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.

    Four years later she had become a top television actress and movie star. She earned a Grammy, started a record label, and became the president of her own company. Today she is rap music's most enduring female force.But how did Dana Owens, a young girl from Newark, New Jersey, become Queen Latifah and make it to the top of the charts? The most powerful voice in rap has always been quiet about her life.Until now.At once autobiographical and inspirational, Ladies First is the story of a young woman, making tough decisions and terrible mistakes -- about sex and drugs and about who was real and who wasn't -- before she was old enough to drive. It is about the reign of depression that descended on her after her brother's tragic death and how she found a sustaining love in God when it seemed the world was trying to break her. Ladies First is about being confident and sensual in a big, strong body and about blocking out the junk to let in the good. It is about how anyone -- whether from the poorest means or the richest -- can hold her head high in a world full of attitude.In a queen's universe, each experience is a lesson. Keeping it real and making no excuses, Queen Latifah shares her truth about what's important in life. Full of wisdom and revelations, Ladies First will instill in you the same self-esteem, respect, and courage that brought Queen Latifah peace and her independent edge. Allow her to guide you to discover who you are -- inside and out-as you discover who she is.Ladies First is one woman's journey to find the riches that were in her life all along, and it is a message of majesty for everyone.With Ladies First, the queen who lives within all of us will rise.

    Acclaimed as both actor and director, as well as for his musical compositions, he’s won multiple Oscars for his achievements in front of and behind the camera and has established himself as a true cinematic great. This stunning volume presents a chronological look at his astonishing body of work, from the early “spaghetti westerns” to his iconic role as “Dirty” Harry Callahan in Dirty Harry (1971), to the soulful Bird (1988) and the revolutionary western Unforgiven (1992) through to more recent films such as the Academy Award-winning Mystic River (2003) and Million Dollar Baby (2004), and his latest picture, the rousing drama Invictus, starring Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman, which was released in December 2009. Over 300 spectacular images, including dynamic stills from memorable screen performances and revealing behind-the-scenes photos, are accompanied by Richard Schickel’s incisive and illuminating commentary.

    In this no-holds-barred memoir, legendary rocker Danny Seraphine shares his dramatic—and often shocking—experiences as the popular supergroup's cofounder and longtime drummer. He reveals behind-the-scenes anecdotes about Chicago’s beginnings as the house band at Los Angeles's legendary Whisky A Go Go, where they were discovered by music icons Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, and personal insights about the group’s many comebacks and reinventions over the years.Offers a lively inside account of the music and history of the perennially popular band Chicago, one of the most successful American bands ever with over 122 million albums sold, by the band’s cofounder and longtime drummer Danny SeraphineIncludes riveting tales and rare photographs from Seraphine's time on the road touring with performers including Dennis and Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and Bruce SpringsteenCandidly tackles many rumors about Chicago, including Mafia ties, accounting and payola scandals, and major drug abuseDiscusses the mysterious circumstances surrounding Seraphine's 1990 firing from the band as well as his comeback with his critically acclaimed new band, California Transit AuthorityWhether you're a diehard Chicago fan or just love a well-told rock-and-roll memoir, Street Player will entertain and surprise you.

    Sitting through hundreds of hours of interviews and private conversations -- not only with Jayne but also with her husbands, her lovers, and her children -- gave Ray the opportunity to present a revealing portrait of the woman. He records her drive for fame and success and her overpowering need to be loved and to love, needs that led her into numerous affairs with rich and powerful men -- including President John F Kennedy -- and with younger men from all walks of life. And he discusses frankly Jayne's ultimately successful plan to become pregnant by Nelson Sardelli because she wanted to have an Italian child.Know to millions as the consummate sex symbol who rivaled Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield received more press coverage than anyone else in Hollywood. The headlines were often sensational, causing society matrons and Baptist ministers to shake their heads and point their fingers. But under those sensational headlines there was a woman of greater complexity that any reporter could hope to understand. Strait goes below the surface to examine Jayne's emotions and motivations, revealing the truth about her many lovers, her three unsuccessful marriages, her love affair with Mickey Hargitay that lasted to the end and her battle against and her surrender to alcohol and drugs.

    Why did Kurt Cobain write "Polly", his graphic anti-rape song? What is "Teen Spirit"? Who is Floyd the Barber? As Chuck Crisafulli answers these questions he chronicles Nirvana's rise to fame and the emergence of grunge. 90 full-color and b&w photos.

    

    Written with the full cooperation of each of the group’s members and their intimates, this book tells the inside story of the music and the madness, the feuds and the drugs, the marriages and the affairs—from the greatest heights to the self-destructive depths of the Fab Four. In-depth and definitive, The Love You Make is an astonishing account of four men who transformed the way a whole generation of young people thought and lived. It reigns as the most comprehensive, revealing biography available of John, Paul, George, and Ringo. Includes 32 pages of rare and revealing photosA Literary Guild® Alternate Selection

    Pendel's attention. It is very interesting and throws many sidelights on the life of the White House. Pendel writes: "In 1861, or 1862, the Metropolitan Police was established by Congress at the Capital, and I made application for and received an appointment on the force. I made the first arrest, with the assistance of "Buck" Essex. The case was that of a fellow named Grady, one of the English Hill toughs. A roundsman said to us, "Boys, you take a walk down Seventh Street, and if you see anything going on, take a hand in it." Just as we got opposite the Patent Office, this Grady had assaulted, or rather was assaulting, a young fellow with a whip. I went up and grabbed him and put him under arrest, then took him to Squire Dunn's court and preferred charges against him. The Squire was busy writing for some time. When he got through he handed me the paper he was writing, and I was so green at the business I did not know what it was, so said: "What is this, Squire?" He replied, "Why, that is the paper of commitment for this fellow. Take him to jail." "On November 3, 1864, Sergeant John Cronin, Alfonso Dunn, Andrew Smith, and myself were ordered to report at the First Precinct, in the old City Hall, at one o'clock in the afternoon. We supposed we were to be detailed for detective work in New York City on account of the great riot then on there, especially as we were ordered to report in citizens' clothes, to conceal our revolvers, and to be sure to have them all clean and in good order. We arrived at the City Hall, and then were told where we were to go, which was to the President's Mansion, there to report to Marshal Lanham, at that time United States Marshal of the District of Columbia, and a bosom friend of Abraham Lincoln. "These were days that tried men's hearts, and women's, too. Men were falling at the front by hundreds, both in the Union and in the Confederate armies. There was weeping and mourning all over the land. Our nation was trembling with anxiety; we were all hoping that the great strife was over or soon to be. "Marshal Lanham took us upstairs and into the President's office, where we were introduced to him and to his two secretaries, Mr. Nicolay and Mr. Hay, the latter now being Secretary of State. We were then instructed to keep a sharp lookout in the different parts of the house, more particularly in the East Room and at the door of the President's office. " CONTENTS I — Under President Lincoln II — Under President Johnson III — Under President Grant IV — Under President Hayes V — Under President Garfield VI — Under President Arthur VII — Under President Cleveland VIII — Under President Harrison IX — Cleveland's Second Administration X— Under President McKinley XI — Furniture in Executive Mansion Originally published in 1902; reformatted for the Kindle; may contain an occasional imperfections; original spellings have been kept in place.

    In the case of Beethoven, however, the standard approach has been to treat his life and his art separately. Now, Barry Cooper's new volume incorporates the latest international research on many aspects of the composer's life and work and presents these in a truly integrated narrative. Cooper employs a strictly chronological approach that enables each work to be seen against the musical and biographical background from which it emerged. The result is a much closer confluence of life and work than is usually achieved, for two reasons. First, composition was Beethoven's central preoccupation for most of his life: I live entirely in my music, he once wrote. Second, recent study of his many musical sketches has enabled a much clearer picture of his everyday compositional activity than was previously possible, leading to rich new insights into the interaction between his life and music. This volume concentrates on Beethoven's artistic achievements both by examining the origins of his works and by expert commentary on some of their most striking and original features. It also reexamines virtually all the evidence--from fictitious anecdotes right down to the translations of individual German words--to avoid recycling old errors. And it offers numerous new details derived from sketch studies and a new edition of Beethoven's correspondence. Offering a wealth of fresh conclusions and intertwining life and work in illuminating ways, Beethoven will establish itself as the reference on one of the world's greatest composers.

    Raised in a poor South London family with a history of mental illness, David Robert Jones was to become an emblem of his time whose fame rivaled that of Elvis Presley and the Beatles. He sang some of the most haunting pop songs of the 1970s and starred in some of the strangest plays and films of the period (The Elephant Man, The Hunger, The Man Who Fell to Earth). Androgynous, Jekyll and Hyde by turns, susceptible to cocaine and paranoia, casting off a series of managers and involved in complex lawsuits, Bowie eventually deserted Britain and America and moved to a house near the Berlin Wall. The Gillmans' formidable research enables them to smash many Bowie myths, but their sympathy for him and his disturbed family is evident, and they deal fairly with his wife, agents and lovers. Still, only obsessed Bowie fans will have the stamina to get all the way through this depressing 500-page odyssey. Photos. Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

    Parker has talked tomany of those closely invloved in the scene and has uncovered many previously undisclosed - and often outrageous facts about Rollins' life.

    He is this century's most ardent advocate of First Amendment rights, a man whose landmark Supreme Court cases are studied by every law student in America. He is the founder and publisher of Hustler magazine, a journal often described as tasteless, crude, scatological, and gynecologically explicit - to which he would reply, "Good!" For Flynt, tastelessness is "a necessary tool in challenging preconceived notions in a world where people are afraid to discuss their attitudes, prejudices, and misconceptions." Born in the hills of Kentucky, in the poorest county in America, Flynt became a teenage runaway, an underage recruit in both the army and the navy, a bootlegger, a scam artist, a bar owner, the proprietor of a string of go-go clubs, an evangelical Christian, an atheist, and eventually a millionaire pornographer and publisher. A prodigious sexual athlete, Flynt was shot down in his prime by an assailant's bullet and paralyzed from the waist down. Wheelchair bound and racked by years of searing pain, he became a pain-medicine junkie and habitue of America's courtrooms. Persecuted by the self-righteous Charles Keating, prosecuted by ambitious district attorneys, sued by moral crusaders like Jerry Falwell, and hounded by the government, Flynt forged a blazing trail through the American legal system. Remarkably, Larry Flynt has never told his story before. This highly personal and reflective account will surprise everyone, offend a few, and entertain many.

    One of the best-known and most beloved broadcasters in Britain, the charismatic BBC Radio 2 DJ has achieved legendary status with a hugely loyal following thanks to his tireless pioneering of new music, his warm and passionate personality and his soothing voice.Having thrown away the rule book as a teenager, Johnnie has always made decisions from the heart. As a result, he has had a brilliantly colourful life, with more ups and downs than a rollercoaster ride. He made his name in the 1960s when he and Radio Caroline, where his night-time show was essential listening for 86% of radio listeners, continued broadcasting in defiance of Government legislation. In 1976 he walked out of Radio 1 because of his outspoken views and his insistence on playing album tracks. He made front page news when he described the Bay City Rollers as 'musical garbage' and when he was caught snorting cocaine.In his memoir, he reveals all about his time with Radio Caroline, his drug addiction, his fight against cancer and his spiritual awakening. Honest, passionate and humorous, his autobiography will provide inspiring and entertaining listening to his million of fans.

    Molly gives us his unforgettable encounters with The Beatles, Elton John, David Bowie, The Rolling Stones, Madonna, John Farnham, Bruce Springsteen, the Bee Gees, Rod Stewart, Russell Crowe, Oasis, Beyonce and Prince. As well as the tales that surround his other loves: the Australian cricket team, the St Kilda footy club and the Melbourne Storm."I have a lot of love for the great Ian 'Molly' Meldrum" - Shane WarneNo one has lived a life like Ian 'Molly' Meldrum. And no one can tell a story like Molly.