I sure hope the author feels good about himself

I was dissapointed in this book, written by the keyboard player for one of my favorite bands, the Faces. Like virtually every other book I've ever read by or about a rocker (small 'r', not Rocker, with a big "r', which a good Mod would still take as an insult, I'm sure), ALL THE RAGE is little more than a litany of boozy gigs, plane trips, dull hangovers, and bad business deals.

All The Rage was GREAT FUN!!! A story of one the ORIGINAL MODS! A member of the seminal Mod band The Small Faces ( as well as The Faces: the band's sound ripped off by the Black Crowes) "Mac " McLagan is a funny and poignant writer. Why read All The Rage? What relevance and interest does this autobiography hold? Well, MOD is the ONLY authentic, non "corporate", GRASS roots YOUTH culture dynamic going today. The book chronicles the life of one of its EARLIEST participants and shows how Mod , with its roots heavily rooted in US Blues and Soul morphed into Heavy Rock ( such as Led Zeppelin, Humble Pie and McLagan's Faces) while other elements branched into Disco /funk of Rod Stewarts ( Do You Think I'm Sexy? era) and the murky combo of BOTH genres in the "Some Girls" heyday of The Rolling Stones. "Mac " was there for ALL of it and shares the details of what went on BEHIND the SCENES. Any student of youth culture and pop music will find the book invaluable as well as a LOT OF FUN!The stories of musical triumphs and debacles are sad, poignant and most of all well written.

I thought the book gave a brief but to the point over view of how the funk mob got started. It was ok but it left out the names of some of the players of the funk ie.. Sheila Horn,Jessica Cleaves Steve Washington,Mickey Atkins to name a few. The funk is long deep and wide.

Being that I am a hardcore Parliament-Funkadelic fan, I found this book to be a bit of a dissapointment. It was hard to keep up with what year the editor was going into. The book reads very fast and seems crammed. Each chapter covered at least 5 years at a time. However, being that there has never been a book written about George Clinton and P-Funk, this book is definitely entertaining, informing and revealing. It was good to read what other members takes are on P-Funk. Interesting insights were the introduction of George to Bootsy, quarrels within the band, the competition between the Brides of Funkenstein and Parlet, and how the band broke up. I personally would have liked to know more about the relationships between the musicians, especially clinton/collins/worrell, and Lynn Mabry, an original bride, seems to be absent from the book. I also would have liked to know how George and the other members of the band to talk about how they wrote and formed some of their biggest hits. I especially would have liked them to comment on the concepts of hits like "P-Funk (Wants to get funked up)" "Dr. Funkenstein" and "Sir Nose D'Voiddoffunk". All-n-all, this book should be read by all HARDCORE P-Funk fans until something better comes along.

Peace El-715

loved this book loys of info aboput the band, but my fault was i wanted more details about about the group, and what made them inspire to write the p-funk hits, how george really felt about his material being sampled. what are plans for the mob. george was interesting, bootsy was,nt given enough space. but not a bad place for those who want to learn about p-funk. but will leave funkateers craving more knowledge.this book really needs to be updated. it seems some stuff was left out.

This book is decent, although others are better. I would recommend a read if you are a Jackson fan.

At times, Dave Marsh succumbs to overt hyperbole (who the hell cares whether Jackson loves Bugs Bunny cartoons?) and white "progressive" racist arrogance (Yo, Dave, if "black people carry a burden in America, Michael"---ain't that caused by white racism?). Still, by and large, it serves as a good book on M.J. up to THRILLER (I wish he'd update it for the 90's), and it functions nicely as ironic commentary on his own newsletter (ROCK & RAP CONFIDENTIAL)'s runaway, naive intergrationist/communitarian rhetoric.

Dear Dave,

Dave, I have a few notions about why your book, _Trapped_, is now sadly out of print. It is, after all, perhaps the best-written tome you've ever come up with. It's filled with more honest emotion than any of your other writing. It's a book that bleeds and struggles and fights with itself. So why, Dave, do you think this book fell away from us?

Could it, Dave, have something to do with the white-liberal-inadvertant racism and condescension that offends to the very marrow of one's bones? Could it be, Dave, your "smarter/holier/morally superior-than-thou" stance? Could it, Dave, have something to do with the ugly, though again inadvertant homophobia that drips creepily from so many of the pages of this book? Could it be that in looking way down on your subject, you dug yourself a hole of hypocrisy from which you've never entirely been able to climb out?

Could it be, Dave, that you were never satisfied with just being a music lover and critic? That you, Dave, wanted to somehow _control_ what musicians said and did to an utterly unreasonable extent? Could it be, Dave, that you wanted those musicians to look up to you, and ask for and follow your advice every time they made a public move?

Finally, could the problem, Dave, be that you finally did find yourself an artist who listened obediantly when you wrote (or quite probably said) "Dear Bruce . . ." And could it be that you were happier when that artist fulfilled your dreams instead of his own?

Dave, you're a fine writer and your analysis of Jackson's songs rank among some of the most insightful ever written. This is why it is so sad that your book is so hard to find. Why, there are times when you propel a listener to run to the nearest CD player and put on their Jackson records immediately. Your words make the music dance right off the page. You seem to understand Jackson's fear, and rage, and pain as he sings those emotions on his records. You even capture the joy of the records like few other writers. You truly illuminate what is best in Jackson's music, and even at time betray a compassion for the man that you try not to feel.

But, Dave, what you failed to do here, as elsewhere, is to take a good look first at the man in the mirror before wagging your finger down at the struggles of another.

ROCK AND ROLL (now named RAP---hell of a P.C. gesture for a rockcrit who, in the latest edition of the BOOK OF ROCK LISTS, listed the Rolling Stones' 1976 BLACK & BLUE LP the"first album to fall victim to political correctness," i.e., feminist protests against that LP's misogynist ad campagin) CONFIDENTIAL bills itself as "The Voice Of The Undesirable Element," and, truth to tell, on such issues as music censorship, the newsletter does often serve a useful purpose. Unfortunately, the newsletter is too often a retro-acid flashback to the male-left rhetoric that destroyed the 60's radical movement. For example, in this book, RRC disses and demonizes "women's music" artist Cris Williamson with the viciousness the U.S. government demonizes its enemines (RRC compares her to Cambodia's murderous leader, Pol Pot---which, to me is like George Bush Sr. calling Saddam Hussein worse than Hitler). And elsewhere, Marsh and his RRC cohorts rake the New York branch of NOW (the National Orginization for Women) over the hot coals for criticizing Bruce Springsteen's use of the term "little girl" in his songs. Now, if this meant that Marsh & Co. were taking a consistent stand against "the tyrrany of political correctness," I'd respectfully agree to disagree----but in the same book, they voice staunch support for a similar campaign against the 80's heavy-metal group Def Leppard by a Hispanic-rights group for calling Latin-American immigrants "greasy Mexicans." Mexicans." I guess that in what they call "The Rock & Roll Confidential Era," Mexican-Americans have made it the ranks of Downtrodden & Oppressed, but women haven't. RRC owes NOW or Def Leppard (or both) and the politically conscious everywhere an apology for one of the most naked examples of hyprocisy ever to come from a group calling itself "progressive."

Dave Marsh's biography tells the story of how Bruce Springsteen went from daydreaming of being just like Elvis, to Rock 'N' Roll icon. Marsh painstakingly details Bruce's rise from obscurity to his peak in the music world. Sometimes preachy, sometimes succumbing to information overload, Marsh writes from the subjective viewpoint of a true believer. Essential reading for any Springsteen fan.

Although I've valued Dave Marsh's musical taste and criticism over the years, this book is an embarrassing suckup to Bruce. Marsh criticizes Springsteen's fans for resisting elements of Born in the USA and its accompanying hoopla, but never fairly addresses the possibility that they may be correct in assessing the album's failures. Other reviewers are right that in Marsh's mind, Springsteen can do no wrong, both musically and personally. The low point of this book for me was his fawning over not only Dancing in the Dark (one of my most depressing moments as a Springsteen fan was the disappointment I felt when the long awaited new single turned out to be this synth-driven throwaway), but the dance remixes of the Born in the USA singles. Yuck! Even more frustrating is the fact that Marsh never questions the judgment of Jon Landau as he pushes the reluctant Springsteen towards superstardom. It was clear to me the compromises Bruce made to gain such popularity.

In David Marsh's biography of one of the best rockers; of his era; he portrays the life story of Bruce Springsteen in his book, Glory Day's. The book starts off with the telling of Springsteen's emense popularity throughout almost all the nations in the world. Springsteen scheduled more concerts in different countries than could be imagined by any fan. He was a man who tried to play as many concerts as he could, to try to give the much desired music to his awaiting fans. Bruce's music was extremely popular in the 1980's as he toured throughout the world.
In the beginning of this book, Marsh states that Springsteen's career started up with the release of the album "Born in the U.S.A." on June 4, 1984. People referred to the album as the base for the start of his career. Marsh dictates all the little details of Bruce Springsteen's career starting with release of "Born in the U.S.A." all the way through the individual concerts on each individual tour. He wrote about them to magnify the talents and achievements of Springsteen's life and career. Marsh depicted the unappreciated things that Springsteen did for his fans and that were not taken note of or recognized by some of his fans.
Dave Marsh writes in a couple different types of styles about his opinions and views on Springsteen and his music. Marsh first writes about him in a type of constructive criticism. This up to the reader mainly to decide whether he is actually going after Bruce or is maybe implying something that Bruce could have done differently. The other way Marsh writes about Springsteen is in a larger than life overwhelming presence figure in the music world at that time. He writes about Bruce as if he were a god like figure. He also writes it to say that he was grossly underestimated for being a part of some of the most new music at that time. Marsh tried to make it clear that Bruce did more for his fans than ever could be expressed like the way he did. "After Leeds, the Born in the U.S.A. tour, about a year on the road, had played 128 shows with a total attendance of 2.9 million." (p. 321) Bruce played each concert with the same excitement he did as when he played his first show.
I thought that Dave Marsh was a bit to critical at times, however fair in others. He tried to show the general public that Springsteen was an amazing musician that played with the same vigor even if he played 128 shows in a year he loved playing each and every one of them. It was a quick read at times and at others I thought the details were overwhelming and not needed. Marsh did a nice job at complimenting Springsteen at his accomplishments and his superb playing contributions to the music world.

This is not an awful book, as other reviews have suggested. Dave Marsh's unabashed enthusiasm for Bruce's music should not be taken as gospel. Do you believe everything you read? Heck no! As with any rabid fan's writing, "Glory Days" contains its share of deification, but a closer look might reveal things of which you were not previously aware. "Dancing in the Dark" does indeed possess a rather dark set of lyrics, but I, like many other Springsteen fans, had dismissed it as synthetic fluff. What a mistake! What insight on the part of the writer, in this and many other instances! What a great book!

... The "collage of voices" approach endemic to oral history leads in this case to a frustrating, almost indigestible mess. Dave Marsh warns in his editor's note to the For The Record series of which this volume is a part, "if an artist isn't especially interested in what happens in the recording studio but has a fascination with what happens in hotel rooms after live gigs, that's what you'll get." So, instead of getting more than the barest glimpse inside the studio during the recording of There's A Riot Going On, surely one of the deepest albums in all of American popular music history, we are given page after page devoted to the band's sex lives, taste in drugs, and even their surprising if unilluminating avocation as collective dog fanciers (really!). What's missing, literally, is Sly's voice, which leaves a gaping hole in the center of the narrative. By connecting the dots one can glean a few insights about the music from the mass of bleary anecdotes herein, but aren't authors and editors are supposed to do that for you? If you're in the market for a mess of depressing gossip, this will be your meat; if you're seeking insight into the man's (and the group's) brilliant music, look elsewhere.

I have long believed that Sly and The Family Stone are quite possibly the most under-rated rock band ever. They may be enshrined the RnR Hall of Fame, but their records are now unfairly viewed as nothing more than oldies radio fare.

In their time they were revolutionaries who broke down the barriers between "black music" and "white music"; in the process, they were instrumental in creating what later became known as "Funk".

When I found out about this book, I was thrilled. AT LAST---some insight into WHY the band made the music that they did!

No such luck here.

Crammed with lurid, voyeuristic, tales of excess and decline that sadly became the band's legacy, For the Record offers little insight into just what went into creating the music and records.

While readers might have loved to have found out something about Sly's inspiration for There's A Riot Goin' On, beyond "he was taking a lot of drugs"---that's about all that's offered here.

No doubt, the fact that drug casualty Sly was not available to offer his insights made the author's task more difficult(impossible?), you gotta believe that there had to have been SOME people with a little more insight into THE MUSIC of Sly Stone, rather than just the ugliness that went on behind the scenes.

It should have been better.

I thought this was a decent book with some good anecdotes and stories. One thing to consider--even though it may not be a literary masterpiece, it IS a book about Sly, and it does cover a lot of his activities, both as a DJ and then as the perenially F*d up bandleader for probably the funkiest band in history. That fact, in and of itself, makes it worth reading. To me, an average book about Sly is always better than a great book on lesser topics.

By the way, isn't Sly still alive? Doesn't that exempt him from technically being a "drug casualty?"

I would have to agree with the anonymous writer from Florida on most accounts. I choose to give this one star instead of two because of the wasted potential this book could have been. Any amateur could have written such a simple summary of the careers of Billy Joel, Simon & Garfunkel, Eric Clapton, etc. Pete Fornatale is giving us nothing new there.

In addition, Fornatale frequently fails to even quotes the lyrics of the songs acurately. His expansion on the song's true meanings are suspect at best. As a disc jockey for many years, he could've provided some interesting insight on what each song-writer was trying to say in his song lyrics. However, Fornatale merely goes off on every possible tangent to illustrate all possible meanings each song could have. This makes the book very painful to read and quite unfocused.

On top of all the incessant ramblings, Fornatale's analysis is very questionable. In his analysis of the Rolling Stones, Time Waits For No One, Fornatale misleads the readers thinking that if you blow an opportunity to succede in life, another one will come along only with different players. Whereas that may indeed in happen in life, the song merely gives the message to make the most of all your opportunties because they don't last for you, me, or anyone. The analysis for Presence of The Lord doesn't hit the point as well. Having read a book analyzing Eric Clapton's songs, the meaning behind Presence Of The Lord is that Eric who never was a religious man just wanted to Thank G-d for the little things in life. Mr. Fornatale's lack of research caused him to miss the mark again.

The premise of this book was to show that Rock N Roll wasn't just about sex, drugs, and rock n roll. Yet, Fornatale includes the Rolling Stones song Satisfaction in this book. This signature Stones song is clearly written from the point of view of someone who is just looking for sex, drugs, and rock n roll. What about the line,"He Can't be a man because he don't smoke the same cigarettes as me". Its obvious what kind of Cigarettes he's referring to. The last verse refers to Mick trying to find some girl to score with. Mr. Fornatele, you should be embarrased to include this song as an uplifting wholesome rock n roll song.

On top of all that, the format for each brief chapter is oh so redundant. Why couldn't our author merely write a simple analysis without categorizing everything? It all sounds the same anyway.

For every good moment in this batch(there are a few most particularly pertaining to Bruce Springsteen) there are about three or four bad moments. Mr. Fornatale, I implore you to research your material before publishing your next book. Glance at this in the book store for a few minutes but don't bring it to the cash register.

When I saw the title of this book, I expected a tongue in cheek exposition of classic rock songs and their "meanings". However, rather than being humorous, this book is quite serious. It is sort of like reading a secular version of "Our Daily Bread" or other religious devotional guide. Each entry has a brief but interesting background on the artist and the song (the reason for two stars rather than one), followed by a reflection and some questions or exercises designed to put into practice the lessons taught by the songs. These reflection and question sections are overly serious and didactic, and it is the contrast between the somewhat "cute" concept behind the book, and the "preachy" tone of the meditations that makes it quite unsatisfying.

This book offers great insight and knowledge into many popular classic rock songs. Many of the life lessons and messages are obvious, such as the Beatles 'All You Need is Love' and Billy Joel's 'Just the Way You Are.' However, there are some songs analyzed by the authors whose meanings are not quite understood by the songs titles' and requires a deeper, more focsued listening. I love how the book makes mention of Bruce Springsteen's 'Badlands' in a positive manner...it truly is a song to get you moving and think positive. If you are a classic rock and roll fan, you will highly enjoy this book and the insight that it reveals about popular songs.