It’s cold and snowy outside. Holiday bills are coming due. You’re sick of friends and family. And you’ve already abandoned all your resolutions. Welcome to mid-January. There’s no better time to hunker down with a good book. Here are your latest options:
Magnum Opus: The Unbelievable 15-Year Saga of Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy
By James Greene Jr.
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “By 1993, Guns N’ Roses had hit practically every benchmark possible for a rock ’n’ roll band.Their eight-year journey had included an explosive and game-changing debut record, a self-indulgent but even more successful double album, a handful of raucous global tours, and various front-page controversies over their lyrics, band members’ drug addictions, and lead singer Axl Rose’s rattlesnake temper. The most captivating part of their story was just beginning, however. A 15-year saga was about to unfold over the creation of the group’s sixth studio album Chinese Democracy — a perverse and jaw-dropping tale that would come to involve not only a small nation of diverse musical talent but also figures from the world of pro sports, a multinational soft drink company, and the FBI. Cultural critics couldn’t agree if the resulting work was unprecedented genius or criminally mediocre. Magnum Opus: The Unbelievable 15-Year Saga Of Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy recounts in engaging depth and detail the long and often ludicrous road to the last mythic rock ’n’ roll album of the 20th century. Of course, Chinese Democracy was not released until well into the 21st century, and Magnum Opus assembles a thrilling narrative of the mishaps, detours, and near-death experiences that accompanied the long journey to its release. Combining outrageous facts and never-before-told stories from as many direct sources as possible, this is the definitive story of a famously troubled album that will allow rock die-hards to finally separate truth from fan lore and outright lies.”
Forever Young: The Music Of Neil Young As The Soundtrack Of My Life
By Constant Meijers
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “ ‘During a visit to his ranch in California in the mid-1970s, Neil asked if I was planning to write a book about him,’ recalls Constant Meijers. ‘I’m not ready to write a book about you,” I answered in all honesty. “Of course, I would like to, but I feel too much like a fan right now. Maybe later, when I have a little more distance to the subject.’ That distance has never really come, quite the contrary. Looking back after half a century, Neil’s autobiography — as told through his songs — never deviated far from mine. He is still with me, as I am still with him. Could it be that it was not me who chose him, but that he instead chose me? That my life and his music remain entwined for ever and ever? That is why this book is as much a story of Neil as it is the story of my own life, the life of an (almost) unconditional fan. When I began my career as a rock journalist in 1971, my first and foremost ambition was to interview my hero. Unfortunately, and I confess this right at the beginning, I never succeeded. In spite of my relentless efforts, we never actually sat down for a formal interview. But I never gave up trying, and Neil and I have had quite a few encounters over the last 50 years. Encounters that I meticulously entrusted to paper, not from an interviewer’s point of view, but rather as a fly on the wall.”
You’d Look Good On A Donkey: Britpop, Basslines & Bad(ish) Decisions
By Damon Minchella
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Founder of Ocean Colour Scene, long-time bass player for Paul Weller, and current partner-in-riff with Richard Ashcroft, Damon Minchella’s memoir is about music, madness and survival (*and saying “no” to joining Oasis). Think Keith Richards with fewer wrinkles, Patti Smith with more sarcasm, and a bassline that keeps the whole thing pulsing forward. In a musical life that has ricocheted between Paul McCartney and Jimmy Page, Diana Ross and Dr. John, The Who and Primal Scream, Minchella’s brushes with politics, art, dogs, fame and drugs are hilarious, terrifying and frequently ridiculous. From tiny pub gigs in Birmingham to the globe-conquering Oasis reunion tour, Damon has been there, seen it, and mostly done it all, picking up a PhD, two children, and inheriting another three along the way. Born and bred on Merseyside, he now lives in Italy.”
Search & Destroy: The Complete Archive
Edited by V. Vale, Cecily Chen, Mitch Anzuoni
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “From 1977 to 1979, Search & Destroy chronicled the birth of San Francisco’s punk scene with an intensity and vision that transformed music journalism. Now, for the first time, every issue of this seminal publication has been collected and meticulously restored in one definitive volume. Launched with a $100 loan from Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Search & Destroy was the nerve center of West Coast punk culture. V. Vale and his motley cast of contributors struck a new form of guerrilla journalism with an aesthetic and attitude that was as raw and uncompromising as the music itself. Search & Destroy: The Complete Archive captures the texture and tension of a scene in flux through stark photography, radical design, and unfiltered interviews with legends such as William S. Burroughs, Throbbing Gristle, Dead Kennedys, Suicide and Negative Trend. This collected edition also features retrospective writing on the legacy of Search & Destroy, its influence on design and culture, and Vale’s work as a publisher, researcher, and archivist.”
Rethinking Elvis
By Mark Duffett
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Decades after his passing, Elvis Presley remains one of popular music’s greatest icons. He was among the most successful, influential, socially significant, and controversial performers of the 20th century, with a celebrity so indelible that every recent American president has negotiated its orbit. While much of the coverage of Elvis’s life concerns his personal history and musical ability, Rethinking Elvis pushes beyond the familiar to address his branding, historical and geographic reception, heritage, and fan phenomenon. Using Elvis’s iconography as a point of departure, popular music scholars and historians contend with issues related to his whiteness, Southern identity, and gender, among others, in turn offering myriad opportunities to pursue new approaches in the emergent field of Elvis studies.”
33⅓: CCCP – Fedeli Alla Linea’s Affinità: Divergenze Fra Il Compagno Togliatti e Noi
By Giacomo Bottà
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “A squat in West Berlin, a farmhouse in Fellegara, a garret in Reggio Emilia, a cellar in Bologna — where is Affinità – Divergenze Fra Il Compagno Togliatti e Noi really from? This book traces the tangled geographies behind one of Italy’s most enigmatic records to ask: How do places shape music, and how does music make space? Giacomo Bottà explores the groundbreaking album by Italian band CCCP – Fedeli alla Linea, arguing that their aesthetic, musical and ideological approach embodies an ‘imaginary and affective territorialization’ caught between maximalism and minimalism. Through chapters that analyze the band’s origins, the album as an artifact and its deeper theoretical implications, the book explores CCCP’s ambiguous position, their unique sound and their lasting influence on Italian alternative music. Ultimately, this study reveals the band’s out-of-time and out-of-place nature, capturing their controversial yet pioneering role in shaping creative identities across Europe.”
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source tinnitist.com ’
