Whatcha reading?

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iso74
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by iso74 »

Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 9:29am

Way more book on the Sex Pistols than The Clash. Not bad for a band that released one and a half albums.
Are many of them very good, though? When I say well-chronicled I mean good books by good music writers. There's loads of books about Elvis, but very, very few of them are any good. What Clash books would you recommend?

Marky Dread
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Marky Dread »

iso74 wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 10:05am
Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 9:29am

Way more book on the Sex Pistols than The Clash. Not bad for a band that released one and a half albums.
Are many of them very good, though? When I say well-chronicled I mean good books by good music writers. There's loads of books about Elvis, but very, very few of them are any good. What Clash books would you recommend?
The Clash:
Marcus Gray - Route 19 Revisited
Marcus Gray - Last Gang in Town
Pat Gilbert - Passion Is a Fashion
Clash City Showdown - Chris Knowles
We Are The Clash - Mark Andersen/Ralph Hebutzki

Sex Pistols:
John Lydon - No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs
Steve Jones - Lonely Boy
Glen Matlock - I Was a Teenage Sex Pistol
Alan Parker - Sid Vicious No One Is Innocent

Further reading:
John Savage - England's Dreaming
Clinton Heylin - Anarchy in the Year Zero
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No fuchsias for you.

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iso74
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by iso74 »

Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 10:45am
iso74 wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 10:05am
Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 9:29am

Way more book on the Sex Pistols than The Clash. Not bad for a band that released one and a half albums.
Are many of them very good, though? When I say well-chronicled I mean good books by good music writers. There's loads of books about Elvis, but very, very few of them are any good. What Clash books would you recommend?
The Clash:
Marcus Gray - Route 19 Revisited
Marcus Gray - Last Gang in Town
Pat Gilbert - Passion Is a Fashion
Clash City Showdown - Chris Knowles
We Are The Clash - Mark Andersen/Ralph Hebutzki

Sex Pistols:
John Lydon - No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs
Steve Jones - Lonely Boy
Glen Matlock - I Was a Teenage Sex Pistol
Alan Parker - Sid Vicious No One Is Innocent

Further reading:
John Savage - England's Dreaming
Clinton Heylin - Anarchy in the Year Zero
Yeah, the Pat Gilbert book was good, like a mammoth Mojo Special Edition. I prefer Clinton Heylin to Jon Savage. "England's Dreaming" is legendary, but does it have much on the Clash? At 600 pages I thought you might need to be a hardcore Pistols fan to get through it. The Clash is the only punk band i'm really into, although I enjoy watching Punk documentaries in general.

I was wondering about the Marcus Gray books, they've got some bad reviews on Amazon. People seem to be pretty narked, saying he's negative, but I want critical comment, even on my heroes. I was also wondering about the books by Quantick and Du Noyer and some of those track-by-track books?

Kory
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Kory »

iso74 wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 11:13am
Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 10:45am
iso74 wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 10:05am
Marky Dread wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 9:29am

Way more book on the Sex Pistols than The Clash. Not bad for a band that released one and a half albums.
Are many of them very good, though? When I say well-chronicled I mean good books by good music writers. There's loads of books about Elvis, but very, very few of them are any good. What Clash books would you recommend?
The Clash:
Marcus Gray - Route 19 Revisited
Marcus Gray - Last Gang in Town
Pat Gilbert - Passion Is a Fashion
Clash City Showdown - Chris Knowles
We Are The Clash - Mark Andersen/Ralph Hebutzki

Sex Pistols:
John Lydon - No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs
Steve Jones - Lonely Boy
Glen Matlock - I Was a Teenage Sex Pistol
Alan Parker - Sid Vicious No One Is Innocent

Further reading:
John Savage - England's Dreaming
Clinton Heylin - Anarchy in the Year Zero
Yeah, the Pat Gilbert book was good, like a mammoth Mojo Special Edition. I prefer Clinton Heylin to Jon Savage. "England's Dreaming" is legendary, but does it have much on the Clash? At 600 pages I thought you might need to be a hardcore Pistols fan to get through it. The Clash is the only punk band i'm really into, although I enjoy watching Punk documentaries in general.

I was wondering about the Marcus Gray books, they've got some bad reviews on Amazon. People seem to be pretty narked, saying he's negative, but I want critical comment, even on my heroes. I was also wondering about the books by Quantick and Du Noyer and some of those track-by-track books?
The Savage book does have a lot on the Clash. I was satisfied as a big Clash fan when I first read it, but it's also much deeper than that, covering Situationism as a prime "influence" on punk via McLaren, and later goes on to detail a lot of lesser bands as well. So it's quite extensive.

Marcus Gray is pretty hard on the band in LGIT (or RoLGIT), but it's balanced by a lot of info, and a lot of his criticism is directed at their self-mythology, so the information he offers instead is pretty valuable. The Route 19 book is a lot more gentle, and both are great.
"Suck our Earth dick, Martians!" —Doc

iso74
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by iso74 »

Thanks, I did want to get one of the Marcus Gray books. Criticism is an essential part of the Clash story, I don't see how you can write a proper history and leave it out. You have to deal with what others thought about them. They're not a band where you can write just about the music without any context.

I'll have a crack at "England's Dreaming" as well. Some serious music books and major biographies of musicians are hard slogs. Even during lockdown I gave up halfway through Mark Lewisohn's book on The Beatles, "All These Years". After 800 pages it's only 1963. 1700 pages if it's the Extended Special Edition! I'm not a fan of The Byrds, but even if I was I bet I wouldn't enjoy Johnny Rogan's two door stoppers. Not if his book on The Smiths is anything to go by.

Low Down Low
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Low Down Low »

I love Marcus London Calling book, it's a labour of love, jam packed with detail and gives one of the great albums the treatment it deserves imo. I think LGIT is an essential read for Clash fans, but it's the weaker of the two i think. Shame for Clash fans we never got any autobiographies or memoirs, unless you want to count the pink book. I'm still hoping topper might redress that gap, because Mick or Paul definitely don't seem interested. How much would topper remember of those critical years, though? That's a question.

I'd agree re Johnny Rogan. Read his much hyped book on Van Morrison and it was a major let down. Clinton Heylin a much more accomplished music writer in my estimation.

Marky Dread
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Marky Dread »

I don't deny Savage is a good writer. But he's also comes across as a snob to me. Yes he was part of the scene but I'll take Heylin any day.
Image

Forces have been looting
My humanity
Curfews have been curbing
The end of liberty


We're the flowers in the dustbin...
No fuchsias for you.

"Without the common people you're nothing"

Nos Sumus Una Familia

iso74
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by iso74 »

Last night I was listening to the Great Lives radio programme about Joe, where Matthew Parris says that he and other young Thatcherites "loved that anarchic and angry stuff." Jon Savage writes a book called "1966 ~ The Year The Decade Exploded" and its pretty dull, that says it all really. If you write about exciting times you should really have an engaging writing style.

Johnny Rogan always admitted he was an obsessive writer. He wrote a brilliant book on football managers but that only had a chapter a piece on each one. So he was alright when he reined himself in. It's not that I have a problem with big books, I love reading history.

But generally we're pretty lucky these days. When I started reading about pop music in the 80s there was very few decent books around. As a teenage Lennon fan I was very disappointed with "Shout", which I could tell even then was unreliable, and Ray Coleman's turgid official bio. You had Charlie Gillett but "Sound of the City - The Rise of Rock 'n' Roll" seem to mostly cover r'n'b, where I was into later stuff. KInd of a misleading title I thought. And Greil Marcus, I just can't get on with him.

I want to read Clinton Heylin's new book on Dylan. He got a bit of stick for the introduction where he trashes other biographers - not the done thing, old boy. He did a very interesting book called, "All the Madmen: Barrett, Bowie, Drake, the Floyd, The Kinks, The Who and the Journey to the Dark Side of British Rock". That was a book that actually lived up to its title.

Kory
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Kory »

iso74 wrote:
30 Aug 2021, 2:43pm
He did a very interesting book called, "All the Madmen: Barrett, Bowie, Drake, the Floyd, The Kinks, The Who and the Journey to the Dark Side of British Rock". That was a book that actually lived up to its title.
Now this sounds interesting, I'm going to have to check it out.
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Dr. Medulla
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Dr. Medulla »

The book on airline posters was a bust—way too advanced for undergrads—so I'm trying this now:
Image

Wanted to read this anyway, tho, so it's all good.
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Flex
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Flex »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
02 Sep 2021, 7:33pm
The book on airline posters was a bust—way too advanced for undergrads—so I'm trying this now:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com ... 3,200_.jpg

Wanted to read this anyway, tho, so it's all good.
I'd be very interested in hearing how this one is.
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a bowl of soup
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a rolling hoop
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a ton of lead
Wiggle - you can raise the dead

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Dr. Medulla
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Dr. Medulla »

Flex wrote:
02 Sep 2021, 7:35pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
02 Sep 2021, 7:33pm
The book on airline posters was a bust—way too advanced for undergrads—so I'm trying this now:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com ... 3,200_.jpg

Wanted to read this anyway, tho, so it's all good.
I'd be very interested in hearing how this one is.
I accept Paypal and intriguing offers.

(Will do.)
"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

Silent Majority
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Silent Majority »

Flex wrote:
02 Sep 2021, 7:35pm
Dr. Medulla wrote:
02 Sep 2021, 7:33pm
The book on airline posters was a bust—way too advanced for undergrads—so I'm trying this now:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com ... 3,200_.jpg

Wanted to read this anyway, tho, so it's all good.
I'd be very interested in hearing how this one is.
Yeah, same.
a lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison


www.pexlives.libsyn.com/

Silent Majority
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Silent Majority »

40) Overcoming MS - Dr Jelenek. Paperback.This book recommends more exercise, a diet without dairy or saturated fats, meditation, medication and other things which seem obvious once you read them. Niomie's seen a noticeable uptick in her quality of life since starting the program and that makes me happy.

41) Life - Keith Richards. Paperback. 2010. 1st reread since it was published. Interesting on music, songwriting, being in the Stones up to about 1972, and, at his best, being very specific on the guitar. I got bored at around the time when the life left their music, leaving me with 200 pages of bitching about Mick Jagger and Keith buying his own bullshit. On the whole, okay.

42) The Anglo Saxons - Marc Morris. 2021. Audiobook. A great bit of pop history about the underdocumented time between the Romans fucking off from England and the Normans turning up. There's a dry, nerdy enthusiasm which makes it very appealing, like an academic chatting happily with you over a bottle of red wine.

43) Cujo - Stephen King. 1981. Paperback. Could have been a short story, or at least half as long. But this flawed book - apparently written by an author so blitzed on coke and booze, he has no memory of composing it - has everything I ask for from a novel. Believable characters, unputdownable prose, a good couple of passages from a St Bernards point of view. The feeling of writing and storytelling by pure instinct without bothering the conscious mind is something I can almost touch. The Gunslinger next.
a lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison


www.pexlives.libsyn.com/

Silent Majority
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Re: Whatcha reading?

Post by Silent Majority »

44) I'm a Joke and So are You: A Comedian's Take on what Makes Us Human - Robin Ince. 2018. Audiobook read by the author, who has a mildly annoying voice and an overall pedantic nerd persona that just lands on the right side of likable for me. He also does a great Stewart Lee impersonation when reading that comedian's backhandedly complimentary introduction. Ince is a comedian I like best when not watching him but this is a good book, an interesting look at creativity and how it might get formed by our brains with funny asides and interviews with worthwhile subjects.
a lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison


www.pexlives.libsyn.com/

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