After that he could describe his cars for three [LP] sides and get away with it." Christgau on Carly Simon: "If a horse could sing in a monotone, the horse would sound like Carly Simon, only a horse wouldn't rhyme 'yacht,' 'apricot,' and 'gavotte.'" Christgau on Van Morrison: "This is a man who gets stoned on a drink of water and urges us to turn our radios all the way into the mystic. Visionary hooks his specialty." Christgau on Lou Reed: "Reed Sounds like he's imitating his worst enemy, himself." (Lou Reed on Robert Christgau: "What a moron! Studying rock and roll. I can't believe it!") An indispensable book, Christgau's Rock Albums the '70s is the definitive guide to nearly 3,000 albums of the decade that brought us progressive rock, country rock, glam rock, funk, disco, punk, heavy metal, and new wave.

    Offering strong coverage of the music business, rock's visual culture, and contemporary music, the text is complemented by listening guides to over 70 major works.

    . . . A masterpiece.” —Margaret Atwood“No one who is invested in any kind of art . . . can read The Gift and remain unchanged.” —David Foster WallaceBy now a modern classic, The Gift is a brilliantly orchestrated defense of the value of creativity and of its importance in a culture increasingly governed by money and overrun with commodities. This book is even more necessary today than when it first appeared.An illuminating and transformative book, and completely original in its view of the world, The Gift is cherished by artists, writers, musicians, and thinkers. It is in itself a gift to all who discover the classic wisdom found in its pages.

    Drawn from over 180 interviews with friends, rivals, lovers, and collaborators, some of whom have never before spoken about their relationship with Bowie, this oral history weaves a hypnotic spell as it unfolds the story of a remarkable rise to stardom and an unparalleled artistic path. Tracing Bowie's life from the English suburbs to London to New York to Los Angeles, Berlin, and beyond, its collective voices describe a man profoundly shaped by his relationship with his schizophrenic half-brother Terry; an intuitive artist who could absorb influences through intense relationships and yet drop people cold when they were no longer of use; and a social creature equally comfortable partying with John Lennon and dining with Frank Sinatra. By turns insightful and deliciously gossipy, DAVID BOWIE is as intimate a portrait as may ever be drawn. It sparks with admiration and grievances, lust and envy, as the speakers bring you into studios and bedrooms they shared with Bowie, and onto stages and film sets, opening corners of his mind and experience that transform our understanding of both artist and art. Including illuminating, never-before-seen material from Bowie himself, drawn from a series of Jones's interviews with him across two decades, DAVID BOWIE is an epic, unforgettable cocktail-party conversation about a man whose enigmatic shapeshifting and irrepressible creativity produced one of the most sprawling, fascinating lives of our time.

    A highly readable and beautifully illustrated re-telling of the most famous stories from Greek mythology.

    There are no verse references, and Scripture segments are seamlessly woven together with transition text into a single grand narrative. For those intimidated or overwhelmed by the unabridged Bible, The Story helps people understand God’s Word more fully and engage with it more easily.Simple, accessible, and easy to use, churches are finding The Story a powerful way to engage their people in Bible reading like never before. As The Story brings the Bible to life, the broad scope of God’s message will penetrate hearts. People of all ages will be swept up in the story of God’s love and God’s plan for their lives.God goes to great lengths to rescue lost and hurting people. That is what The Story is all about: the story of the Bible, God’s great love affair with humanity. Condensed into 31 accessible chapters, The Story sweeps you into the unfolding progression of Bible characters and events from Genesis to Revelation. Using the clear, accessible text of the NIV Bible, it allows the stories, poems, and teachings of the Bible to read like a novel. And like any good story, The Story is filled with intrigue, drama, conflict, romance, and redemption; and this story’s true! “This book tells the grandest, most compelling story of all time: the story of a true God who loves his children, who established for them a way of salvation and provided a route to eternity. Each story in these 31 chapters reveals the God of grace---the God who speaks; the God who acts; the God who listens; the God whose love for his people culminated in his sacrifice of Jesus, his only Son, to atone for the sins of humanity.”

    It includes a dozen rare images, most never before seen.

    Heath's translation of the thirteen books of Euclid's Elements. In keeping with Green Lion's design commitment, diagrams have been placed on every spread for convenient reference while working through the proofs; running heads on every page indicate both Euclid's book number and proposition numbers for that page; and adequate space for notes is allowed between propositions and around diagrams. The all-new index has built into it a glossary of Euclid's Greek terms.Heath's translation has stood the test of time, and, as one done by a renowned scholar of ancient mathematics, it can be relied upon not to have inadvertantly introduced modern concepts or nomenclature. We have excised the voluminous historical and scholarly commentary that swells the Dover edition to three volumes and impedes classroom use of the original text. The single volume is not only more convenient, but less expensive as well.

    Oriented toward traditional black and white photography, the book also explores digital techniques and web photography resources, equipment, the exposure and development of film, and the making and finishing of prints.

    With this volume spanning from her punk fanzine roots to her landmark piece on R. Kelly's past, The First Collection leaves no doubt why The New York Times has called Hopper's work "influential." Not merely a selection of two decades of Hopper's most engaging, thoughtful, and humorous writing, this book documents the last 20 years of American music making and the shifting landscape of music consumption. The book journeys through the truths of Riot Grrrl's empowering insurgence, decamps to Gary, IN, on the eve of Michael Jackson's death, explodes the grunge-era mythologies of Nirvana and Courtney Love, and examines emo's rise. Through this vast range of album reviews, essays, columns, interviews, and oral histories, Hopper chronicles what it is to be truly obsessed with music. The pieces in The First Collection send us digging deep into our record collections, searching to re-hear what we loved and hated, makes us reconsider the art, trash, and politics Hopper illuminates, helping us to make sense of what matters to us most.

    The most exciting book on music in years. A book of treasure, a book of discovery, a book to open your ears to new worlds of pleasure. Doing for music what Patricia Schultz—author of the phenomenal 1,000 Places to See Before You Die—does for travel, Tom Moon recommends 1,000 recordings guaranteed to give listeners the joy, the mystery, the revelation, the sheer fun of great music. This is a book both broad and deep, drawing from the diverse worlds of classical, jazz, rock, pop, blues, country, folk, musicals, hip-hop, world, opera, soundtracks, and more. It's arranged alphabetically by artist to create the kind of unexpected juxtapositions that break down genre bias and broaden listeners’ horizons— it makes every listener a seeker, actively pursuing new artists and new sounds, and reconfirming the greatness of the classics. Flanking J. S. Bach and his six entries, for example, are the little-known R&B singer Baby Huey and the '80s Rastafarian hard-core punk band Bad Brains. Farther down the list: The Band, Samuel Barber, Cecelia Bartoli, Count Basie, and Afropop star Waldemer Bastos. Each entry is passionately written, with expert listening notes, fascinating anecdotes, and the occasional perfect quote—"Your collection could be filled with nothing but music from Ray Charles," said Tom Waits, "and you'd have a completely balanced diet." Every entry identifies key tracks, additional works by the artist, and where to go next. And in the back, indexes and playlists for different moods and occasions.

    The second section contains the grand master's ruminations on the SF genre itself. And the final section is comprised of Asimov's thoughts on the craft and writing of science fiction.

    Its Philosophy 101 for everyone who knows not to take all this heavy stuff too seriously. Some of the Big Ideas are Existentialism (what do Hegel and Bette Midler have in common?), Philosophy of Language (how to express what its like being stranded on a desert island with Halle Berry), Feminist Philosophy (why, in the end, a man is always a man), and much more. Finally it all makes sense!

    Original.

    The catalogue of current classical CDs runs to more than two and half thousand tightly packed pages, and lists nearly three hundred composers before reaching the second letter of the alphabet. An average month sees some four hundred recordings and re-issues added to the pile. The Rough Guide to Classical Music attempts to make sense of this overwhelming volume of music, giving you the information that's essential whether you're starting from the beginning or have already begun exploring. As well as being a buyer's guide to CDs, this book is a who's who of classical music, ranging from Hildegard of Bingen, one of the great figures of eleventh-century European culture, to Thomas Adès, born in London in 1971. Of course we've had to be selective, both with the composers and with their output - Domenico Scarlatti, for example, was a fascinating musician, but no book of this scope could do justice to each of his five hundred keyboard sonatas. Gaetano Donizetti wrote more than seventy operas, but you wouldn't want to listen to all of them. We've gone for what we think are the best works by the most interesting composers, mixing some underrated people with the big names, and highlighting some we think you should keep an eye on. When it comes to CDs the situation requires even greater ruthlessness. Beethoven may have written only nine symphonies, but there are more than one hundred versions of the fifth in the catalogue, and scores of recordings of all the others. Several of these CDs should never have been issued - they are there simply because any up-and-coming conductor has to make a Beethoven recording as a kind of calling card, regardless of any aptitude for the music. However, a fair proportion of the Beethoven CDs are worth listening to, because a piece of music as complex as a Beethoven symphony will bear as many different readings as a Shakespeare play. Although there are recordings that stand head and shoulders above the competition, no performance can be described as definitive, which is one reason why we have often recommended more than one account of a work. Whereas all our first-choice CDs make persuasive cases for the music, some of the additional recommendations are included because they make provocative counter-arguments. Where price is a consideration, we've also listed a lower-cost alternative whenever appropriate - thus we might suggest a mid-price boxed set of symphonies as an alternative to buying them as full-price individual CDs. Finally, in many instances we've picked an outstanding pre-stereo performance as a complement to a modern recording. These `historic' reissues are the one reliable growth area in the classical music industry, and their success is not due to mere nostalgia. There are some great musicians around today, but there's also a lot of hype in the business, with many soloists owing their success more to the way they look than to the way they play - and conversely, many superlative musicians who remain obscure because they don't project the requisite glamour. It's in the area of orchestral music and opera that the situation is especially bad, notwithstanding the technically immaculate quality of many digital recordings. Orchestral musicians are now trained to a very high standard, but only a few of the top-class orchestras enjoy the sort of long-term relationship with an individual conductor that can mould a distinctive identity. The same goes for opera companies, which used to have a stable core of singers and musicians working under the same conductor for years. Now there's a system based on jet-setting stars, who might be performing in London one night, New York the next, then in the recording studio for a few days to record something with people they hadn't met until the day the session started. You don't necessarily get a good football team by paying millions for a miscellaneous batch of top-flight players, and you don't build a good musical team that way either. Musically, then, new is not always best. And don't assume that a recording made more than thirty years ago will sound terrible. Sound quality won't match that of digital CDs, but you'll be surprised at how good it can be - indeed, many people prefer the warmth of the old analogue sound to the often chilly precision produced by modern studios. (We've warned you if surface noise or tinny quality might be a hindrance to enjoyment.) In short, you'll be missing a lot if you insist on hi-tech - few recent releases can match Vladimir Horowitz's 1940 account of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1, for instance, or Josef Hofmann's versions of the Chopin piano concertos from the 1930s.