His soccer talent was spotted at a young age and, in 1985, he signed with City. Just three years later he was handed the team captaincy, becoming the youngest ever City captain. An international career soon beckoned and, after trying out for the England under–21 team, he was called up to the England training camp for Italia ’90. Despite missing out on a place in the final squad he suitably impressed the management, with Bobby Robson marking him as an England captain in the making. As a rising star Paul became a target for top clubs like Manchester United, Arsenal, Spurs, and Liverpool, but he always stayed loyal to his beloved club, deeming Maine Road the spiritual home at which his destiny lay. But then, in September 1990, disaster struck. Paul ruptured his crucial ligament and so began his nightmare. Neglected, ignored, and misunderstood by his club after a career–saving operation was irreversibly botched, Paul’s career began to fall apart. Watching from the sidelines as similarly injured players regained their fitness, he spiraled into a prolonged bout of severe depression. With a forced retirement from the game he adored, the death of his father, and the collapse of his marriage, Paul was left a broken man. Set against the backdrop of one of the world’s wealthiest football clubs at the end of their era at Maine Road, I'm Not Really Here is the powerful story of love, loss, and the cruel, irreparable damage of injury. It is a story of determination, spirit, resilience, and broken dreams.

    It is also an unprecedentedly revealing and instructive guide to how songs and records are made.Developed from a series of interviews conducted over many months, the book explores in detail some thirty XTC songs--including well-know singles such as 'Senses Working Overtime' and the controversial 'Dear God'--from throughout the group's thirty-year career. It casts new light on the writing of lyrics, the construction of melodies and arrangements, the process of recording, and the workings of the music industry. But it is also filled with anecdotes about Partridge, his XTC bandmates, and their adventures around the world, all told with the songwriter's legendary humor.

    But she was a born performer, destined to be on the stage. Unlike fake starlets who become famous overnight, Gaga earned her success the hard way, working night after night at sleazy bars and clubs, performing at every club in New York, getting booed offstage, and in the process, finding herself—as a singer, a dancer, a performer, and an artist. She has shocked the public with her crazy outfits, individual sense of style, and headstrong manner. She has sold millions of records, performed to millions of people, and through it all, she has won hearts with her brashness and honesty.

    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.

    Glen Campbell's boy-next-door persona belied his hedonistic, near-fatal lifestyle. It all started like a dream - the rise from ruthless poverty as one of twelve children in a small Arkansas town and the against-all struggle for stardom, first as a brilliant studio musician (behind artists such as Sinatra, Elvis, Ray Charles, and Nat King Cole), then as a solo performer who in the sixties and seventies sold some 45 million records (including the timeless classics "Wichita Lineman, " "Gentle on My Mind, " "By the Time I Get to Phoenix, " and, of course, "Rhinestone Cowboy") and hosted his own top-rated TV show. Too quickly, though, the dream became a nightmare of mad spending, multiple marriages, and abusive and all-too-public affairs, as well as wildly escalating alcohol and cocaine dependencies that threatened not only his career but his very existence. Now a Christian and in recovery, he has stepped back into the spotlight a whole man at last. With the help of bestselling author Tom Carter, Glen Campbell has given us a book that is both a star-studded show-biz memoir and a spiritual testimony that radiates great faith and emotion. Rhinestone Cowboy is his personal gift of thanks to the millions who have supported him through decades of good times and bad - and to the vast new audience who have grown to know him through his frequent appearances on cable television's 700Club and other Christian TV shows. "A lot of people are going to be surprised by my story, and I hope that a lot are going to be inspired, " Campbell declares. "All I know for sure is that it's time to tell it. And as honestly as I can, that's just what I've gone and done."

    Karlheinz Stockhausen once asked the composer what his -secret- was: -I don't push the sounds around, - Feldman replied. His writings resemble his music in their quiet steadiness, their oscillations between assertion and doubt. They are also funny and illuminating, not only about his own music but about the entire New York School of painters, poets and composers that coalesced in the 1950s, including Feldman's friends Jackson Pollock, Philip Guston, Mark Rothko, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank O'Hara and John Cage. Give My Regards to Eighth Street is an authoritative collection of Feldman's writings, culled from published articles, program notes, LP liners, lectures, interviews and unpublished writings. It is one of those rare books from which anyone can draw inspiration, no matter what the vocation or discipline.

    Maybe they’re even suspicious of it. John Coltrane’s saxophonic flights of fancy, Jimi Hendrix’s feedback drenched guitar solos, Ravi Shankar’s sitar extrapolations—all these sounds seem like so much noodling or jamming, indulgent self-expression. “Just” improvising, as is sometimes said. For these music fans, it seems natural that music is meant to be composed. In the first book of its kind, John Corbett’s A Listener’s Guide to Free Improvisation provides a how-to manual for the most extreme example of spontaneous improvising: music with no pre-planned material at all. Drawing on over three decades of writing about, presenting, playing, teaching, and studying freely improvised music, Corbett offers an enriching set of tools that show any curious listener how to really listen, and he encourages them to enjoy the human impulse— found all around the world— to make up music on the spot.           Corbett equips his reader for a journey into a difficult musical landscape, where there is no steady beat, no pre-ordained format, no overarching melodic or harmonic framework, and where tones can ring with the sharpest of burrs. In “Fundamentals,” he explores key areas of interest, such as how the musicians interact, the malleability of time, overcoming impatience, and watching out for changes and transitions; he grounds these observations in concrete listening exercises, a veritable training regime for musical attentiveness. Then he takes readers deeper in “Advanced Techniques,” plumbing the philosophical conundrums at the heart of free improvisation, including topics such as the influence of the audience and the counterintuitive challenge of listening while asleep. Scattered throughout are helpful and accessible lists of essential resources—recordings, books, videos— and a registry of major practicing free improvisors from Noël Akchoté to John Zorn, particularly essential because this music is best experienced live.           The result is a concise, humorous, and inspiring guide, a unique book that will help transform one of the world’s most notoriously unapproachable artforms into a rewarding and enjoyable experience.

    But success wouldn’t have happened for this songwriter, artist and producer without the darker times of defeat. Now, in this daringly honest memoir, DioGuardi reveals everything she’s learned about living, creating, loving, stumbling, picking herself up again and ultimately succeeding.  And, of course, she hares behind-the-scenes stories from her years on American Idol, including the real truth about her departure from the show.  Passionate, wide and funny, A Helluva High Note inspires readers to find, develop and follow their own true voice.

    Except it wasn’t that simple. Self-confessed latch-key kids, theirs was far from an easy ride.Inspired by both the energy of British punk bands like the Sex Pistols and Buzzcocks and cult American bands such as Dead Kennedys and Husker Du, Green Day formed in 1989. The band gigged relentlessly across the US, quickly selling out every underground club that booked them, and their 1994 major label debut Dookie was a 10-million-selling worldwide hit album that seized the zeitgeist while rock music was still reeling from the death of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain. They toured the world, headlined all the big festivals, won countless awards and released multi-million selling albums.In 2004 Green Day reached a career pinnacle with the concept album American Idiot, a sophisticated commentary on modern life—not least dissatisfaction with their president and America’s continued cultural and economic imperialism. The No. 1 success of the Grammy-winning album extended Green Day's fan base even further—from pre-teen kids to previously skeptical critics.This book is the world’s first full biography on Green Day. An authority on punk and hardcore, author Ben Myers charts the band members’ difficult childhoods, the context of the band within the US and world punk scene and their glittering rise to success. Myers has also interviewed the band for various magazines at different stages of their career.

    Included are original and revealing interviews with band members and the key people close to U2. The band's rich cultural and social context is fully explored, providing a colorful backdrop to the songs. U2: Into the Heart traces U2's meteoric rise from the early days of their career with Boy, their first album, to the spanning success of The Joshua Tree, Rattle and Hum, Achtung Baby, and Pop. U2 is a group that has become a world-class rock 'n' roll band; a band that continues to invent themselves and are not afraid to take chances with their craft—as well as make a unique impact in the world of music with their raw, emotional energy.

    Now guitarists can have all three volumes of this classic guitar method in one convenient book! Created by popular demand, this new edition of the method used as the basic text for the renowned Berklee College of Music guitar program is a complete compilation of the original Volumes 1, 2, and 3. Innovative solos, duets and exercises progressively teach melody, harmony and rhythm. Perfect for the serious guitar student and instructor alike.

    What do Postman Pat, Tommy Cooper, Norman Wisdom and George Best have in common with being abandoned in a Costa Rican jungle after a severe bout of flatulence? Indeed, how are they also connected to trying to buy an Australian brewery just to get a beer, owning twenty-two cars, an American soccer team and a Swiss mail-order pornography company?The common feature is of course a certain Richard Wakeman.The Further Adventures of a Grumpy Old Rock Star takes you, the privileged reader, on a trip of absurd excess, a cultural car crash of side-splitting hilarity and an unforgettable glimpse (again) into the life of one of Britain's most legendary showmen, rock stars and all-time great raconteurs.

    He has also appeared in numerous independent films and made his New York Stage debut in the acclaimed MCC production of Small Engine Repair.Keegan was given his first camera at age nine, and began a lifelong study and pursuit of photography. life.love.beauty is a selection of photographs taken since his childhood. It's a photo journey through the life of an intensely creative soul whose expression finds various forms: in acting, in poems and stories, lyrics and music, but above all in photography. This book's content resonates in the commonality we all share on our own journeys while unveiling an inside look into a world that very few experience.Organized into three broad groups-life, love, and beauty-the book ranges over the public and private side of Keegan Allen and his world. A child of Hollywood, whose father was also an actor and his mother a painter, Keegan roams freely through that realm, photographing his fellow actors on set, behind the scenes; and recording the amazed, gleeful, sometimes weeping fans that flock to his television and career related events.Allen also has an eye for the anonymous and the unexpected: the woman gazing dreamily from the balcony of a run-down hotel; the rifle-toting dog walker who seems to have emerged from the 19th century; the performers and denizens of Venice Beach and also the streets of New York, some of them chasing the dream of fame, others having long-since abandoned it; the little boy amid in the crowd in an enormous airport; portraits of lovers kissing on subways, in parks, and on the streets. Traveling from California to New York to Paris and back, as well as through the American west, he finds beauty in both urban and rural places: from large-scale landscapes to glimpses of light transforming what it touches.Keegan's poems, stories, captions and musings, song lyrics, and journal pages complement the photographs on this journey. He provides an account of growing up just off the Sunset Strip, coming into his own as an actor/artist, dealing with public recognition while maintaining a very private life, falling in and out of love, and acknowledging the influence of his family, friends, fans, and loved ones.life.love.beauty is an unusually intimate and revealing book: a delight for anyone who values photography, and a gift for the many fans who already follow Keegan's career.Keegan's real passion comes through in both his photographs and candid story telling in this unique photo-journal.

    An Autobiography chronicles the first half-century of Stravinsky's life, all the while offering his opinions and "abhorrences." A Parsifal performance at Bayreuth? "At the end of a quarter of an hour I could bear no more." Nijinsky? "The poor boy knew nothing of music." Spanish folk music? "Endless preliminary chords of guitar playing."

    In all his writing, Cioran cuts to the heart of the human experience.