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Books > Arts & Architecture > Music > Contemporary popular music > Rock & pop > General
"A refreshingly candid read...a Doors bio worth opening." --Entertainment Weekly No other band has ever sounded quite like the Doors, and no other frontman has ever transfixed an audience quite the way Jim Morrison did. Ray Manzarek, the band's co-founder and keyboard player, was there from the very start--and until the sad dissolution--of the Doors. In this heartfelt and colorfully detailed memoir, complete with 16 pages of photographs, he brings us an insider's view of the brief, brilliant history...from the beginning to the end. "AAn? engaging read." --Washington Post Book World
The Classic Rock and Roll Reader: Rock Music from Its Beginnings to
the Mid-1970s is chock full of entertaining essays to inform and
delight you about an era that shaped our culture and future musical
trends. This unique book will surprise and enchant even the most
zealous music buff with facts and information on the songs that
reflected America's spirit and captured a nation's attention. The
Classic Rock and Roll Reader is offbeat, somewhat irreverent,
ironic, and ancedotal as it discusses hundreds of rock and non-rock
compositions included in rock history era. The songs offer you
information on: Rock's Not So Dull Predecessors (for example,
"Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" and "The Cry of the Wild
Goose") The Pioneering Rock Songs (such as "Rock Around the Clock"
and "Shake, Rattle, and Roll" ) Older Style Songs Amidst the Rocks
(for example, "I Could Have Danced All Night" and "Rocky Mountain
High" ) The Megastars and Megagroups (such as "Blue Suede Shoes,"
"Respect," and "Surfin'USA" ) The Best Songs that Never Made No. 1
(for example," I Feel Good" and " Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole
Oak Tree" )The Classic Rock and Roll Reader: Rock Music from Its
Beginnings to the Mid-1970s also examines the music which preceded
early rock, the music which followed early rock, and the numerous
non-rock songs which flourished during the classic rock period. A
wide spectrum of music is discussed in well over 100 essays on
various songs. Musicians, librarians, and the general audience will
be taken back to the birth of rock and roll and the various
contributing influences. Analyzing each song's place in rock
history and giving some background about the artists, The Classic
Rock and Roll Reader offers even the most avid music enthusiast new
and unique information in this thorough and interesting guide.
Rock Music in American Popular Culture III: More Rock 'n'Roll
Resources explores the fascinating world of rock music and examines
how this medium functions as an expression of cultural and social
identity. This nostalgic guide explores the meanings and messages
behind some of the most popular rock 'n'roll songs that captured
the American spirit, mirrored society, and reflected events in our
history. Arranged by themes, Rock Music in American Popular Culture
III examines a variety of social and cultural topics with related
songs, such as: sex and censorship--"Only the Good Die Young" by
Billy Joel and "Night Moves" by Bob Seger and The Silver Bullet
Band holiday songs--"Rockin'Around the Christmas Tree" by Brenda
Lee and "The Christmas Song" by Nat King Cole death--"Leader of the
Pack" by The Shangri-Las and "The Unknown Soldier" by The Doors
foolish behavior--"When a Man Loves a Woman" by Percy Sledge and
"What Kind of Fool" by Barbra Streisand and Barry Gibb jobs and the
workplace--"Don't Stand So Close to Me" by The Police and "Dirty
Laundry" by Don Henley military involvements--"Boogie Woogie Bugle
Boy" by the Andrews Sisters and "War" by Edwin Starr novelty
recordings--"The Purple People Eater" by Sheb Wooley and "Eat It"
by Weird Al Yankovic letters and postal images--"P. S. I Love You"
by The Beatles and "Return to Sender" by Elvis PreselyIn addition,
a discography and a bibliography after each section give further
examples of the themes and resources being discussed, as do
extensive lists of print references at the end of the text.
'The greatest book ever written on British independent music'
Guardian 'One of the best British music books of the last ten
years' Mojo Founded by Alan McGee in 1983, Creation Records
achieved notoriety as the home of Primal Scream, the Jesus and Mary
Chain and other anti-Establishment acts. During the Britpop boom of
the mid-90s, the astonishing success of Oasis brought Creation fame
on the world stage. In 1999, however, McGee announced his shock
departure as his label's influence over a generation of British
music came to a confusing and disappointing end. Containing
interviews with Creation musicians, employees, supporters and
detractors, this is the inside story of Creation Records - and of
British music since the 1980s.
Babes in Toyland was one of the most influential and underrated
bands of the 1990s. They rode the wave of the Minneapolis grunge
scene crafting a unique sound composed of self-taught
instrumentation and unabashed banshee raging vocals. Their stage
presence was enigmatic, their lyrics vitriolic, and their
Kinderwhore fashion ironic and easy to emulate. But what made them
most inspiring was their ethos and a unique brand of sisterhood
that inspired fans to create Riot Grrl and form legendary bands
such as 7 year Bitch, Bikini Kill, and Hole. Despite the media's
politicization of them as an "all-female" band, the Babes insisted
their music wasn't a political statement but about personal
expression. They would dismiss labeling their act as feminist, but
their actions sent a positive message of what a female space within
music could look like. Now, almost 30 years after their most
seminal record, Fontanelle, was released, the legend of the band is
being resurrected and re-spun to reclaim their proper space and
context in the history of music and women in rock.
This index is divided into 4 parts: a bibliography of collections indexed, an index of first lines, an index of composers and an index of works frommusicals, motion pictures and television. Coverage spans recently published collections of songs from Tori Amos and George Michael to Dick Clark's American Bandstand and the Definitive Dixieland Collection.
"Winner of the Oregon Book Award for General Nonfiction and Los
Angeles Times bestseller
"It makes good music sound better."--Janet Maslin in The New York
Times
""A fascinating look into the West Coast recording studio scene of
the '60s and the inside story of the music you heard on the radio.
If you always assumed the musicians you listened to were the same
people you saw onstage, you are in for a big surprise "
--Dusty Street, host of "Classic Vinyl" on Sirius XM Satellite
Radio
If you were a fan of popular music in the 1960s and early '70s, you
were a fan of the Wrecking Crew--whether you knew it or not.
On hit record after hit record by everyone from the Byrds, the
Beach Boys, and the Monkees to the Grass Roots, the 5th Dimension,
Sonny & Cher, and Simon & Garfunkel, this collection of
West Coast studio musicians from diverse backgrounds established
themselves in Los Angeles, California as the driving sound of pop
music--sometimes over the objection of actual band members forced
to make way for Wrecking Crew members. Industry insider Kent
Hartman tells the dramatic, definitive story of the musicians who
forged a reputation throughout the business as the secret weapons
behind the top recording stars.
Mining invaluable interviews, the author follows the careers of
such session masters as drummer Hal Blaine and keyboardist Larry
Knechtel, as well as trailblazing bassist Carol Kaye--the only
female in the bunch--who went on to play in thousands of recording
sessions in this rock history. Readers will discover the Wrecking
Crew members who would forge careers in their own right, including
Glen Campbell and Leon Russell, and learn of the relationship
between the Crew and such legends as Phil Spector and Jimmy Webb.
Hartman also takes us inside the studio for the legendary sessions
that gave us "Pet Sounds, ""Bridge Over Troubled Water, " and the
rock classic "Layla," which Wrecking Crew drummer Jim Gordon
cowrote with Eric Clapton for Derek and the Dominos. And the author
recounts priceless scenes such as Mike Nesmith of the Monkees
facing off with studio head Don Kirshner, Grass Roots lead
guitarist (and future star of "The Office") Creed Bratton getting
fired from the group, and Michel Rubini unseating Frank Sinatra's
pianist for the session in which the iconic singer improvised the
hit-making ending to "Strangers in the Night."
"The Wrecking Crew" tells the collective, behind-the-scenes stories
of the artists who dominated Top 40 radio during the most exciting
time in American popular culture.
What does it mean when a singing voice is detached from an
originating body through recording? And how does this affect
consumers of recorded song? This book examines the practice of
lipsynching to pre-recorded song in both professional and
vernacular contexts, covering over a century of diverse artistic
practices from early cinema through to the current popularity of
self-produced internet lipsynching videos. It examines the ways in
which we listen to, respond to, and use recorded music, not only as
a commodity to be consumed but as a culturally-sophisticated and
complex means of identification, a site of projection,
introjection, and habitation, and, through this, a means of
personal and collective creativity.
Black Sabbath has often been credited with inventing heavy metal
with their first album released in 1970. Their new style of music
was loud, brutal, scary, innovative, and it has greatly influenced
heavy metal bands since then. Their five decades of music cross
generations of fans, and they remain relevant to this day, with
their 2013 album charting #1 in the United States and at least five
other countries. In Experiencing Black Sabbath: A Listener's
Companion, musician and scholar Nolan Stolz leads the reader
through Sabbath's twenty studio albums and additional songs,
closely examining their music and the storied history of the band.
Along the way, Stolz highlights often-overlooked key moments that
defined Sabbath's unique musical style and legacy. Band members'
own words illuminate certain aspects of the music, and Stolz makes
connections from song to song, album to album, and sometimes across
decades to create an intricate narrative of the band's entire
catalog. Experiencing Black Sabbath reveals the underappreciated
genius of these heavy metal progenitors to all rock music lovers
and gives even the most fervent Sabbath fans a new perspective on
the music.
Greg Lake first won acclaim as lead vocalist, bass guitarist and
producer when, together with Robert Fripp, he formed King Crimson.
Their first album, the landmark In the Court of the Crimson King,
co-produced by Greg, featured the iconic song '21st Century
Schizoid Man'. King Crimson pioneered progressive rock and paved
the way for many famous bands that followed, from Yes and Genesis
to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. In 1970 Greg met fellow legend Keith
Emerson during a North American tour; the two shared common bonds:
European musical influences and a desire to reinterpret classical
works while creating a new musical genre. After being introduced to
drummer Carl Palmer, they formed the first progressive rock
supergroup Emerson, Lake and Palmer. To date ELP has sold over 50
million records. Lake produced Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Tarkus,
Pictures at an Exhibition, Trilogy, Brain Salad Surgery, Works Vol.
1 and 2, and two different live albums. All went platinum and
featured a series of hit singles, most written and all sung by
Lake. The three created a unique live theatrical performance which
featured Emerson attacking his keyboards with knives, Palmer
playing a 2.5 ton stainless steel kit and Lake performing on a
GBP6,000 Persian rug which had its own roadie. One of their very
first performances was at the historic Isle of Wight Festival in
1970 and they went on to headline California Jam, one of the
biggest concerts of the 1970s, attended by 350,000 people. Probably
the voice of his generation, Greg fronted the greatest rock
supergroup of the 1970s but never held with the 'progressive' tag
that attached itself to both the music and the excess. Lucky Man
not only charts the highs and lows of a career in rock music but
also reflects on the death of Keith Emerson last year, living with
terminal cancer and the end of life. Greg can best be summed up by
his now-famous line: 'Material wealth is a very fleeting pleasure
... when you can buy anything you want and do anything you want,
you soon discover that you actually don't want any of it.'
Poignantly, Greg finished writing his memoir shortly before he died
in December 2016.
From his early Liverpool days, through the historic decade of The
Beatles, to Wings and his long solo career, The Lyrics pairs the
definitive texts of 154 songs by Paul McCartney with first-person
commentaries on his life and music. Spanning two alphabetically
arranged volumes, these commentaries reveal how the songs came to
be and the people who inspired them: his devoted parents, Mary and
Jim; his songwriting partner, John Lennon; his "Golden Earth Girl",
Linda Eastman; his wife, Nancy McCartney; and even Queen Elizabeth
II, amongst many others. Here are the origins of "Let It Be",
"Lovely Rita", "Yesterday", and "Mull of Kintyre", as well as
McCartney's literary influences, including Shakespeare, Lewis
Carroll and Alan Durband, his secondary school English teacher.
With images from McCartney's personal archives-handwritten texts,
paintings and photographs, hundreds previously unseen-The Lyrics,
spanning sixty-four years, is the definitive literary and visual
record of one of the greatest songwriters of all time.
From "Who Put the Bomp (in the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)?" to a list of all
song titles containing the word "werewolf," Rock Music in American
Popular Culture II: More Rock 'n'Roll Resources continues where
1995's Volume I left off. Using references and illustrations drawn
from contemporary lyrics and supported by historical and
sociological research on popular cultural subjects, this collection
of insightful essays and reviews assesses the involvement of
musical imagery in personal issues, in social and political
matters, and in key socialization activities. From marriage and sex
to public schools and youth culture, readers discover how popular
culture can be used to explore American values. As Authors B. Lee
Cooper and Wayne S. Haney prove that integrated popular culture is
the product of commercial interaction with public interest and
values rather than a random phenomena, they entertainingly and
knowledgeably cover such topics as: answer songs--interchanges
involving social events and lyrical commentaries as explored in
response recordings horror films--translations and transformations
of literary images and motion picture figures into popular song
characters and tales public schools--images of formal educational
practices and informal learning processes in popular song lyrics
sex--suggestive tales and censorship challenges within the popular
music realm war--examinations of persistent military and home front
themes featured in wartime recordingsRock Music in American Popular
Culture II: More Rock 'n'Roll Resources is nontechnical, written in
a clear and concise fashion, and explores each topic thoroughly,
with ample discographic and bibliographic resources provided for
additional research. Arranged alphabetically for quick and easy
reference to specific topics, the book is equally enjoyable to read
straight through. Rock music fans, teachers, popular culture
professors, music instructors, public librarians, sound recording
archivists, sociologists, social critics, and journalists can all
learn something, as the book shows them the cross-pollination of
music and social life in the United States.
Though the Beatles are nowadays considered national treasures, this
book shows how and why they inspired phobia as well as mania in
1960s Britain. As symbols of modernity in the early sixties, they
functioned as a stress test for British institutions and
identities, at once displaying the possibilities and establishing
the limits of change. Later in the decade, they developed forms of
living, loving, thinking, looking, creating, worshipping and
campaigning which became subjects of intense controversy. The
ambivalent attitudes contemporaries displayed towards the Beatles
are not captured in hackneyed ideas of the 'swinging sixties', the
'permissive society' and the all-conquering 'Fab Four'. Drawing
upon a wealth of contemporary sources, The Beatles and Sixties
Britain offers a new understanding of the band as existing in
creative tension with postwar British society: their disruptive
presence inciting a wholesale re-examination of social, political
and cultural norms.
First published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor &
Francis, an informa company.
The reverse of Nick Drake's headstone, wedged deep into the earth
of an English parish church graveyard, reads: "Now we rise and we
are everywhere." The words were penned by Drake in 1974: Thirty
years later, they are jarringly prophetic. Like nearly all
prematurely buried cult figures, Nick Drake is reinvented each time
he is rediscovered. In 2000, the sheepish, astral musings of Pink
Moon became synonymous with backing a Volkswagen Cabrio convertible
away from a raucous house party, as VW boldly sold American drivers
on the notion of eschewing red plastic cups and bro-hugs for
moonbeams and tree trunks (and a cute German car - sort of).The
Cabrio ad inadvertently sparked an unlikely boost in record sales,
propelling the album towards platinum status nearly 28 years after
its release. But with each well-intentioned revival of interest,
Nick Drake slips further and further out of reach, martyred and
codified, superceded and consumed by his own tragic context. Since
his controversial death in 1974, Nick Drake has been heralded as a
26-year-old prophet, the diffident enigma, the tortured precursor
to Kurt Cobain, the fallen hero, the folksinger-as-folksymbol, the
self-sacrificing patron saint of lonely, disaffected teenagers -
the One who died for our sins.This book explores how a tiny
acoustic record has puttered and purred its way into a new
millennium. Amanda Petrusich interviews producer Joe Boyd, string
arranger Robert Kirby, and even the marketing team behind the VW
commercial."Thirty-Three and a Third" is a series of short books
about critically acclaimed and much-loved albums of the past 40
years. By turns obsessive, passionate, creative and informed, the
books in this series demonstrate many different ways of writing
about music.
Becoming Elektra tells the incredible true story of the pioneering
Elektra Records label and its far-sighted founder, Jac Holzman, who
built a small folk imprint into a home for some of the most
groundbreaking, important, and enduring music of the rock era.
Placing the Elektra label in a broader context, the book presents a
gripping narrative of musical and cultural history that reads like
an inventory of all that is exciting and innovative about the 60s
and 70s: The Doors, Love s Forever Changes, Tim Buckley s Goodbye
and Hello, The Stooges, The MC5 s Kick Out The Jams, Queen and
Queen II, The Incredible String Band, Carly Simon s No Secrets, and
many, many more. First published in 2010, Becoming Elektra was
praised as 'eye-opening (Q) and a 'dazzling narrative (The Sun),
and for 'perfectly encapsulating the enigmatic, unpredictable
spirit of the label (Record Collector). This fully revised and
expanded edition includes a brand new foreword by John Densmore of
The Doors and draws on extensive new interviews with a wide range
of Elektra alumni, including Tom Paley, Judy Henske, Johnny Echols,
Jean Ritchie, and Bernie Krause, as well as further conversations
with Holzman himself. It also adds two new chapters: a look at
Elektra in Britain in the 60s and a reappraisal of the label s 70s
output.
Music videos promote popular artists in cultural forms that
circulate widely across social media networks. With the advent of
YouTube in 2005 and the proliferation of handheld technologies and
social networking sites, the music video has become available to
millions worldwide, and continues to serve as a fertile platform
for the debate of issues and themes in popular culture. This volume
of essays serves as a foundational handbook for the study and
interpretation of the popular music video, with the specific aim of
examining the industry contexts, cultural concepts, and aesthetic
materials that videos rely upon in order to be both intelligible
and meaningful. Easily accessible to viewers in everyday life,
music videos offer profound cultural interventions and negotiations
while traversing a range of media forms. From a variety of unique
perspectives, the contributors to this volume undertake discussions
that open up new avenues for exploring the creative changes and
developments in music video production. With chapters that address
music video authorship, distribution, cultural representations,
mediations, aesthetics, and discourses, this study signals a major
initiative to provide a deeper understanding of the intersecting
and interdisciplinary approaches that are invoked in the analysis
of this popular and influential musical form.
(Instrumental Folio). Play 50 of your favorite pop tunes on your
instrument of choice This collection features arrangements written
in accessible keys and ranges with lyrics and chord symbols. Songs
include: All My Loving * Blowin' in the Wind * Clocks * Don't Stop
Believin' * Every Breath You Take * Fireflies * Hey, Soul Sister *
In My Life * Love Story * My Girl * Nights in White Satin * Sweet
Caroline * Unchained Melody * Viva La Vida * What a Wonderful World
* You've Got a Friend * and more.
This complete discography of Paul McCartney's solo and other
post-Beatles work examines his entire catalog. It covers his studio
and live albums and compilations, including the trance, electronic,
classical and cover albums and selected bootleg recordings; all of
the singles; videos and DVDs; and the 15 radio shows he made as
Oobu Joobu. Each song is reviewed in depth, providing a wealth of
information for both dedicated McCartney fans and those just
discovering his music.
Since their first performances in 1960, The Beatles' cultural
influence grew in unparalleled ways. From Liverpool to Beatlemania,
and from dance halls to Abbey Road Studios and the digital age, the
band's impact exploded during their heyday, and has endured in the
decades following their disbandment. Beatles fashion and celebrity
culture, politics, psychedelia and the Summer of Love, all
highlight different aspects of the band's complex relationship with
the world around them. With a wide range of short, snapshot
chapters, The Beatles in Context brings together key themes in
which to better explore The Beatles' lives and work and understand
their cultural legacy, focusing on the people and places central to
The Beatles' careers, the visual media that contributed to their
enduring success, and the culture and politics of their time.
Legendary music producer, Gordon Raphael has spent four decades
working with musicians, performers and songwriters to create unique
genre-defining sounds. His work with THE STROKES, REGINA SPEKTOR
and THE LIBERTINES has made him one of the world's most
sought-after music producers. What's his secret? This book gives an
insider's view into how music is created and recorded, sharing
insights into the artistic discoveries that happen when a group of
talented musicians find the right studio, the right producer and
the right sound. Like sitting on the purple velvet couch at New
York's fabled Transporterraum Studio, this rock 'n' roll memoir
gives an All Access Pass to the processes and techniques, the
people and the performances. It's the early 2000s and, for the
first time, young people who've grown up hating their parent's rock
music, have found a reason in the songs of NYC newcomers THE
STROKES to drop their electronica, house and techno for guitars,
Converse, leather jackets-to form their own bands. Focussing on the
eight-year period from the demise of the Seattle grunge scene to
the rebirth of a thrilling cultural shift in New York and London
that reimagined rock 'n' roll. Gordon Raphael shares his tales of
musical glory and loss, creative triumphs and breakups. It's a
bumpy ride with a killer soundtrack.
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