Mark Blake draws on his own interviews with band members as well as the group's friends, road crew, musical contemporaries, former housemates, and university colleagues to produce a riveting history of one of the biggest rock bands of all time. We follow Pink Floyd from the early psychedelic nights at UFO, to the stadium-rock and concept-album zenith of the seventies, to the acrimonious schisms of the late '80s and '90s. Along the way there are fascinating new revelations about Syd Barrett's chaotic life at the time of "Piper at the Gates of Dawn," the band's painstaking and Byzantine recording sessions at Abbey Road, and the fractious negotiations to bring about their fragile, tantalizing reunion in Hyde Park.

Meticulous, exacting, and ambitious as any Pink Floyd album, "Comfortably Numb" is the definitive account of this most adventurous--and most English--rock band.

David Bowie: The Golden YearsAuthor Roger GriffinABOUT THE BOOKDavid Bowie's career is defined by the 70s, his golden years. This book chronicles Bowie's creative life during that decade in a year by year, month by month, day by day format, placing his works in their historical, personal and creative contexts. Every live performance: when and where and who played with him. Every known recording: session details, who played on it, who produced it and release details. Every collaboration is also covered, including production and guest appearances. Film, stage and television appearances: Bowie brought his theatrical training into every performance and created a new form of rock spectacle.Follows Bowie on his journeys across the countries that fired his imagination and inspired his greatest work. A detailed illustrated discography documenting every Bowie recording during this period, including tracks he left in the vault. Many of these ended up on reissues and compilations, which are covered comprehensively - an invaluable reference work.

Redefining Mainstream Popular Music is a collection of seventeen essays that critically examines the idea of the "mainstream" in and across a variety of popular music styles and contexts. Notions of what is popular vary across generations and cultures - what may have been considered alternative to one group may be perceived as mainstream to another. Incorporating a wide range of popular music texts, genres, scenes, practices and technologies from the United Kingdom, North America, Australia and New Zealand, the authors theoretically challenge and augment our understanding of how the mainstream is understood and functions in the overlapping worlds of popular music production, consumption and scholarship. Spanning the local and the global, the historic and contemporary, the iconic and the everyday, the book covers a broad range of genres, from punk to grunge to hip-hop, while also considering popular music through other mediums, including mash-ups and the music of everyday work life. Redefining Mainstream Popular Music provides readers with an innovative and nuanced perspective of what it means to be mainstream.

Late on 8 December 1980, the world stopped turning for millions when news broke that its best-loved rock star had been gunned down in cold blood in New York City. But who, or what, really killed him? And when did the 'real' John Lennon die? Peeling back the layers, acclaimed music biographer and journalist Lesley-Ann Jones tracks the highs and lows that led Lennon to relocate to New York, where he was shot dead on the street outside his apartment building that fateful winter night. Using fresh first-hand research, unseen images and exclusive interviews with those who knew Lennon best, the author's search for answers in this enthralling exploration offers a gripping, 360-degree view of one of our most iconic music legends, four decades on from his tragic death. There have been countless books about the Beatles and John Lennon. There has never been one quite like this.

Madchester may have been born at the Hacienda in the summer of 1988, but the city had been in creative ferment for almost a decade prior to the rise of acid house. The end-of-the-century party is the definitive account of a generational shift in popular music and youth culture, what it meant and what it led to. First published right after the Second Summer of Love, it tells the story of the transition from new pop to the political pop of the mid-1980s and its deviant offspring, post-political pop. Resisting contemporary proclamations about the end of youth culture and the rise of a new, right-leaning conformism, the book draws on interviews with DJs, record company bosses, musicians, producers and fans to outline a clear transition in pop thinking, a move from an obsession with style, packaging and synthetic sounds to content, socially conscious lyrics and a new authenticity. This edition is framed by a prologue by Tara Brabazon, asking how we can reclaim the spirit, energy and authenticity of Madchester for a post-youth, post-pop generation. It is illustrated with iconic photographs by Kevin Cummins. -- .

By the early nineties, singer-songwriter and former Blake Babies member Juliana Hatfield's solo career was taking off: She was on the cover of "Spin" and "Sassy." Ben Stiller directed the video for her song ""Spin the Bottle"" from the "Reality Bites" film soundtrack. Then, after canceling a European tour to treat severe depression and failing to produce another ""hit,"" she spent a decade releasing well reviewed albums on indie labels and performing in ever-smaller clubs. A few years ago, she found herself reading the "New Yorker" on a filthy couch in the tiny dressing room of a punk club and asked, ""Why am I still doing this?"" By turns wryly funny and woundingly sincere, "When I Grow Up" takes you behind the scenes of rock life as Hatfield recounts her best and worst days, the origins of her songs, the source of her woes, and her quest to find a new purpose in life.

This is the story of the Cavern Club - the most famous club in the world. The Cavern saw the birth of the Beatles and Merseybeat, and more. Respected author, music journalist and Merseybeat historian Spencer Leigh - with a little help from Sir Paul McCartney, who provides the Foreword - tells the Cavern's history by talking to the owners, hundreds of musicians who played at the club, the backroom staff and fans. Spencer paints a vivid picture of the Cavern, from its days as a jazz club, through the Beatles years to the present.

Popular Music and the Moving Image in Eastern Europe is the first collection to discuss the ways in which popular music has been used cinematically, from musicals to music videos to documentary film, in Eastern Europe from 1945 to the present day. It argues that during the period of state socialism, moving image was an important tool of promoting music in the respective countries and creating popular cinema. Yet despite this importance, filmmakers who specialized in musicals lacked the social prestige of leading 'auteurs' and received little critical attention. The resulting scholarly prejudice towards pop culture created a severe shortage of critical studies of the genre. With the fall of state socialism - and with it, the need for economically viable film and media industries - brought about an unprecedented upsurge of films utilizing popular music, and a greater recognition of popular cinema as a legitimate object of study. Popular Music and the Moving Image in Eastern Europe fills the gap and demonstrates why the popular music-cinema interface needs to be theorized with respect to the political, ideological, and social forces invested in popular culture.

DIY House Shows and Music Venues in the US is an interdisciplinary study of house concerts and other DIY ('do-it-yourself') music venues in the US, such as warehouses, all-ages clubs and guerrilla shows, with its primary focus on West Coast American DIY locales. Focusing on DIY houses, music venues, social spaces, and local and translocal cultural geographies, the author examines how American DIY communities constitute themselves in relation to their social and spatial environment. The ethnographic approach shows the inner-workings of American DIY culture, and how the particular people within particular places strive to achieve a social ideal of an "intimate" community.

The ultimate showbiz insider's expose, HOWLING AT THE MOON, is the wildly entertaining and brilliantly narrated autobiography of Walter Yetnikoff, head of CBS Records during its heyday in the 1980s, and then the most powerful man in the music industry. Yetnikoff knew most of the stars and embraced all the excesses of this era: he was mentor to Streisand, father confessor to Michael Jackson, shared a mistress with Marvin Gaye and came to blows with Mick Jagger. He feuded with David Geffen and outmanoeuvred Rupert Murdoch. He was also addicted to cocaine and alcohol - until his doctor gave him just 3 months to live. Yetnikoff came from a working- class Jewish family from Brooklyn; he graduated from law school in the 1950s and proceeded to climb the corporate ladder to the very top. His high-flying ended in breakdown, but throughout his rise and fall, Yetnikoff remained a man of huge charisma and disarming charm. HOWLING AT THE MOON is written with David Ritz, the only 4-time winner of the Ralph J Gleason Music Book award, who has collaborated on the autobiographies of such stars as Ray Charles, BB King, Aretha Franklin and Etta James.

Teaching the Beatles is designed to provide ideas for instructors who teach the music of the Beatles. Experienced contributors describe varied approaches to effectively convey the group's characteristics and lasting importance. Some of these include: treating the Beatles' lyrics as poetry; their influence on the world of art, film, fashion and spirituality; the group's impact on post-war Britain; political aspects of the Fab Four; Lennon and McCartney's songwriting and musical innovations; the band's use of recording technology; business aspects of the Beatles' career; and insights into teaching the Beatles in an online format.

(Piano/Vocal/Guitar Artist Songbook). 40 of the pop diva's biggest smash hits, including: Always Be My Baby * Can't Let Go * Dreamlover * Emotions * Hero * Love Takes Time * Loverboy * One Sweet Day * Vision of Love * Whenever You Call * and more

"Prince: All the Songs is a major achievement...[It] may be the definitive single-volume book about Prince for both its breadth and the way it views his life through the songs that were the true essence of his being." - Psychobabble Spanning nearly 50 years of albums, EPs, B-sides, and more, read the full story behind all of the songs that Prince ever released. Moving chronologically through his epic back catalogue, expert author Benoit Clerc analyses everything there is to know about each song and session. No stone is left unturned across more than 600 pages, illustrated with incredible photography throughout. From the inspiration behind the lyrics and melody to the recording process and even the musicians and producers who worked on each track, uncover the stories behind the music in this truly definitive book - a must-have for every Prince fan.

Whiskey and porn stars, hot reds and car crashes, black leather and high heels, overdoses and death. This is the life of Mötley Crüe, the heaviest drinking, hardest fighting, most oversexed and arrogant band in the world. Their unbelievable exploits are the stuff of rock 'n' roll legend. They nailed the hottest chicks, started the bloodiest fights, partied with the biggest drug dealers, and got to know the inside of every jail cell from California to Japan. They have dedicated an entire career to living life to its extreme, from the greatest fantasies to the darkest tragedies. Tommy married two international sex symbols; Vince killed a man and lost a daughter to cancer; Nikki overdosed, rose from the dead, and then OD'd again the next day; and Wick shot a woman and tried to hang his own brother. But that's just the beginning. Fueled by every drug they could get their hands on and obscene amounts of alcohol, driven by fury and headed straight for hell, Mötley Crüe raged through two decades, leaving behind a trail of debauched women, trashed hotel rooms, crashed cars, psychotic managers, and broken bones that has left the music industry cringing to this day. All these unspeakable acts, not to mention their dire consequences, are laid bare in The Dirt.

Here -- directly from Nikki, Vince, Tommy, and Mick -- is the unexpurgated version of the whole glorious, gut-wrenching story. In these pages, published for the first time anywhere, are Tommy Lee's letters to Pamela Anderson from prison: Mick's confession to having an incurable disease that is slowly killing him; Vince's experience burying his own daughter -- and the train wreck that his life became afterward; and Nikki's anguished struggle to deal with an entire life fueled by anger over his childhood abandonment, his discovery of the family he never knew he had -- and his subsequent loss of them. And all of it accompanied by scores of rare, never-before-published photographs, mug shots, and handwritten lyrics. No one is spared. Not David Lee Roth, Ozzy Osbourne, Vanity, Aerosmith, Heather Locklear, AC/DC, Lita Ford, Iron Maiden, Pamela Anderson, Guns N' Roses, Donna D'Errico, RATT, or those two girls from Dallas, Texas.

Make no mistake about it: these guys are geniuses. They invented glam metal and then left it in the dust; sold more than forty million albums from Shout at the Devil to Dr. Feelgood; toured the world dozen times and have the scars to prove it it; and maintained a rabid following in an era of throwaway pop stars. Mötley Crüe has done nothing less than tattoo the psyche of the entire MTV generation. They are the ultimate rock 'n' roll band. And if you don't believe it, read The Dirt. You don't know what decadence is...

It all started in London. More than fifty years ago, a generation of teens created something that would change the face of music forever. London, Reign Over Me immerses us in the backroom clubs, basement record shops, and late-night faint radio signals of 1960s Britain, where young hopefuls like Peter Frampton, Dave Davies, and Mick Jagger built off American blues and jazz to form a whole new sound. Author Stephen Tow weaves together original interviews with over ninety musicians and movers-and-shakers of the time to uncover the uniquely British story of classic rock's birth. Capturing the stark contrast of bursting artistic energy with the blitzkrieg landscape leftover from World War II, London, Reign Over Me reveals why classic rock 'n' roll could only have been born in London. A new sound from a new generation, this music helped spark the most important cultural transformation of the twentieth century. Key interviews include: *Jon Anderson (Yes) *Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull) *Rod Argent (The Zombies) *Chris Barber (Chris Barber Jazz Band) *Joe Boyd (Producer/manager) *Arthur Brown (Crazy World of Arthur Brown) *David Cousins (The Strawbs) *Dave Davies (The Kinks) *Spencer Davis (Spencer Davis Group) *Judy Dyble (Fairport Convention) *Ramblin' Jack Elliott (Solo folk/blues artist) *Peter Frampton (Humble Pie, solo artist) *Roger Glover (Deep Purple) *Steve Howe (Yes) *Neil Innes (Bonzo Dog Band; Monty Python) *Kenney Jones (The Small Faces; The Who) *Greg Lake (King Crimson; Emerson, Lake & Palmer) *Manfred Mann (Manfred Mann) *Terry Marshall (Marshall Amplification) *Dave Mason (Traffic) *Phil May (The Pretty Things) *John Mayall (The Bluesbreakers) *Jim McCarty (The Yardbirds) *Ian McLagan (The Small Faces) *Jacqui McShee (The Pentangle) *Peter Noone (Herman's Hermits) *Carl Palmer (Atomic Rooster; Emerson, Lake & Palmer) *Jan Roberts (Eel Pie Island Documentary Project) *Paul Rodgers (Free) *Peggy Seeger (Solo folk artist) *Hylda Sims (Club owner) *Keith Skues (DJ: Radio Caroline, Radio London, Radio One) *Jeremy Spencer (Fleetwood Mac) *John Steel (The Animals) *Al Stewart (Solo folk artist) *Dick Taylor (The Pretty Things) *Ray Thomas (The Moody Blues) *Richard Thompson (Fairport Convention) *Rick Wakeman (The Strawbs, Yes) *Barrie Wentzell (Photographer: Melody Maker)

The living embodiment of The Beatles and a musical juggernaut without parallel, Paul McCartney is the patriarch of pop. Ahead of McCartney's 80th birthday and Glastonbury headline set, acclaimed author Howard Sounes creates the most accurate and extensive profile of McCartney ever built, leaving no stone unturned, and no shadow unexplored. He is the torch-bearer of the Beatles - the greatest band in pop - and one of the most closely studied stars in show business. But surprises and secrets still linger in the life of Sir Paul McCartney. In FAB, his full story is told for the first time. Acclaimed author Howard Sounes spent more than two years investigating every aspect of Sir Paul's life and work, including interviewing over 200 people. The result is the richest and more comprehensive biography of McCartney ever written. Uniquely, FAB pays equal attention to the story of Paul McCartney both in the Beatles and post-Beatles, creating a unique narrative spanning the arc of the artist's life. FAB culminates in the sensational human story of Sir Paul's calamitous marriage to Heather Mills, which is fully revealed for the first time. Sounes proves a judicious critic of the music of an iconic star while also delivering a superb psychological portrait of the man.

(Piano/Vocal/Guitar Artist Songbook). Our songbook features all 12 exuberant and hook-laden tunes from Avril's third CD: The Best Damn Thing * Contagious * Everything Back but You * Girlfriend * Hot * I Can Do Better * I Don't Have to Try * Innocence * Keep Holding On * One of Those Girls * Runaway * When You're Gone.

The first book ever on the classic British rock band UFO. Based around the author's many interviews with all the key players such as Phil Mogg, Pete Way & Michael Schenker. Noted author Martin Popoff takes you through the Schenker era in great detail; album-by-album, song by song along with touring anecdotes and of course, tales revolving around the wild and excessive behaviour that was very much a part of the band. Rounding if off is a full discography.

"Hoskyns brings a genuine love as well as an outsider's keen eye to the rise and fall of the California scene...This is a riveting story, sensitively told." - Anthony DeCurtis, Contributing Editor, "Rolling Stone". From enduring musical achievements to drug fueled chaos and bed hopping antics, the L.A. pop music scene in the sixties and seventies was like no other, and journalist Barney Hoskyns re-creates all the excitement and mayhem. "Hotel California" brings to life the genesis of Crosby, Stills, and Nash at Joni Mitchell's house; the Eagles' backstage fistfights after the success of "Hotel California"; the drama of David Geffen and the other money men who transformed the L.A. music scene; and more. Barney Hoskyns (London, UK) is the former U.S. correspondent for MOJO, the author of several books about music and Hollywood, and the cofounder of rocksbackpages.com, a rock journalism library.