By the time her life and artistry were cut tragically short by a heroin overdose, Joplin had become the stuff of rock–and–roll legend.Through the eyes of her family and closest friends , we see Janis as a young girl, already rebelling against injustice, racism, and hypocrisy in society. We follow Janis as she discovers her amazing talents in the Beat hangouts of Venice and North Beach–singing in coffeehouses, shooting speed to enhance her creativity, challenging the norms of straight society. Janis truly came into her own in the fantastic, psychedelic, acid–soaked world of Haight–Asbury. At the height of her fame, Janis's life is a whirlwind of public adoration and hard living. Laura Joplin shows us not only the public Janice who could drink Jim Morrison under the table and bean him with a bottle of booze when he got fresh; she shows us the private Janis, struggling to perfect her art, searching for the balance between love and stardom, battling to overcome her alcohol addiction and heroin use in a world where substance abuse was nearly universal.At the heart of Love, Janis is an astonishing series of letters by Janis herself that have never been previously published. In them she conveys as no one else could the wild ride from awkward small–town teenager to rock–and–roll queen. Love, Janis is the new life of Janis Joplin we have been waiting for–a celebration of the sixties' joyous experimentation and creativity, and a loving, compassionate examination of one of that era's greatest talents.

    The band themselves have assisted in this official illustrated record, contributing over 400 photographs (many never seen outside the pages of this book), press cuttings, album sleeves and posters. The Who: Maximum R&B also features complete UK and US discographies, including solo work by the individual members.First published in 1982 and now in its fifth edition, The Who: Maximum R&B is a colourful pictorial joyride widely accepted as the best book on the Who. Updated to detail the creative tensions and the chemistry that allowed the group to reform for one more time on their 2002 tour, it describes the untimely death of bassist John Entwistle on that same tour and features an Introduction by songwriter/guitarist Townshend on the loss of his friend and his own recent legal problems.

    He went on to record and perform in various configurations, including as a member of Stephen Stills’s Manassas and as a co-founder of The Souther-Hillman-Furay Band. In the 1980s he formed The Desert Rose Band, scoring eight Top 10 Billboard country hits. He’s released a number of solo efforts, including 2017’s highly acclaimed Bidin’ My Time—the final album produced by the late Tom Petty. In Time Between, Hillman shares his quintessentially Southern Californian experience, from an idyllic, rural 1950s childhood; to achieving worldwide fame thanks to hits such as “Mr. Tambourine Man,” “Turn! Turn! Turn!” and “Eight Miles High”; to becoming the first musician to move to Laurel Canyon. Featuring behind-the-scenes insights on his time in The Byrds, his productive but sometimes complicated relationship with Gram Parsons, his role in launching the careers of Buffalo Springfield and Emmylou Harris, and the ups and downs of life in various bands, music is only part of his story. Within the pages of Time Between, Hillman reveals the details of his personal life with candor and vulnerability, writing honestly about the shocking tragedy that struck his family when he was a teenager, his subsequent struggles with anger, and how his spiritual journey led him to a place of deep faith that allowed him to extend forgiveness and experience wholeness. Chris Hillman is much more than a rock star. He is truly a founding father of American music and a man who has faced down the challenges of life to discover what really matters.

    -The New York Times Book Review

    Willie riffs on everything: music, wives, Texas, politics, horses, religion, marijuana, children, the environment, poker, hogs, Nashville, karma, and more. He shares the outlaw wisdom he has acquired over eight decades, along with favorite jokes and insights from friends and others close to him. Rare family pictures, beautiful artwork created by his son Micah Nelson, and lyrics to classic songs punctuate these charming and poignant memories. Willie Nelson has touched millions, and none more deeply than his family, friends, and bandmates, several of whom share, for the first time, intimate stories about the Red Headed Stranger.From teaching a granddaughter to play the guitar to touring with the Highwaymen, from picking cotton while growing up in Texas to being home with the tribe on Maui, Willie takes you on the tour bus and, through candid observations and vivid recollections, gives you a front-row seat to his remarkable world. But beware: "You know you shouldn't be reading this BS, it could ruin you for all time to come," he says. "You could end up a social outcast like me, an outlaw!"At once a road journal written in his inimitable, homespun voice and a fitting tribute to America's greatest traveling bard, Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die—introduced by Kinky Friedman, another favorite son of Texas—is a deeply personal look into the heart and soul of a unique man and one of the greatest artists of our time, a songwriter and performer whose legacy will endure for generations to come.

    Part of Audible’s rapidly expanding Words + Music series, blending storytelling, music, and performance to create exceptional listening experiences, Crow’s session is marked by gorgeously stripped-down versions of the songs that made her a household name (exclusively recorded for these sessions). The tunes punctuate rich storytelling, as she dives deep into the history of her career, reexamining the personal experiences and relationships that impacted her artistic journey.“My journey is my own”, Crow says. “I mean, it's definitely not without some detours and definitely not without some hard lessons”. True to form, Crow leads us through her winding road to success - maybe more accurately defined as a series of jolting roller-coaster rides, as she recounts all the fits and starts, the feverish highs and lows, that have come to define a career now in its fourth decade. Featuring stunningly crisp, yet lo-fi renditions of eight songs including, “If It Makes You Happy”, “All I Wanna Do”, “Leaving Las Vegas”, “Strong Enough”, “My Favorite Mistake”, and George Harrison’s soulful “Beware of Darkness”, Sheryl Crow lays herself bare. From her early days in small-town Missouri where she sought salvation from her melancholy by turning to mystical rockers (Stevie Nicks and Zeppelin, most notably); to pursuing her dreams, and in quick fashion landing the spectacular gig as one of Michael Jackson’s featured solo vocalists on tour. (A career catapult that quickly became a cautionary tale.)From the crushing weight of perfectionism and loneliness, to the joys of finally finding kindred musical spirits - only to have it all crumble, just as the music was skyrocketing, the toll of her volatile ascent to stardom comes into focus. In a particularly fascinating section, she revisits the total sense of peer disconnect during the height of her records’ success as her style was painfully incongruent with the greater musical landscape at the time. This, subsequently leading to an “adoption” of sorts by an older, more simpatico class of musicians - luckily for her, they doubled as her heroes: Nicks, Keith Richards, and Dylan among them. In another poignant moment, Sheryl lets listeners in on the dysfunction and emotional reckoning that came after her well-publicized romances with Eric Clapton and a few years later Lance Armstrong.In just an hour and a half, Sheryl Crow manages to transform before our ears: from a well-known artist to human being we now know pretty damn well. That’s not easy to accomplish. And perhaps most extraordinarily, we are left with a lasting gift: beautiful songs we entered knowing become beautiful songs we now understand.

    As soon as she graduated from high school, Pamela Des Barres headed for the Sunset Strip, where she knocked on rock stars' backstage doors and immersed herself in the drugs, danger, and ecstasy of the freewheeling 1960s. Over the next 10 years she had affairs with Mick Jagger, Jimmy Page, Keith Moon, Waylon Jennings, Chris Hillman, Noel Redding, and Jim Morrison, among others. She traveled with Led Zeppelin; lived in sin with Don Johnson; turned down a date with Elvis Presley; and was close friends with Robert Plant, Gram Parsons, Ray Davies, and Frank Zappa. As a member of the GTO's, a girl group masterminded by Frank Zappa, she was in the thick of the most revolutionary renaissance in the history of modern popular music. Warm, witty, and sexy, this kiss-and-tell–all stands out as the perfect chronicle of one of rock 'n' roll's most thrilling eras.

    He gave rock and roll its devil's edge with hit records like 'Great Balls of Fire'. His incendiary shows caused riots and boycotts. He ran a decade-long marathon of drugs, drinking, and women, and married his thirteen-year-old second cousin, the third of seven wives. He also nearly met his maker, at least twice. He survived it all to be hailed as one of the greatest music icons. For the very first time, he reveals the truth behind the Last Man Standing of the rock-and-roll era.

    His staunch patriotism, tenacity, appetite for a fight, and, above all, his towering rhetoric inspired the British people to mount a gallant defense of their island nation. Having set a new bar for national heroism, he earned a place in the pantheon of the world’s greatest leaders. Churchill, a fearless soldier, was a veteran of countless battles and a rider in one of Britain’s last cavalry charges. He was also a gifted writer, a winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, whose war reporting made his name and whose books outlived him. A bon vivant who loved his brandy and cigars, he was also a devoted husband whose marriage was a lifelong love affair. By any measure, Churchill was a giant. But the man was far from perfect. He was a hero, yes, but a human one. He could be petty, irascible, and self-centered; it was bred in his bone that white Englishmen were born to lead the world and all others to be led. His mistakes cost billions of dollars and thousands of lives, but he had courage and a born politician’s sense of the public stage. In the end, Churchill became a regal figure whose life came to symbolize defiance of tyranny in the face of impossible odds. Here is his story.

    A collection of the notoriously private Beckett's reminiscences about his life and remembrances of Beckett fromthose who knew him.

    She was a Hollywood movie star. She is the wife of one of the greatest presidents of the twentieth century. She is a cancer survivor. And she now wages her greatest, unwinnable battle -- against her husband's Alzheimer's disease. Nancy Davis Reagan has led an extraordinary life; it has also been an extraordinarily private one. Now Mike Deaver, whose relationship with Mrs. Reagan dates back to the 1960s, shares the side of Nancy that only her intimates know.Most people don't know the real Nancy Reagan, or their impression of her has been shaped by consistently negative press coverage. If you believe the mainstream press, all you would really know about Nancy is that she likes fancy clothes or that she has rich and powerful friends or that she was obsessed with trivialities like the White House's china. Pundits were equally tough on her, crowning her with ugly nicknames, the tamer ones being Queen Nancy, Iron Lady, Ice Lady, and Dragon Lady.But the Nancy Reagan Mike Deaver has come to know over thirty-five years, the woman portrayed in Nancy, is far more complicated than the stereotype. No cardboard cutout, she is pure flesh and blood, a woman of immense will and fortitude. And in the Reagans' fifty-year marriage, Ron always received top billing, and she would have it no other way. She is convinced that her husband was one of the great men of the twentieth century -- a rare world leader who changed the tide of history. Still, Nancy has been no bit player in the story. Deaver believes that Reagan would not have risen to such distinction without Nancy at his side.Reluctantly drawn into politics, the retired actress and housewife was at first intimidated, but then gradually embraced her role. To the president who was incapable of protecting himself from those who served him poorly and even wished him harm, Nancy Reagan would bring discipline. When it would come time for a momentous life decision, to wage a campaign for the White House, she would ask the tough questions. When his image might be tainted, she would fervently guard it, even at the expense of her own.To Ronald Reagan the man, who always had trouble expressing intimacy, Nancy gave the gift of her unrestricted love. She was his respite, his comfort, his reward at the end of the day. Whenever she left him to travel, the leader of the free world was anxious as a schoolboy until she was safely home again. Now to a man no longer capable of looking after himself, Nancy is everything there is left to be: care-taker, guardian, nurturer of the Reagan legacy.