This book is thorough and well researched, but the prose is rather pedestrian and a good editor could have helped a lot. The pictures alone are worth the price for a real Neil fan.

A detailed account of Neil's life before Buffalo Springfield. (Einarson also wrote a book on BS with Richie Furay) "Don't Be Denied" is probably the most valuable book available for people wanting information about Neil that is not otherwise widely known by Neil fans (and who else reads these types of books).

Einarson writes more like a small town newspaperman than "an author" but that is part of the charm of this book. Einarson is obviously proud that a fellow Canadian has achieved all that Neil has and unlike many who write these types of books never tries to place himself as a peer of the subject. I found the book informative and enjoyable.

My only complaint is that the copy i bought was not well manufactured with several pages at the end out of order and duplicated which made it cumbersome to read.

Of all the books on Neil Young I've read, this one is the most interesting and informative. He really delves into the man and the music. It's not gossipy at all, but very interesting.

This book is notable for what was left out. It doesn't delve into why the current version of BTO will not play with him, or why Burton Cummings affixed the "Aesop Bachman" moniker to him. All in all, the Randy Bachman story is that of a tremendously talented man who was as ruthless business-wise as he was talented musically. Some things are more important than money and power, namely family, which is one lesson this man has apparently never learned. Save your money.

At last, a detailed, readable biography of a man whose music career spans close to 40 years! Randy Bachman and John Einarson team up to provide a detailed and entertaining chronicle of a huge part of rock history, one that has been long overlooked. Randy Bachman's credentials are quite impressive, and as a founding member of rock legends The Guess Who, and Bachman-Turner Overdrive, has contributed many songs that will be forever inbedded in the minds of music lovers. A good deteailed look into the Canadian music scene of the 1960's adds a very descriptive view of a time far away and far more innocent. A bit long, the book could have been shortened a little, but overall, a great job and great read on a man, overlooked for far too long. Highly reccomended.

Randy Bachman, guitarist with the Guess Who, Brave Belt and Bachman Turner Overdrive, delivers with a candid look at his life and career, all the way from his beginnings on the north side of Winnipeg Manitoba. His chapters detailing the early years of the groups he was in, and the whole atmosphere of the early 60's is excellent. One gets images of Saturday night at the community centre with all the young bands in town competing against one another. The tale moves on to sudden success, followed by the introduction of Burton Cummings into the Guess Who, and the several years of struggling.

The huge success of the Guess Who in the late 60's runs the gamut from the thrill of hearing their song on American radio, to the major breakthroughs, and then the downside of the firing/resignation of Bachman from the group, one of the more controversial moments in Canadian rock and roll history.

Bachman started over with his own band called Brave Belt, and in many ways he was back to square one. These chapters are interesting to read, as it was the low point of his career, but one in which the seeds of BTO were planted. After a few tough years, one enjoys Randy's comeback and triumph, with the title song becoming another national anthem in Canada almost. Throughout it all, Randy touches on the business end of music a great deal, and his day to day life with his family over the years. The volatile love/hate relationship with Burton Cummings is featured prominently as well. Now that the group is on an endless "greatest hits" tour, it seems that the hatchet has been finally been buried, whether it be out of making peace or raking in the nostalgia dollars. Enjoy this book, it's a page turner for the Randy Bachman fan especially.

The Clash, shortlived though they were, was one of the great rock bands of all time.

David Quantick's book here, The Clash, from the Kill Your Idols series, is a thin little book heavy on the author's opinion (I do realize it's supposed to be a CRITICAL biography, but more on this is below), and light on wisdom.

First, the positive elements of Quantick's book:

1) a great grasp of the discography. He reviews practically every Clash record: LPs, singles, B-sides, and CDs, not to mention CD tributes by other bands.

2) some insidery gossip on the clash, including stories about how the songs came about. This background is great, as it tends to make the band seem like ordinary guys, and they seem a lot more fun once you've read these anecdotes.

3) the longish essay at the back of the book is very good, and I read it with relish even after the book had annoyed me to that point. This essay is very well written.

now here are the rubs:

1) the author's catty and immature tone: he calls "guns on the roof" SILLY, the u.s. version of their debut album "mangled, bizarre" (despite the fact that only four tracks are different from the U.K. version), and the book is full of insults and condemnations of anything else the author cares to take a potshot at, like U.K. radio, U.S.A. radio, EMI (USA), and Rolling Stone magazine.

2) Often the author just doesn't know what he's talking about.

He can't be more in the dark about The Clash when he writes this about Death or Glory-- "The Clash's self-obsession is never funnier than on Death or Glory. They were a band, not a cavalry regiment, for goodness sake." For crying out loud, it's a song making fun of that VERY attitude.

Check this out about The Clash and Sting: "They may have not been very good at reggae when they started but they invented a musical form that allowed Sting to become rich."

What? The Police worked out their reggaeish sound before The Clash did. Does he mean Sting's solo records, which are jazz-inflected pop? Geez, I hope not. But it seems you just can't tell, with this author.

3) He's repetitive.

Quantick calls Hitsville U.K. (I admit, it's not a good song) an "all-time artistic low." Fair enough. But then later in the book he calls the same song "insanely bad." Gotcha, Dave. A few pages later, Quantick must have had the urge to use the same modifier again, so he calls the same song "insanely dreadful." Please.

If you have to own everything Clash, you'll get this book no matter what I say, I suppose.

If you don't, and you'd like something more substantial than Quantick's book, I recommend Marcus Gray's book called LAST GANG IN TOWN: STORY AND MYTH OF THE CLASH.

ken32

This book is a fountain of everything important about the careers of the members of the Clash. Not only does it give you the biography of the band, but helpful reviews of all of the releases. It also reviews the releases of the band members own musical endevours outside of the clash. Although it is opinionated, it still offers an excellent read. This book is reminds me of all of those field guides you used in science class, except it is based on one of the greatest bands ever. Essential for any Clash Fan. Buy it.

Already some years ago, the FBI made the "Elvis-file" available for the public. It's the best-sold FBI-file in history. Elvis-The Secret Files is based on the FBI files and contains remarkable interpretations from John Parker.

The files contain letters (e.g. from people in 1956 concerned about Elvis' supposed bad influence on the American youth), pictures and other "facts" only interesting for the die-hard Elvisfan. Parker comes up with a theory that it is likely that Elvis has been murdered, perhaps even by the mafia. Elvis was swindled for about $1 million with the redecoration of one of his planes and the planned lease of it. The plan went wrong and Elvis was supposed to testify in a lawsuit against those swindlers at the end of August 1977. Elvis died at August 16, 1977...

Read this book yourself and make up your own mind. One thing is for sure: you won't be bored.

Elvis may have sung songs like "It's a Wonderful World" and "Fairytale" but this book suggests that Elvis' personal life was all too real, plagued by his own excesses and outside forces apparently driven to exploit him, indeed to a tragic end. This subject matter is very disturbing and FBI file information seems to support such speculation.
However, if we accept that Elvis actually had a terminal illness [reportedly bone cancer] and that his personal conversations foreshadowing his own impending death are true then one must think that his passing was not the result of foul play. Yes, it is reasonable to wonder about the described telephone calls to Washington close to the time of a Grand Jury hearing to address his victimization. But I must reiterate that Elvis Presley's health was possibly in rapid decline and this points to a much more common departure from this realm.

Although this book is somewhat entertaining, it is also very impersonal. Most of the interviews are from a second person point of view. The other problem I have with this book is that the persons asked about Eltons problem's weren't that important to him. And finally the last problem was that it was like reading an issue of Rolling Stone(where most of the first quotes came form). If are a true Elton John fan, this would make a nice nightstand book(or paper weight), depending on what side of elton you love the most.

This Book is a pretty thorough look at the life of pop superstar Elton John. From his early days as Reginald Kenneth Dwight to his tenure in the London group Bluesology, To his transformation Of New Singing/Piano Playing Sensation known as Elton John. The Book is interesting enough to hold your attention for the most part. But there is also a lot of negativity surrounding Elton's life. There are too many details. The book divulges more of Elton's personal life than I want to know. Some of the information is just too straightforward and direct. Don't get me wrong, I still think this book is worth reading, It's just that it gets a little too personal at times, and sometimes it's a little hard to take. But judge for yourself. Don't just take my word for it.

Sport & Face Climbing is a valuable instructional resource, like the other books in the series. As usual with Long's books, it is a clear and engaging read. It primarily focuses on movement on rock, footwork and different holds, subjects which are difficult to describe in text, and within limitations does well. Very little ropework, belaying or anchoring is covered. The lack of information on belaying for sport climbing is a little troubling, but it would be out of date in any case since this edition precedes the Gri-Gri. The sections on competitions and indoor climbing seem outdated, and readers will find some of the definitions -- i.e. "soloing" -- confusing. I haven't read Sport Climbing, part of the same series, but it may represent an updated presentation of similar information.

All the books in this series are worthy to own. A decent way to learn technique without taking a class.

Two things kept me from enjoying this book. The first was the sense that the history it related was very disproportionate. The second was the overall feeling that the book was very hurriedly written.

These two faults are never more evident than when the author is writing about what he terms "The First Wave" of Christian rock (1966-1979). To begin with, the author devotes less than fifty pages to this period (when Christian rock - by the mere fact that it was in its infancy - was at its most exciting possibility-wise) and almost three times that much space to everything 1980 and thereafter. Moreover, while reading about this "First Wave", one cannot help but feel that the author's mindset while writing that section was "Let's hurry up talking about this pre-1980 stuff, so that we can get to what interests me!" Case in point is the fact that little more than one paragraph is devoted to the group Agape (the first real Christian rock band and one which all agree was a trailblazer, a pioneer, and a maverick of Christian music)!

A rather sloppy job, if you ask me.

"Meanwhile, artists and bands like Allies, John Elefante, Mark Farner, Idle Cure, Jag, Legend Seven, Liaison, Mastedon, PFR, Ruscha, Skillet, Switchfoot, and Matthew Ward get little, if any, credit in this book."

Gee, maybe that's because they produced mostly unoriginal, derivative drivel.

"Sure, the 80's group Daniel Amos was okay, but they are mentioned throughout the book as if they were to Christian rock what the Beatles were to secular rock and roll."

Well, that's exactly what they are, artistically speaking. Or maybe they're the REM of Christian rock, or the Nirvana of Christian rock -- the only difference being that DA never had success with charts or record sales. In commercial terms, I guess Petra were the Beatles of Christian rock, but in terms of artistic achievement, they were midgets.

If you're trying to find detail on your favorite Christian pop stars, this really isn't the place. You will, however, find great information on those tenacious Christian music "artists". These artists, for the most part, came on-scene before contemporary Christian music was well accepted. They had, out of necessity, to develop their own ministry and distribution systems. They kept their stuff a bit too controversial for the mainstream --both mainstreams. They were too Christian for the secular market, but too edgy for mainstream Christians. The artists Raised By Wolves concentrate on really show some of the better work in Christian music. I made lots of great discoveries in the book.

This all is not to say other artists aren't mentioned. Newsboys, Audio Adrenaline, DC Talk, and more, get very positive reviews, too. I bought the book because I'm questing for Christian music.

Whoever said that John Strausbaugh had to listen to aging rockers? What's he so upset about? Nobody said that he can't listen to bling bling.

Rock Til You Drop is the quintessential screed every "hip"music journalist has against "Dinosaur Rock". Trouble is, he doesn't even examine his own facts. He admits early on that "blame has to be laid at the feet of the boomers who continually support these over-the-hill acts" and then goes on to spend the rest of the book taking on Jagger and Townsend. But that statement begs the question: if people are willing to spend their money that way, Jagger and Townsend have a right to keep delivering don't they? We KNOW cigarettes are bad, but if no one bought them, Phillip Morris would be out of business. Also, Strausbaugh takes on-exclusively- the behemoths of 70s-FM radio. OK, so REO Speedwagon sucks. But what about Tina Turner? If he had had the guts to take on the "queen of rock an roll"'s crappy Euro-pop which makes up 90% of her concerts before tossing out "Proud Mary" I would be more inclined to give him some props. Or how about the Temptations, touring with only one original member left? (Ok he gets points for taking on icon Patti Smith) Also, I find that people who hate 70s rock acts are really just reacting to the unbelievable overplayed-ness of "Classic Rock" Stations. Imagine, just imagine, Zep, Floyd, or the Stones had never sold more than a couple 100,000 copies. (Hard I know, but just try). They'd be worshipped like the Velvet Underground and Big Star. Still, the book is quite good for a laugh, but best taken with the proverbial grain of salt.

John Strausbaugh omits one rather important strain of thought in the premise of his extremely well-written, humorous, irreverent book; that ultimately, quality of output is what defines an artist's worth, not age. It is sophomoric to imply that youth is a necessary prerequisite to creating meaningful, impactful art, popualr or otherwise. By such criteria, Eminem - young, irreverent, angry - is a more valid and valuable artist than Buddy Guy, or Johnny Cash, or Bruce Springsteen, or Bob Dylan, or Herbie Hancock, or willie nelson, or brian eno, or paul simon, or david bowie, or iggy, or... you get the point. Music, (though those who can't play it, or lack the patience to unearth its more subtle rewards, or who employ it as some sort of lifestyle wallpaper, would like to believe otherwise,) is a craft, after all. Part of that craft is the ability to express, be it in a visceral or subdued fashion, some sort of commentary on - or interpretation of - one's surrounding circumstances, the human condition, whatever the hell you wanna call it. To imply that only young people have the right to offer such commentary is ludicrous, although understandable in our consumerist, here today-gone tomorrow culture. As with any craft, the more time one spends honing it, ostensibly the better one is able to employ it toward some positive end. Sometimes, age does bring a maturity informed by a certain amount of earned wisdom. Not always. Burt sometimes. In the end, it's about the music, not about some pre-fabricated criteria of hipness based on a juvenile worship of youth culture, whatever the hell that actually means today. The music never lies.

This book is so poor, it does not even qulaify as "fun" garbage, as others have put it. I have over 2000 books and this will be only the 2nd book I will ever throw away to keep it from my library. Why? The scholarship is so bad, I simply cannot believe any of it. Let me give you some examples:

On page 89, the author writes, "Lennon's imaginary encounters ranged from rising star Madonna to the unlikely Barbara Walters, from Yoko's sister Setsuko to McCartney's kid sister Ruth." Madonna's first single was released in 1982, two years after Lennon DIED. The author even puts this quote in the chapter about 1975, a year before Madonnna finished High School in Michigan.

On Page 109, the author writes "During the 1969 filming of the Let It Be recording sessions, John made insinuating references to the drug, comparing heroin to sex by cracking, "Shooting is good exercise." In the book on the LET IT BE transcripts, it reveals that is YOKO who said this, NOT JOHN, and this is an example of the sloppy way the entire book is put together, seemingly without any effort to tell the truth.

The first chapter is so poorly put together, you realize immediately the author is going to put down anything negative about Lennon no matter what the circumstance and believe them all. There are huge blocks of conversations repeated in this book from friends of friends, ex-wives of groupies,etc. Let me try to get this across. The brain does not store whole conversations. Think of someone you talked to yesterday- now try to recreate the conversation exactly as it occurred, word by word. it's impossible, the brain does not record those things, it will record the essence of a conversation, maybe even a sentence or two, but not a word by word blow.

But this is what you get here- long conversations that you realize is complete fiction but appears as it is faultless fact. I like "Globe" like articles, so I was not going to take it too seriously, but after seeing things I know cannot possibly be right, I realized I could believe none of it. And neither should you, even for fun.

Giuliano's research into John Lennon's post-Beatle years is at once compelling and nasty -- not unlike a car accident you both wish you hadn't seen, yet still wonder if you could have had a better view. Lurid, often sloppy (dates are mixed up; Lennon supposedly dreams of Madonna in the late seventies, years before her first album even appeared), yet no Grossmanesque butcher job. Giuliano obviously cares deeply for his subject, but doesn't seem to really know how to balance Lennon's innate contradictions. Photos of Lennon during '75-80 rarely show a less than healthy ex-Beatle; yet Giuliano would have us believe he was a sickly malnourished neurotic heroin addict who kicked babies wives and mistresses in his spare time. Still, an intriguing book. Can't put it down, can't help but wonder about Lennon's last years -- yet at the same time terribly doubtful about this book's supposedly "accurate" resources.

I've loved John Lennon since I was 15 (I was born in '73) and at first, loved him as the quintessential 'roughneck' Beatle-boy. After listening to all of the Beatles, and most of Lennon's solo work, I felt there was much more to Lennon than one could imagine. A darker, more self-deceptive and sinister side.
If the peace-lovin', or even straightlaced (like my parents) generation of the '60's, would have their way, John would (and is) branded as the radical, hippie peacenik, or just general happiness-spreading guy, that revolutionized the world through his music, his (and the Beatles') charm and the 'media's' interpretation of his work. As a child of the 80's and 90's (god rest Kurt Cobain), I choose to seek out the more bare-boned truth about Lennon. If you believe that the 'Media' tells us everything about an artist, even in his own supposed words, then you should not read this. If you believe that Lennon, in his best efforts in songwriting, showed us 'everything' there is to know about him, you should not read this. If you believe that history is made the most truthful today, instead of when most of the figures are long dead, you should not read this. In the last few years, from seeking out books from Fred Seaman, May Pang, Albert Goldman (gasp!), I have found that Lennon is the most endearing, and the most tragic, of all Myth-like figures.
Lennon's caustic anger is well-known, even innocent figures like Dezo Hoffmann, in his book 'The Faces of John Lennon', tell of John's savage anger, putting Dezo down in front of a whole film crew (and this was a book of portraits, with a small intro, nonetheless!). Brian Epstein, probably the most sympathetic and admirable of the Beatles' entourage, suffered (in his own, or as others' say, Derek Taylor's) book, when he talks about John's savage outbursts.
Can it not be said that John was a completely insecure, paranoid man who suffered many demons?
This is what Giuliano is trying to convey, and I think he does it quite well.
That John was bisexual, I have no doubt. Stuart Sutcliffe was an up and coming great artist, and according to many modern opinions in the art world, might have become one of the defining artists of his generation, if not for his death. When John met Yoko, I believe he said something to the effect of his 'wanting to meet a true artist and be swept away', as he was with her.
Why wouldn't John have been captivated by Stuart? He met Cynthia at art school, but she didn't live up to his demanding expectations...
Giuliano's writings may not merit 'scholarly research', but it seems to me that his writing of John in his later years, paranoid, lost, self-doubting, starving himself or drugging himself into ill-health (can anyone say that the last pictures of John are HEALTHY ones! To me, in every pic, good and bad, of the last few years of his life, he seems to be a very emaciated, walking skeleton, so very sad to see, considering how beautiful John was up to about 35), are very true ones.
Even Julian, on his own website, has this quote:
"My dad's music was a great inspiration to me
He wasn't a great father. He was a great musician. That's always been a touchy one, and it will be until I can find the answer, but I don't know if there is one. I didn't hate him, but I was scared of him. I didn't know this man at all, and trying to rebuild a relationship that was never there made him as frightened of me as I was of him."

Giuliano actually treats Yoko fairly, I think (but then again, I've read Goldman, and his absolute vilification of her character chills me). Giuliano does give Yoko some credit, unlike many reviewers who have said he grates her to shreds, by noting that Yoko did her best to save Lennon from a sure breakdown, a few times over. At the same time, it seems that Yoko stifled John by becoming an almost 'Aunt Mimi' figure, demanding, impossible to please, ever critical.
As far as all the mumbo-jumbo about numerology, astrology, psychic matters in the book, isn't it clear that John wrote some rather shamanistic tunes? #9 dream, Mind Games, I Am the Walrus, Tomorrow Never Knows? Didn't he write some rather low self-esteem tunes, like 'I'm A Loser', 'Help!', 'Mother', 'Jealous Guy', and dare I say, 'Crippled Inside' (which was supposedly written about Paul, but I really think is John talking about himself).
Overall, I think he's done a fair job of showing us the last years of Lennon. I actually felt very depressed, though, in seeing a great man, who, if he would have believed more in himself, could have saved himself and gone on to make more meaningful, gorgeous music, as he did with the boys in the glory days.

I've read this book twice. Once when it came out and once again recently. Both times I thought little of it. It is better suited in a tabloid than a bookstore.

Truly, it is the rumors and gossip that are treated as fact in this book that ruins it. The bisexual stuff, I mean, he can't possibly know if any of that is true and yet he seems to have no problem with dispensing it.

He looks at Lennon very negatively- the cup is always half empty and I'll give you a perfect example. The story about the creation of "I Want to Hold your Hand." John and Paul were writing this and they were trying to find the chord that would give structure to the song. They were running through ideas and Paul hits a chord. John said he stopped and shouted "That's it! Do that again!" Thus the song was on it's way to being what it is. Now, in other books, John is praised for recognizing this chord and is given credit for doing so. Goldman, however, in his referencing the song, all he says about it is Paul was responsible for finding the chord that made "I want to Hold Your Hand." That's it. He doesn't really tell the story, he leaves it at that, leaving the reader to assume Paul did it all by himself.

And that's what this whole book is. A bunch of half-stories. It's garbage.

Okay, here's the thing with this book.

A)How do you know that what Goldman says isn't true? You're not the one who did six years of research. B)As much as I admire John Lennon, it was refreshing to read a book that was the opposite extreme of all the sappy, fan-clubby stuff that's written about him, and C)with brutal honesty, it sheds light on the fact that Lennon vacillated between a need for commercial success and a need for artistic integrity in his work, something that all artists go through but no one wants to admit to it, especially about the great artists like John Lennon because it's much easier to slap the label "genius" on them and move on.

Yeah, the book is mean, but for the most part, I find the meanness necessary in light of all the other sappy tripe that's been written about him- and maybe it'll pave the way for more middle of the road approaches. The only thing I don't like is, he totally takes these cheap shots at Yoko Ono... yeah, Goldman, like THAT'S really original. I happen to like Yoko Ono.

I read this book when it was first released in the 80's and could not put it down, enjoying it even more than his previous book, ELVIS. Since Elvis had no pretensions about his public image vs. private (he's been called "the Howard Hughes of show business"), he received a harsh treatment from Goldman and it did feel like, as one reviewer said, Goldman "was picking on the rube." But looking at John Lennon, Goldman ventures behind the Lennon-Ono "myth machine" to expose a mad couple's packaging of themselves and the weird reality they really lived. I liked Lennon and loved his wicked sense of humor, but I also have to admit that madness also fueled his genius and Goldman's book filled me with more pity than anything else.
The only thing missing from the new edition is the article Goldman wrote about the persecution he endured for writing about Lennon in the first place (only Penthouse would publish it at the time!). By taking on the cult of rock stars, he ended up enduring the wrath of America's mass media and the rock establishment itself (Rolling Stone dedicated an entire issue to defaming him and U2, those peace-loving ambassadors of goodwill, wrote a song that included lyrics calling for his death!).