Highly acclaimed music critic Peter Carlin tracks the Boss's dazzling ascent to fame, whilst painting a vivid portrait of the real Springsteen: an insistently private man who nevertheless would do anything for his fans.Recently, in response to his mother's failing health, Springsteen decided he wanted to tell his story, and that he wanted Carlin to tell it. He gave Carlin many hours of interview time, including a trip to his family home, and lett him preview his unreleased album. With unprecedented access to Springsteen, his family, friends and management, Carlin presents a riveting and highly personal account of Springsteen's life.

    (1985) score redefined video game music. With under three minutes of music, Kondo put to rest an era of bleeps and bloops-the sterile products of a lab environment-replacing it with one in which game sounds constituted a legitimate form of artistic expression. Andrew Schartmann takes us through the various external factors (e.g., the video game crash of 1983, Nintendo's marketing tactics) that coalesced into a ripe environment in which Kondo's musical experiments could thrive. He then delves into the music itself, searching for reasons why our hearts still dance to the “primitive” 8-bit tunes of a bygone era.What musical features are responsible for Kondo's distinct “Mario sound”? How do the different themes underscore the vastness of Princess Peach's Mushroom Kingdom? And in what ways do the game's sound effects resonate with our physical experience of the world? These and other questions are explored within, through the lens of Kondo's compositional philosophy-one that would influence an entire generation of video game composers. As Kondo himself stated, “we [at Nintendo] were trying to do something that had never been done before.” In this book, Schartmann shows his readers how Kondo and his team not just succeeded, but heralded in a new era of video games.

    And yet, it doesn't neatly fit into any of these descriptors. Buried underneath the radio-friendly exterior lie coded confessions of the subversive, wounded intelligence that gives this album its staying power as a work of art. Here Lou Reed managed to make a fun, accessible rock'n'roll record that is also a troubled meditation on the ambiguities-sexual, musical and otherwise-that defined his public persona and helped make him one of the most fascinating and influential figures in rock history. Through close listening and personal reflections, songwriter Ezra Furman explores Reed's and Transformer's unstable identities, and the secrets the songs challenge us to uncover.33 1/3 is a series of short books about popular music, focusing on individual albums by artists ranging from James Brown to Celine Dion and from J Dilla to Neutral Milk Hotel. Each album covered in the series occupies such a specific place in music history, so each book-length treatment is different. Jonathan Lethem, Colin Meloy, Daphne Brooks, Gina Arnold and Alan Warner are just some of the authors who have contributed to the series so far. Widely acclaimed by fans, musicians and scholars alike. More

    In the insightful How Music Works, Byrne offers his unique perspective on music - including how music is shaped by time, how recording technologies transform the listening experience, the evolution of the industry, and much more.

    The first English book about Slayer explores the creation of the most universally respected metal album and its long road to the stores, through original interviews with the entire band, producer Rick Rubin, engineer Andy Wallace, cover artist Larry Carroll, and Def Jam insiders from Russell Simmons to M.C. Serch. From Tori Amos to Pantera's Phil Anselmo, dozens of fans and artists discuss the record's ongoing impact and Slayer's status in the small fraternity of rock's greatest groups.

    Started by two twenty-year-old musicians, Merge is a lesson in how to make and market great music on a human scale. The fact that the company is prospering in a failing industry is something of a miracle. Yet two of their bands made the Billboard Top 10 list; more than 1 million copies of Arcade Fire's Neon Bible have been sold; Spoon has appeared on Saturday Night Live and The Tonight Show; and the Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs is a contemporary classic.In celebration of their twentieth anniversary, founders Mac and Laura offer first-person accounts—with the help of their colleagues and Merge artists—of their work, their lives, and the culture of making music. Our Noise also tells the behind-the-scenes stories of Arcade Fire, Spoon, the Magnetic Fields, Superchunk, Lambchop, Neutral Milk Hotel, and Butterglory. Hundreds of personal photos of the bands, along with album cover art, concert posters, and other memorabilia are included.

    His journals reveal an artist who loved music, who knew the history of rock, and who was determined to define his place in that history. Here is a mesmerizing, incomparable portrait of the most influential musician of his time.

    Offering a different perspective from the bestselling Slash, Adler chronicles his life with the band, and own intense struggle with addiction, as seen on Dr. Drew’s Celebrity Rehab and Sober House.

    Naming their band after Leonard Skinner, the gym teacher at Robert E. Lee Senior High School who constantly badgered the long-haired aspiring musicians to get haircuts, they were soon playing gigs at parties, and bars throughout the South. During the next decade Lynyrd Skynyrd grew into the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful of the rock bands to emerge from the South since the Allman Brothers. Their hits “Free Bird” and “Sweet Home Alabama” became classics. Then, at the height of its popularlity in 1977, the band was struck with tragedy --a plane crash that killed Ronnie Van Zant and two other band members.Lynyrd Skynyrd: Remembering the Free Birds of Southern Rock is an intimate chronicle of the band from its earliest days through the plane crash and its aftermath, to its rebirth and current status as an enduring cult favorite. From his behind-the-scenes perspective as Ronnie Van Zant’s lifelong friend and frequent member of the band’s entourage who was also aboard the plane on that fateful flight, Gene Odom reveals the unique synthesis of blues/country rock and songwriting talent, relentless drive, rebellious Southern swagger and down-to-earth sensibility that brought the band together and made it a defining and hugely popular Southern rock band -- as well as the destructive forces that tore it apart. Illustrated throughout with rare photos, Odom traces the band’s rise to fame and shares personal stories that bring to life the band’s journey. For the fans who have purchased a cumulative 35 million copies of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s albums and continue to pack concerts today, Lynyrd Skynyrd is a celebration of an immortal American band.From the Hardcover edition.

    Founded by Jerry Dammers, their fusion of punk, reggae, and ska created a new musical fashion—spearheaded by their own Two Tone record label—that stood for unity and racial harmony in a polarized society. This musical odyssey with The Specials moves from their early days on Coventry's punk circuit, to their chart-storming success with singles like Too Much Too Young and the eerily prescient Ghost Town, released as the race riots of 1982 saw Toxteth and Brixton go up in flames. Written with wry humor, this affectionate look at a band whose sublime music remains influential today is a must for all fans of The Specials.

    Since the late 1980s, however, Sweden has produced over a thousand extreme heavy metal bands, creating one of the most respected regional music scenes in the world. This is the improbable history of how a marginalized teen movement crawled from Sweden's small towns and suburbs, and found a lasting place on the world stage. Daniel Ekeroth captures the epic tale with enlightening detail, beginning with Sweden's violent loss of innocence in the 1980s, through the metal's virtual chokehold on the country during the 1990s into the lasting legacy and influence in the turbulent 2000s of the Sunlight guitar tone, the "Gothenburg Sound," and the countless offshoots of Sweden's most lethal cultural export.This ultimate blow-by-blow account of Sweden’s legendary death metal underground is based on exclusive interviews with members of Nihilist/ Entombed, In Flames, At the Gates, Dismember, Grave, Hypocrisy, Opeth, Unleashed, Marduk, Morbid, Mob 47, Deranged, Edge of Sanity, Merciless, Therion, Liers in Wait, Carnage, Carcass, Tiamat/Treblinka, Afflicted, Repugnant, and the Haunted.

    Shea Serrano deftly pays homage to the most important song of each year. Serrano also examines the most important moments that surround the history and culture of rap music—from artists’ backgrounds to issues of race, the rise of hip-hop, and the struggles among its major players—both personal and professional. Covering East Coast and West Coast, famous rapper feuds, chart toppers, and show stoppers, The Rap Year Book is an in-depth look at the most influential genre of music to come out of the last generation.    Complete with infographics, lyric maps, hilarious and informative footnotes, portraits of the artists, and short essays by other prominent music writers, The Rap Year Book is both a narrative and illustrated guide to the most iconic and influential rap songs ever created.

    Yet few have addressed his contribution in the darkest hour of the civil rights movement. Telling the untold story of his historic Boston Garden concert of 1968, The Hardest Working Man also captures the magnificent achievements that made Brown a revolutionary icon of American popular culture. Acclaimed journalist James Sullivan begins his stirring account by depicting the racially charged climate of Boston in the hours after Martin Luther King, Jr.’s death. Brown’s concert was slated for cancellation as police geared up for mass retaliation. After Brown butted heads with the mayor, the show was allowed to go on—and his emotional, electric performance was broadcast live on local television. Though rioting erupted in more than a hundred U.S. cities that night, Boston remained quiet. Not only bringing to life that transforming show, James Sullivan also charts Brown’s incredible rise from poverty to self-made millionaire and the pivotal voice behind the signature anthem “Say It Loud—I’m Black and I’m Proud,” making The Hardest Working Man a tribute to an unforgettable concert and a rousing biography of a revolutionary musician.

    As Iron Maiden’s front man—first from 1981 to 1993, and then from 1999 to the present—Dickinson has been, and remains, a man of legend.But OTT front man is just one of the many hats Bruce wears. In addition to being one of the world’s most storied and well-respected singers and songwriters, he is an airline captain, aviation entrepreneur, motivational speaker, beer brewer, novelist, radio presenter, and film scriptwriter. He has also competed as a world-class level fencer. Often credited as a genuine polymath Bruce, in his own words (and handwritten script in the first instance!), sets forth many personal observations guaranteed to inspire curious souls and hard-core fans alike.Dickinson turns his unbridled creativity, passion, and anarchic humour to reveal some fascinating stories from his life, including his thirty years with Maiden, his solo career, his childhood within the eccentric British school system, his early bands, fatherhood and family, and his recent battle with cancer.Bold, honest, intelligent and very funny, his memoir is an up-close look inside the life, heart, and mind of one of the most unique and interesting men in the world; a true icon of rock.

    He wrote and recorded with everyone from Iggy Pop to Freddie Mercury to John Lennon, sold 136 million albums, has one of the truly great voices, and influenced bands as wide-ranging as Nirvana and Franz Ferdinand. Paul Trynka illuminates Bowie's seemingly contradictory life and his many reinventions as an artist, offering over 300 new interviews with everyone from classmates to managers to lovers. He reveals Bowie's broad influence on the entertainment world, from movie star to modern-day icon, trend-setter to musical innovator. This book will define Bowie for years to come.