Musik

This is the second volume in Clinton Heylin's magisterial survey of the songs of Bob Dylan. The first volume - Revolution in the Air which is now available in paperback - charted the rise of Bob Dylan from his first jottings to the full expression of genius in songs such as 'Hard Rain Gonna Fall' and 'The Times They Are a Changin''. Still on the Road begins in 1974 with "e;Blood on the Tracks"e;, the album filled with masterworks such as 'Tangled Up in Blue' and 'Simple Twist of Fate' that heralded a watershed in Dylan's creative journey, and continues to chart his never-ending fascination with music and the art of song up to 2006's "e;Modern Times"e;. Praise for Revolution in the Air:'Beg, steal, borrow ... a compelling history of Dylan's mercurial song writing.' Mojo, 5-star review'Better than any biography could ever be, and a crucial Dylan book' Jonathan Letham'Valuable resource' Observer'A gripping new book by Dylan scholar Clinton Heylin so is so far in the deep end that its borderline insane . . [yet] has been devoured with a ravenous, insatiable appetite, and I have even made notes in the margin.' Mark Ellen, Word.'Terrifically interesting for Dylan nuts' Sunday Herald'Manna for completists' Metro 'True to form, Heylin digs deep-way deep-into the songs, mixing cold hard facts with illuminating anecdotes.' - Mark Smith, managing editor, Acoustic Guitar

'Honest and poignant' THE SUNThe honest and revealing story of John Lennon's childhood by his sister Julia. Through her own personal journey, Julia reveals the battle between two strong, self-willed women - John's mother and his Aunt Mimi - to have custody of John in his early years. It was Aunt Mimi who finally won and removed John from his mother at the age of five. But as John grew up, he would frequently return home - spending time with his mother and half-sisters, Julia, Jackie and Ingrid, learning his love of music from his mother, and hanging out, playing guitar with his childhood friend Paul McCartney.Julia is candid about the sadness as well as the joy of their broken family life. She details the devestating loss of their mother Julia in a road accident - and describes the painful legacy for the entire family, especially John as he moves into a life of stratospheric fame with the Beatles.

David Bowie: every single song. Everything you want to know, everything you didnt know. David Bowie remains mysterious and unknowable, despite 45 years of recording and performing. His legacy is roughly 600 songs, which range from psychedelia to glam rock to Philadelphia soul, from avant-garde instrumentals to global pop anthems. Rebel Rebel catalogs Bowies songs from 1964 to 1976, examines them in the order of their composition and recording, and digs into what makes them work. Rebel Rebel is an in-depth look at Bowies early singles and album tracks, unreleased demos, session outtakes and cover songs. The book traces Bowies literary, film and musical influences and the evolution of his songwriting. It also shows how Bowie exploited studio innovations, and the roles of his producers and supporting musicians, especially major collaborators like Brian Eno, Iggy Pop and Mick Ronson. This book places Bowies music in the context of its era. Readers will discover the links between Kubricks 2001 and Space Oddity; how A Clockwork Orange inspired Suffragette City. The pages are a trip through Bowies various lives as a young man in Swinging London, a Tibetan Buddhist, a disillusioned hippie, a rock god, and a Hollywood recluse. With a cast of thousands, including John Lennon, William S. Burroughs, Andy Warhol and Cher.

In the last few decades, new technologies have brought composers and listeners to the brink of an era of limitless musical possibility. They stand before a vast ocean of creative potential, in which any sounds imaginable can be synthesised and pieced together into radical new styles and forms of music-making. But are musicians taking advantage of this potential? How could we go about creating and listening to new music, and why should we? Bringing the ideas of twentieth-century avant-garde composers Arnold Schoenberg and John Cage to their ultimate conclusion, Infinite Music proposes a system for imagining music based on its capacity for variation, redefining musical modernism and music itself in the process. It reveals the restrictive categories traditionally imposed on music-making, replaces them with a new vocabulary and offers new approaches to organising musical creativity. By detailing not just how music is composed but crucially how its perceived, Infinite Music maps the future of music and the many paths towards it.

From one of America's celebrated critics, the definitive field guide to listening to music in the age of the CloudThe most significant revolution in the recent history of music has to do with listening: it is now possible to listen to nearly anything at any time, to ignore albums, and to instantly flit across genres and generations, from 1980s Detroit techno to 1890s Viennese neo-romanticism. Yet music criticism has historically focused on the musician's intent, not the listener's experience. Every Song Ever is therefore the definitive field guide to listening in an age of glorious, overwhelming abundance. By revealing the essential similarities between wildly different kinds of music, Ben Ratliff shows how we listen to music now, and suggests how we can listen better.

Stuart Sutcliffe is the most famous contender for the crown of 'fifth Beatle'. One of the founding members, a close friend of Lennon, he left the band after their Hamburg sojourn in order to pursue his promising career as an artist, dying shortly thereafter of a brain haemorrhage. For years his sister Pauline has tried to protect his memory against the Beatles' need to sanitise their early history and now she is ready to tell the real story. In so doing she sheds new light on their formative period - the rivalry with McCartney, how George Harrison tried to keep the peace, the truth about Stuart's intense relationship with Lennon and why Lennon was haunted by guilt over her brother's death. And she describes what it was like for those like herself and Cynthia Lennon who have had no choice but to live with the Beatles all their lives. 'Gripping . . . the story of Stuart Sutcliffe. . . holds the key to the birth of pop's greatest group' Daily Mail 'An odd, fascinating book' MOJO

In June 1989, Paul Du Noyer was contacted by Paul McCartney's office in London and asked to interview the star as they had met once before and enjoyed a good raport. In the years that followed, Paul Du Noyer continued to meet, interview and work for Paul McCartney on a regular basis, producing magazine articles, tour programmes, album liner notes, press materials and website editorial. It's likely that Du Noyer has spent more hours in formal, recorded conversation with McCartney than any other writer. Conversations with McCartney is the culmination of Du Noyer's long association with McCartney and his music. It draws from their interview sessions across 35 years, coupling McCartney's own, candid thoughts with his observations and analysis.

The man known simply as 'Enge' by his millions of fans worldwide has sold over 150 million records and is in the Guinness Book of Records for achieving 56 consecutive weeks in the chart with 'Release Me'.From living on the dole and receiving last rites with tuberculosis, to buying a Hollywood palace with a heart-shaped pool and a fleet of fourteen Rolls Royces, Engelbert wears his 'King of Romance' crown so well that horticulturists even named a rose after him. And the love god has certainly lived up to his reputation, indulging in a string of affairs and one-night stands, whilst remaining happily married to his first love Patricia. Forty years on from his early hits 'Enge' is still at the very top, selling out concerts across the world, representing the UK at the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest, and topping the charts in all the major markets.Inspired by the warmth of his millions of affectionate fans and the endless support of his wife, Engelbert shares his incredible life story with openness, humour and astonishing honesty.

There's only one book that ever truly got inside the Beatles and this is it. The landmark, worldwide bestseller that has grown with the Beatles ever since. During 1967 and 1968 Hunter Davies spent eighteen months with the Beatles at the peak of their powers as they defined a generation and rewrote popular music. As their only ever authorised biographer he had unparalleled access - not just to John, Paul, George and Ringo but to friends, family and colleagues. There when it mattered, he collected a wealth of intimate and revealing material that still makes this the classic Beatles book - the one all other biographers look to. Hunter Davies remained close with the band and as such has had access to more information over the years. This 40th anniversary edition contains new material which has never been revealed before, from the author's archives and from the Beatles themselves, that will bring new insights to their legend.

**THE DEFINITIVE, UP-TO-DATE BIOGRAPHY OF FREDDIE MERCURY**'An outstanding biography. . .a fitting testament to the creative genius' -- Daily Mail'Touches all manner of intriguing rock 'n' roll debauchery. . .fascinating reading' -- Time OutThis fascinating biography of Freddie Mercury has received outstanding acclaim from Queen and rock fans worldwide -- now revised and updated to coincide with the release of the film about his life, Bohemian Rhapsody.Born Farrokh Bulsara on the island of Zanzibar, Freddie Mercury rose to worldwide stardom as the lead singer of Britain's biggest music act of all time. In this bestselling biography, Laura Jackson reveals the reality behind Queen's flamboyant frontman and lead singer, as she looks behind his unique brand of showmanship to discover who Freddie Mercury really was. Featuring exclusive interviews with some of those closest to Freddie right up until his tragic death, original Queen members and many others -- including new and intimate stories from Tim Rice, Richard Branson, Cliff Richard, Bruce Dickinson, Mike Moran, Wayne Eagling, Zandra Rhodes and Susannah York -- this is the definitive biography of one of rock's greatest legends.

Factory Records' fame and fortune were based on two bands - Joy Division and New Order - and one personality - that of its director, Tony Wilson. At the height of the label's success in the late 1980s, it ran its own club, the legendary Ha ienda, had a string of international hit records, and was admired and emulated around the world. But by the 1990s the story had changed. The back catalogue was sold off, top bands New Order and Happy Mondays were in disarray, and the Ha ienda was shut down by the police. Critically acclaimed on its original publication in 1996, this book tells the complete story of Factory Records' spectacular history, from the label's birth in 1970s Manchester, through its '80s heyday and '90s demise. Now updated to include new material on the re-emergence of Joy Division, the death of Tony Wilson and the legacy of Factory Records, it draws on exclusive interviews with the major players to give a fascinating insight into the unique personalities and chaotic reality behind one of the UK's most influential and successful independent record labels.

What is the difference between a musical note and any other sort of sound? What is harmony, and why does it sound good? Why is it easy to tell the difference between a flute and a clarinet even if they are playing exactly the same note? Why do ten violins sound only twice as loud as one? What is perfect pitch, and do I have it?Discover the answers to these and many other questions in John Powell's charming, straight-talking and ear-opening guide to what music is and how exactly it works. Written by a composer with a PhD in physics, How Music Works is a unique and entertaining guide. Opening up the world of acoustics and the science of music to deepen our appreciation and understanding of what we listen to, How Music Works covers subjects from the difference between how we hear a musical note and any other kind of sound, to a brief history of the scale system, why a run of arpeggios sounds 'romantic' and why a flute sounds different to a clarinet. The perfect book for players and listeners alike.

The first major account of the history of reggae, black music journalist Lloyd Bradley describes its origins and development in Jamaica, from ska to rock-steady to dub and then to reggae itself, a local music which conquered the world. There are many extraordinary stories about characters like Prince Buster, King Tubby and Bob Marley. But this is more than a book of music history: it relates the story of reggae to the whole history of Jamaica, from colonial island to troubled independence, and Jamaicans, from Kingston to London.

The dramatic and tormented life of Jerry Lee Lewis is the most fabled in rock 'n' roll history. Hellfire is a wild, riveting, and beautifully written biography that received universal acclaim on its original publication and is now an American classic. Born in Louisiana to a family legacy of great courage and greater madness, Jerry Lee was torn throughout his life between a harsh Pentecostal God and the Devil of alcohol, drugs, and rock 'n' roll. At twenty-one he recorded 'Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On', which propelled him to stardom. Almost immediately, news of his marriage to his thirteen-year-old cousin all but destroyed his career. Over the next twenty years, Jerry Lee, ever indomitable and ever wild, would rise again as a country star, and then lose it all again to his own inner demons. Hellfire is a brilliant, audacious journey into the soul of a rock 'n' roll legend, and into the soul of rock 'n' roll itself.

"e;The only plan right now is to kill everybody"e; Joey Jordison, drummerIgnoring every rule in the book and more besides, Slipknot are a notoriously controversial band who combine a talent for outrage with their music. Reminiscent of the outlandishness of punk, 'nu metal' has become the fastest growing area in rock, with Slipknot selling over 2 million copies of their debut album. And yet Slipknot spit, swear and risk injury night after night in their extraordinary live performances. Incredibly, their apparel of masks and boiler suits, which they refuse to remove, means that their fans still do not know what they look like. Jason Arnopp, the first British journalist to interview Slipknot face to mask, describes the transformation of the Des Moines crew into unorthodox mega stars. Featuring an introduction by the legendary Gene Simmons of Kiss, this biography will be the first published on the band either in the UK or America and will include exclusive interviews and in-depth information on the mysterious nine masked men.

An impassioned and invaluable guide for actors and students of musical theatre. In Acting Through Song,?Paul Harvard takes the techniques of modern actor training - including the theories of Stanislavsky, Brecht, Meisner and Laban, amongst others - and applies them to the fundamental component of musical theatre: singing. With dozens of exercises to put these theories into practice, and numerous examples from a broad range of musicals, the result is a comprehensive and rigorous acting course for those training in musical theatre or already performing, whether amateur or professional, to realise their potential - and act better. 'The most methodical, thorough and practical book on the subject that I've ever read.' - Daniel Evans, from his foreword 'If you want to maximise your potential in this tough profession, this is not just a must-read - it's your Bible.' - Stuart Barr

Created in the late 1960s, fashionable in the early 1970s and hated in the 1980s, Progressive Rock has a colourful and eventful story. Many of the genre's main protagonists, including Genesis, Yes, King Crimson and Emerson, Lake & Palmer, remain as popular as ever, while lesser-known names like Camel, Caravan, Renaissance, Van der Graaf Generator and Gentle Giant retain cult status. In this completely revised and updated edition, Stephen Lambe guides the reader through the early years as the music developed out of the British Progressive Music boom of the late 1960s into its own genre, and reached full maturity in the early 1970s. He also discusses how the music was received and developed outside the UK, particularly in the USA and Europe. Received wisdom has it that punk swept Progressive Rock away in the late 1970s, yet the genre never died. An early 1980s revival, spearheaded by major label signings Marillion, IQ and Pallas, burned brightly but fell away sharply later in the decade. However, in the early 1990s, the movement began to re-establish itself, largely below the radar, led by Swedish band The Flower Kings and American group Spock's Beard. The rise of the internet and the decline of the worldwide pop industry allowed niche music - as Progressive Rock had now become - to flourish once again in the new millennium. Stephen Lambe has been co-promoter of the Summer's End Progressive Rock festival since 2006. He helps promote Welsh band Magenta, and is Secretary of the Classic Rock Society, whose patrons include Steve Hackett and Roger Hodgson. He writes regularly for the magazine Rock Society.

Kate Bush has written some of the most memorable songs in pop music history. Wuthering Heights, her debut single shot to number 1 in 1978 and she remains something of an enigma over a quarter of a century later. A singer, songwriter, musician, dancer, actress and director, Kate has inspired a devoted following around the world. Rob Jovanovic traces the story of Kate Bush's career, from her up-bringing in the Essex countryside through her first forays into music with a series of home recordings, to her number 1 debut album that propelled her to international stardom. Including exclusive interviews with studio musicians and choreographers, Jovanovic's biography emphasises both her voracious talent and her intensely private personality.

In her bestselling autobiography Bedsit Disco Queen, Tracey Thorn recalled the highs and lows of a thirty-year career in pop music. But with the touring, recording and extraordinary anecdotes, there wasn't time for an in-depth look at what she actually did for all those years: sing. She sang with warmth and emotional honesty, sometimes while battling acute stage-fright.Part memoir, part wide-ranging exploration of the art, mechanics and spellbinding power of singing, NAKED AT THE ALBERT HALL takes in Dusty Springfield, Dennis Potter and George Eliot; Auto-tune, the microphone and stage presence; The Streets and The X Factor. Including interviews with fellow artists such as Alison Moyet, Romy Madley-Croft and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti, and portraits of singers in fiction as well as Tracey's real-life experiences, it offers a unique, witty and sharply observed insider's perspective on the exhilarating joy and occasional heartache of singing.

He is one of the greatest musical talents Britain has ever produced. But even as the principle songwriter and lead guitarist for The Who, it would be unjust to define Pete Townshend's life simply through his achievements with bandmates Daltrey, Moon and Entwistle.Noting that he has sold over 100 million records over a fifty-year period goes some way to quantifying his accomplishments, but numbers only scratch the surface of his contribution to popular culture.An avid student of his profession, during his career he has been credited with the creation of the concept album, worked as a literary editor, developed scripts for television and the stage, and written songs that have defined a generation. The thinking man's rock star with a dedication to his craft unlike any other in the business, he continues to inspire new generations of performers and writers with a continuing commitment to his art.Now, in one of the most eagerly awaited autobiographies of recent times, this icon tells about his incredible life and elaborates on the turbulences of time spent as one of the world's most respected musicians - being in one of rock's greatest ever bands, and wanting to give it all up.Incredibly, as a man who has achieved so much, this truly unique story of ambition, relentless perfectionism and rock and roll excess will be regarded as one of his greatest achievements.

'They are not for you but for a later age!' Ludwig van Beethoven, on the Opus 59 quartets.Tackling the Beethoven quartets is a rite of passage that has shaped the Takacs Quartet's work together for over forty years. Using the history of the composition and first performances of the quartets as the backbone to his story, Edward Dusinberre, first violinist of the Takacs since 1993 - recounts the life of the Quartet from its inception in Hungary, through emigration to the US and its present-day life as one of the world's renowned string quartets. He also describes what it was like for him, as a young man fresh out of the Juilliard School, to join the Quartet as its first non-Hungarian member - an exhilarating challenge. Beethoven for a Later Age takes the reader inside the life of a quartet, vividly showing how four people enjoy making music together over a long period of time. The key, the author argues, is in balancing continuity with change and experimentation - a theme that also lies at the heart of Beethoven's remarkable compositions.

One of the most tangible aftershocks of Punk was its urgency to prompt individuals into action. Document your reality: do it yourself. From this, a generation of young men were inspired and, with often zero financial planning or business sense, in a bedroom, garage or shed, labels such as Factory, Rough Trade, Mute, 4AD, Beggars Banquet, Warp, Domino and Creation began, shifting the musical landscape and trading on an ethos and identity no brand consultant would now dare dream of. Musicians were encouraged to do whatever the hell they wanted and damn the consequences. From humble beginnings, some of our most influential artists were allowed to thrive: New Order, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, Orange Juice, Cocteau Twins, Sonic Youth, Happy Mondays, Primal Scream, Aphex Twin, Teenage Fanclub, My Bloody Valentine, Autechre, Broadcast, Vampire Weekend, The White Stripes and Artic Monkeys to name but a handful. This is the story, set to an incredible soundtrack, of the enormous scale of the passions, the size of the egos, and the true extent of the madness of the mavericks who had the vision and bloody-mindedness to make the musical landscape exciting again.

In virtually all areas of Dylan's life - his immigrant antecedents, his business dealings, his various addictions and his romantic attachments - Heylin is able to provide a fascinating picture of a man who changed the whole course of popular music in the sixties and, over thirty years later, won three Grammys. Heylin has given full weight to Dylan's own words and those of his closest associates, with over 250 people quoted in the book, helping to provide a portrait of a complex figure. Including 60,000 words of brand new material - dealing with Dylan's four twenty-first century albums; his archival audio-visual projects; his third film; his series of paintings and exhibitions; his autobiography, Chronicles; and his ongoing romantic liaisons and 'missing' marriages - this fully updated story of Dylan provides a monumental overview of the Man and his Music.

We live in a pop age gone loco for retro and crazy for commemoration. Band re-formations and reunion tours, expanded reissues of classic albums and outtake-crammed box sets, remakes and sequels, tribute albums and mash-ups . . . But what happens when we run out of past? Are we heading toward a sort of cultural-ecological catastrophe, where the archival stream of pop history has been exhausted? Simon Reynolds, one of the finest music writers of his generation, argues that we have indeed reached a tipping point and that although earlier eras had their own obsessions with antiquity - the Renaissance with its admiration for Roman and Greek classicism, the Gothic movement's invocations of medievalism - never has there been a society so obsessed with the cultural artifacts of its own immediate past. Retromania is the first book to examine the retro industry and ask the question: Is this retromania a death knell for any originality and distinctiveness of our own?

How are conductors' silent gestures magicked into sound by a group of more than a hundred brilliant but belligerent musicians? The mute choreography of great conductors has fascinated and frustrated musicians and music-lovers for centuries. Orchestras can be inspired to the heights of musical and expressive possibility by their maestros, or flabbergasted that someone who doesn't even make a sound should be elevated to demigod-like status by the public.This is the first book to go inside the rehearsal rooms of some of the most inspirational orchestral partnerships in the world - how Simon Rattle works at the Berlin Philharmonic, how Mariss Jansons deals with the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, and how Claudio Abbado creates the world's most luxurious pick-up band every year with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. From London to Budapest, Bamberg to Vienna, great orchestral concerts are recreated as a collection of countless human and musical stories.

In Listen to This, the award-winning music critic and author of The Rest is Noise, Alex Ross looks forward and backward in musical culture: capturing essential figures in classical music history, as well as giving an alternative view of recent pop music.From his own first encounter with classical music to vibrant sketches of Schubert, Verdi and Brahms; from in-depth interviews with modern pop masters such as Bjork and Radiohead to the lives of a high school's music students, Ross shows how music can express the full complexity of human experience. He explains how pop music can achieve the status of high art and how classical music can become a vital part of wider contemporary culture.Witty, passionate and brimming with insight, Listen to This teaches us to listen more closely.

In May 1939 Britten and Pears disembarked at Montreal at the start of their American visit, which was to be a period of intense musical activity and new personal relationships. At the same time, the relationship between Britten and Pears deepened into a partnership that was to endure for almost forty years.Their absence from England during the first years of the war led to sharp public comment and controversy, much of it documented here. On their return from America in 1942, hostility to their pacifist convictions and to their homosexuality resurfaced. Prejudice and subterfuge even affected the premiere of Peter Grimes in 1945, although it could not prevent the opera from being an unprecedented success.The letters in this second volume from the years 1939 to 1945 are among the most fascinating of the correspondence, and - supplemented by the editors' detailed commentary and by exhaustive contemporary documentation - offer a unique insight into American history, politics and culture during the Second World War.

Spanning Tom Waits' extraordinary 40-year career, from Closing Time to Orphans, Lowside of the Road is Barney Hoskyns' unique take on one of rock's great enigmas. Like Bob Dylan and Neil Young, Waits is a chameleonic survivor who's achieved long-term success while retaining cult credibility and outsider mystique. From his perilous "e;jazzbo"e; years in '70s Los Angeles to the multiple-Grammy winner of recent years - by way of such shape-shifting '80s albums as Swordfishtrombones - this exhaustive biography charts Waits' life step-by-step and album-by-album. Affectionate and penetrating, and based on a combination of assiduous research and deep critical insight, this is a outstanding investigation of a notoriously private artist and performer - the definitive account to date of Tom Waits' life and work.

Electric Eden documents one of the great untold stories of British music over the past century. While ostensibly purporting to be a history of that much derided (though currently fashionable) four-letter word, 'folk', Electric Eden will be a magnificent survey of the visionary, topographic and esoteric impulses that have driven the margins of British visionary folk music from Vaughan Williams and Holst to The Incredible String Band, Nick Drake, John Martyn and Aphex Twin. For the first time the full story of the extraordinary period of folk rock from the mid 1960s to the mid 1970s will be told in a book with the breadth of a social history touching on sonic worship, pagan architecture, land art, ley lines and ther outer fringes of the avant garde. Electric Eden identifies a particularly English wellspring of imagery and imagination, an undercurrent that has fed into the creative and organic strand of Britain's music over the past century. From Edwardian composers assimilations of folk song and visionary poetry, via folk rock of the 60s and 70s, the story is brought up to date by placing these earlier movements in a continuum that links through significant figures in 21st century pastoral electronica.

A miracle of still-plentiful hair, raw sex-appeal, and strutting talent . The frontman of one of the most influential and controversial groups of all time. A musical genius with a career spanning over four decades. Mick Jagger is a testament at once to British glamour and sensual decline, the ultimate architect and demi-god of rock.Bestselling biographer Philip Norman offers an unparalleled account of the life of a living legend, Mick Jagger. From Home Counties schoolboy, to rebel without a cause to Sixties rock sensation and global idol, Norman unravels with astonishing intimacy the myth of the inimitable frontman of The Rolling Stones. MICK JAGGER charts his extraordinary journey through scandal-ridden conspiracy, infamous prison spell, hordes of female admirers and a knighthood while stripping away the colossal fame, wealth and idolatry to reveal a story of talent and promise unfulfilled.Understated yet ostentatious; the ultimate incarnation of modern man's favourite fantasy: 'sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll', yet blessed with taste and intelligence; a social chameleon who couldn't blend in if he tried; always moving with the Jagger swagger yet modest enough to be self-deprecating, Mick was a paradoxical energy that reconfigured the musical landscape.This revelatory tour de force is ample tribute to a flawed genius, a Casanova, an Antichrist and a god who, with characteristic nonchalance realised the dreams of thousands of current contenders and rocker pretenders, longevity, while coasting on a sea of fur rugs.