Book picks similar to
Thoughts by Tionne Watkins


poetry
music
music-industry
mom-s-recs

A Muriel Rukeyser Reader


Jan Heller Levi - 1995
    Bringing together works only sparsely anthologized or long out of print, this book is a resource for understanding the range, depth, and originality of this pioneering writer whom the poet Anne Sexton named "Muriel, mother of everyone."

Backstage Pass


Paul Stanley - 2019
    Paul shows you how you can rock ‘n’ roll all night and party every day—without missing a beat.

The Creation Records Story: My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry for the Prize


David Cavanagh - 2000
    During the Britpop boom of the mid-90s, the astonishing success of Oasis brought Creation fame on the world stage. In 1999, however, McGee announced his shock departure as his label's influence over a generation of British music came to a confusing and disappointing end.

Angry Blonde


Eminem - 2000
    His face has graced the covers of Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, and Spin, among other magazines; he has a Pay–Per–View special slated for Christmas 2000; and he will be performing at the MTV Video Music Awards this September.Eminem‘s personal life is also garnering him a lot of media attention: he‘s currently being sued for defamation of character by his mother and faces two separate assault charges.Along with his controversial lyrics and Eminem's own commentary on them, Angry Blonde will feature never–before–published photos.

Between Each Line of Pain and Glory: My Life Story


Gladys Knight - 1997
    of photos.

Godlike


Richard Hell - 2005
    Combining the grit, wit, and invention of Go Now with the charged lyricism and emotional implosiveness of his groundbreaking music, Godlike is brillant in form as well as dazzling in its heartwrenching tale of one whose values in life are the values of poetry. Set largely in the early '70s, but structured as a middle-aged poet's 1997 notebooks and drafts for a memoir-novel, the book recounts the story of a young man's affair with a remarkable teenage poet. Godlike is a novel of compelling originality and trascendent beauty.\

Diamond in the Rough: A Memoir


Shawn Colvin - 1997
    In 1997, two decades after she started, she got her big break. Like the troubled would-be arsonist and survivor of her smash hit "Sunny Came Home," Colvin knows a thing or two about heartache—and setting fires. Diamond in the Rough recounts this passionate musician's coming-of-age, from the prairies of South Dakota to the dark smoky bars in Austin, Texas, to the world stage at the Grammys.Humorous and deeply honest, Colvin relates the experiences behind her best-loved songs in vivid color in this memoir. Diamond in the Rough captures her years of touring cross-country in bands and vans full of guys; falling in and out of love; meeting heroes like Joni Mitchell; searching for her musical identity; and making friendships that would last a lifetime. It is also an unflinching account of Colvin's struggles—weathering addiction and depression, learning to care for not only herself but also a child—and, always, channeling those experiences into song.With the wit, lyricism, and empathy that have characterized Colvin's performances and inspired audiences worldwide, Diamond in the Rough looks back over a rich lifetime of highs and lows with stunning insight and candor. In its pages, we witness the inspiring story of a woman honing her artistry, finding her voice, and making herself whole.

The Favorite Game


Leonard Cohen - 1963
    Life for Breavman is made up of dazzling colour – a series of motion pictures fed through a high-speed projector: the half-understood death of his father; the adult games of love and war, with their infinite capacity for fantasy and cruelty; his secret experiments with hypnotism; the night-long adventures with Krantz, his beloved comrade and confidant. Later, achieving literary fame as a college student, Breavman does penance through manual labour, but ultimately flees to New York. And although he has loved the bodies of many women, it is only when he meets Shell, whom he awakens to her own beauty, that he discovers the totality of love and its demands, and comes to terms with the sacrifices he must make.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot


Gina Kirkham - 2021
    The laughter continues to flow in Gina Kirkham's brilliant sequel to the hilarious Handcuffs, Truncheon and a Polyester Thong.Our hapless heroine, Constable Mavis Upton, is preparing to walk down the aisle with her fianc� Joe, but has to deal with her temperamental teen daughter, as well as investigate a serial flasher on a push bike.Throw a diva drag queen into the mix and you can expect more marvellous Mavis mishaps...Revel in Gina Kirkham's humorous, poignant, and moving stories of an everyday girl who one day followed a dream.

The Good Life


Tony Bennett - 1998
    The renowned recording artist shares a half-century of personal memories, from his childhood in Depression-era Queens, to the New York jazz scene of the 1940s, to his successes with a new generation of fans in the 1990s.

Resistance: A Songwriter's Story of Hope, Change, and Courage


Tori Amos - 2020
    From her unnerving depiction of sexual assault in "Me and a Gun" to her post-9/11 album Scarlet's Walk to her latest album Native Invader, her work has never shied away from intermingling the personal with the political.Amos began playing piano as a teenager for the politically powerful at hotel bars in Washington, D.C., during the formative years of the post-Goldwater and then Koch-led Libertarian and Reaganite movements. The story continues to her time as a hungry artist in L.A. to the subsequent three decades of her formidable music career. Amos explains how she managed to create meaningful, politically resonant work against patriarchal power structures-and how her proud declarations of feminism and her fight for the marginalized always proved to be her guiding light. She teaches readers to engage with intention in this tumultuous global climate and speaks directly to supporters of #MeToo and #TimesUp, as well as young people fighting for their rights and visibility in the world.Filled with compassionate guidance and actionable advice-and using some of the most powerful, political songs in Amos's canon-this book is for readers determined to steer the world back in the right direction.

Always Box Set


Susan Ward - 2017
    I dumped my jerk musician boyfriend at a party for getting with another girl, took off down the beach, and ran feet-first into a heartbroken rock star lying in the sand. The next thing I knew, I was in Jack’s bedroom. JACK... When I looked up and saw her in the moonlight, my heart leapt for the first time since my wife’s death. Every reason not to get involved with Linda was obliterated by what I saw in her eyes. A Second Chance Love Story Rock star Jackson Parker can have any woman he wants. But after the death of his wife and son he is heartbroken and alone, and wants nothing to do with anyone. That is until Linda Cray stumbles unexpectedly into his world.On a beach in Santa Barbara, Linda finds Jack alone at night and in need of help. She’s a feisty, strong, independent woman seventeen years his junior with a troubling past of her own.What happens next neither of them expects. They will love and pull apart, only to love again, staying strong and true to their hearts as they dedicate themselves to each other and the people they love. The journey is far from conventional. The obstacles between them many. Their love enduring.

It's Always Summer Somewhere: A Matter of Life and Cricket


Felix White - 2021
    His passion for the game is at the fore on the BBC 's number one cricket podcast and 5Live show, Tailenders, which he co-presents with Greg James and Jimmy Anderson. It's Always Summer Somewhere is his funny, heartbreaking and endlessly engaging love letter to the game.Felix takes us through his life growing up in South West London and describes how his story is forever punctuated and given meaning by cricket. Through his own exploits as a slow left arm spinner of 'lovely loopy stuff', to the tragic illness of his mother, life with The Maccabees and his cricket redemption, Felix touches on both the comedic and the tragic in equal measure. Throughout, there's the ever-present roller coaster of following the England cricket team. The exploits of Tufnell (another bowler of 'lovely loopy stuff'), Atherton, Hussain et al, are given extra import through the eyes of a cricket-obsessed youth. Felix meets them at each signposted moment to find out what was really behind those moments that gave cricket fans everywhere sporting memories that would last forever, sending the book into an exploration of grief, transgenerational displacement and how the people we've known and things we've loved culminate and take expression in our lives. It's Always Summer Somewhere is an incredibly honest detail of a life lived with cricket. It offers a sense of genuine empathy and understanding not just with cricket fans, but sports and music fans across the world, in articulating our reasons for pouring so much meaning into something that we simply cannot control.Culminating in the heart-stopping World Cup Final in 2019, the book finally answers that question fans have so often asked...what is it about this game?

My Watch Volume 2: Political and Public Affairs


Olusegun Obasanjo - 2015
    It is a memoir of a lifetime spent in service to country, of a man who has been destined with the watch, with the vigilance, with the responsibility to his people to speak up and speak out.My Watch spans large expanses of time, from the pre-colonial Owu history, to early Abeokuta and the last throes of an independent city state at turn-of-the-century colonial Nigeria, to the early life of its author, his civil war experience, his stewardship of the transitional government of 1976-1979, the interregnum, his second appearance on the national scene as a civilian president on Nigeria's return to democracy in 1999, the completion of the first civilian-civilian transfer of government in Nigeria's history that inaugurated the Yar'Adua presidency and signalled the end of Obasanjo's tenure in office, and the years hence.Presented in three volumes, this exquisitely narrated memoir, in turns intensely personal and broadly nationalistic and international, completes a trilogy of autobiographies—My Command, Not My Will, and My Watch—told by this sojourner of Nigerian and world history.

Change of Seasons: A Memoir


John Oates - 2017
    Raised in a small Pennsylvania town, he was exposed to folk, blues, soul, and R&B. Meeting and teaming up with Daryl Hall in the late 1960s, they developed a style of music that was uniquely their own but never abandoned their roots. John uncovers the grit and struggle it took to secure a recording contract with the legendary Atlantic Records and chronicles the artistic twists and turns that resulted in a DJ discovering an obscure album track that would become their first hit record. This is not your typical rock and roll story. John was focused creating great music. Along the way he achieved incredible success, battling the ever-changing pop music landscape and coming to terms with complex managerial, business, and personal challenges.Daryl Hall and John Oates have over 20 albums together, more than 60 million records sold, and 29 Top 40 hits. They are the most successful pop duo in the world and members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And yet John’s story has never been told. Relying on his many hand-written journals, he brings to light many fascinating stories spanning his entire life with a journalist’s eye and a poet’s heart.In Change of Seasons, John shares his highs, lows, triumphs, and failures. He takes the reader on a wild ride through all the eras, personalities and music that has shaped him into what he is.