. If you want to get a taste of Pappademas's style and approach, start with his reconsideration of Gaucho for Pitchfork back in 2019. Then check out two adapted book chapters in the LA Times and Rolling Stone.
It's technically not out till May 23d, but you can actually get it right now from the publisher's website for 40% off (ebook: 50% off) with code UTXSUMMER through July 31. I'm planning to grab some other titles--on Merle Haggard, Los Lobos, A Tribe Called Quest, and Black country music--from the series while the sale is on.
https://utpress.utexas.edu/9781477324998/
I'm just gobsmacked by this. It may not be everybody's thing, but I've got a weakness for music writing that blends speculative non-fiction, cultural studies, and personal essay. This is the smartest, most simpatico writing about Steely Dan I've ever read. If you want to get a taste of Pappademas's style and approach, start with his reconsideration of Gaucho for Pitchfork back in 2019. Then check out two adapted book chapters in the LA Times and Rolling Stone.
It's technically not out till May 23d, but you can actually get it right now from the publisher's website for 40% off (ebook: 50% off) with code UTXSUMMER through July 31. I'm planning to grab some other titles--on Merle Haggard, Los Lobos, A Tribe Called Quest, and Black country music--from the series while the sale is on.
https://utpress.utexas.edu/9781477324998/
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Don and Jeff Breithaupt, Precious and Few: Pop Music in the Early '70s (Macmillan/St. Martin's Griffin, 1996). I like the Breithaupt Brothers, both as writers and musicians: Don has helmed the crack jazz-rock band Monkey House for a couple of decades now (you can get the jaw-dropping Atmos mix of their latest, Remember the Audio, at IAA.com) and he also penned the volume on Aja--some of the best Steely Dan writing ever--for Bloomsbury's 33-1/3 series. I was a little disappointed with this book, though: it surveys 70s radio hits in thirty-plus breezy, three-to-five-page, topical chapters (e.g., "Bubblegum," "Utopian Pop," "Feminist Pop," "Macho Soul," "Self-Pity Pop," "Story Songs")--extended listicles, really--and the format ends up fostering more glib pronouncements than illuminating analysis. The bros love 70s music, and they clearly meant the book as a kind of "reclamation," but their penchant for tongue-in-cheek snark and smart-alecky punning is often at cross-purposes with their program. I suspect that if they were to re-write the book now, in "poptimism's" wake, they might soften some of the jokey superciliousness--towards bubblegum, country, disco, even prog--that was so deeply ingrained among a certain breed of music fan of their/my generation. Still worth seeking out. And to be fair: I think it would probably work better in short bursts, as bathroom reading, maybe. If you grew up in the 70s, it'll definitely get you recalling all kinds of tunes (like the title song, by Climax, the first 45 rpm single I ever bought with my own money) that you used to love--and hate. They also did a companion volume on the late 70s that I haven't read.
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Kelefa Sanneh, Major Labels: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres (Penguin, 2021). Sanneh, who started his musical life as a punk fanatic, branched out to hip-hop and dance--and eventually to pretty much everything else. (These days, he's a big, unapologetic country fan.) His first notable gig as a music writer was at The Source; the New York Times hired him as a music critic before The New Yorker lured him away; he's been writing both short- and long-form pieces there since 2008. He's got big, sympathetic ears, and he's a stylish writer who knows how to tell a good story. His chapter on dance music (for the record, the other six genres are: rock, R & B, country, punk, hip-hop, and pop) was a revelation to me--and a timely one, given all of the Nile Rodgers material that Steven Wilson has put his hands on recently.
Highly recommended; now out in paper. Excerpt available here:
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/576360/major-labels-by-kelefa-sanneh/
Highly recommended; now out in paper. Excerpt available here:
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/576360/major-labels-by-kelefa-sanneh/
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EdwardMatthew
Member
The Sound of the City : The Rise of Rock and Roll by Charlie Gillett.
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