Her father, an ardent moonshiner when he wasn't in prison, and her mother, often showing mental illness from an earlier brain injury, raised their four children in some of the grimmest circumstances that you will ever read about. Messer eventually escaped her extreme living conditions by going to live with a family as their mother's helper outside of Washington, DC. She then moved to New York City to join her oldest sister who had fled an abusive arranged marriage when she was fifteen and left behind a young son. These two teenage girls, uneducated but determined, found freedom from their Appalachian abuse yet encountered a culture and some inhabitants who provided scars even so. Messer's memoir is told through the eyes and with the words of a barely educated child and young woman yet their meaning and her descriptions are clear as a mountain stream. Messer changed the names of many people and places she wrote about to protect her still living family members and herself as well. In the final chapter, Messer shares one legacy from her father....he even taught the infamous "Popcorn" Sutton of Maggie Valley how to be a moonshiner when Popcorn was a teenager. The moonshiner's daughter did survive and ultimately thrive. This is her story. You won't be able to put it down.

    Stephen Tow takes a second look at the music and community that vaulted the likes of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Mudhoney, and Soundgarden to international fame. Chock-full of interviews with the starring characters, Tow extensively chronicles the rise of rock 'n' roll s last great statement and contextualizes what the music really meant to the key players. Delving deep into the archives, Tow paints a vivid picture of the underground rock circuit of tattered warehouses and community centers. Seattle s heady punk scene of the late '80s gave birth to a rowdy and raucous movement, influenced by metal, but wholly its own. Seattle made its own sound, a sound that came to be known internationally as grunge. Tow walks the reader through this sonic evolution, interviewing members of every band along the way. In 1991, Seattle s sound took the world by storm--but this same storm had been brewing in the Pacific Northwest for a decade before it hit MTV.The Strangest Tribeis a reframing of this last transformative era in music. Not just plaid shirts, bleached hair, and angst, grunge is a word used to describe a rich community of artists and jokers."

    Martin Luther King had a dream. And Stevie Wonder had a dream. This is a book about dreams.”In the Fall of 1980, Gil Scott-Heron was invited by Stevie Wonder to join him on a forty-one city tour across America that would end in Washington on January 15, 1981. The purpose of this tour was to raise popular support for the creation of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, a national holiday that would honor the great civil rights leader. This holiday became official in 1986. Scott-Heron uses this history-making tour as the backbone of his fascinating memoir.Raised by his grandmother in Jackson, Tennessee, Scott-Heron’s journey from these humble beginnings to becoming one of the most uncompromising and influential musicians and songwriters of his generation is a remarkable one. Frequently cited as the godfather of rap, Scott-Heron’s poetic output spanned from the politically savvy to the savagely satirical, from the socially conscious to the tenderhearted. His unexpected death in May 2011 robbed America of one its most vocal and articulate artists and resulted in an extraordinary outpouring of appreciation for him and his work from all around the world. Chuck D of Public Enemy said of Scott-Heron, “we do what we do and how we do because of you.” Eminem added, “Scott-Heron influenced all of hip-hop,” and from Sarah Silverman, “he mirrored ugliness with beauty, audacity, and valor.”This posthumous publication of The Last Holiday is a fitting testament to the career and achievements of Gil Scott-Heron. But it is also a heartfelt and highly personal account of his growing up in the South, a touching portrait of Stevie Wonder, and a compelling narrative vehicle for Scott-Heron’s keen insights into the music industry, the civil rights movement, modern America, governmental hypocrisy, and our wider place in the world.

    Even as everything else about the world of music changes, the piano lesson retains its appeal. Drawing on her own lifelong experience as a student and teacher, Tunstall writes about the mysteries and delights of piano teaching and learning. What is it that happens in a piano lesson to make it such a durable ritual? In a world where music is heard more often on the telephone and in the elevator than in the concert hall, why does the piano lesson still have meaning in the lives of children? What does it matter whether one more child learns to play Bach's Minuet in G? "Note by Note" is in part a memoir in which Tunstall recalls her own childhood piano teachers and their influence. As she observes, the piano lesson is unlike the experience of being coached on an athletic team or taught in a classroom, in that it is a one-on-one, personal communication. Physically proximate, mutually concentrating on the transfer of a skill that is often arduous, complicated and frustrating, teacher and student occasionally experience breakthroughs-moments of joy when the student has learned something, mastered a musical passage or expressed a feeling through music. The relationship is not only one-way: teaching the piano is a lifelong endeavor of particular intensity and power.Anyone who has ever studied the piano-or wanted to-will cherish this gem of a book.

    (Music)

    Their sound was inventive and tetchy, and front man Jello Biafra’s lyrics were incisive and often scathing. This chronicle—the first in-depth book written about Dead Kennedys—uses dozens of firsthand interviews, photos, and original artwork to offer a new perspective on a group that was mired in controversy almost from its inception. It examines and applauds the band’s key role in transforming punk rhetoric, both polemical and musical, into something genuinely threatening and enormously funny. Author Alex Ogg puts the local and global trajectory of punk into context and, while not flinching from the wildly differing takes the individual band members have on the evolution of the band, attempts to be celebratory—if not uncritical.

    In 1987, Lawrence Livermore founded independent punk label Lookout Records to release records by his band The Lookouts. Forming a partnership with David Hayes, the label released some of the most influential recordings from California’s East Bay punk scene, including a then-teenaged Green Day. Originally operating out of a bedroom, Lookout created "The East Bay Punk sound,” with bands such as Crimpshrine, Operation Ivy, The Mr. T Experience, and many more. The label helped to pave the way for future punk upstarts and as Lookout grew, young punk entrepreneurs used the label as a blueprint to try their hand at record pressing. As punk broke nationally in the mid 90s the label went from indie outfit to having more money than it knew how to manage.

    One experience that would take some beating is that endured by Baxter Dury.When punk rock star Ian Dury disappeared to make films in the late 80s, he left his teenage son in the care of his roadie, in a rundown flat in Hammersmith. But this was no ordinary roadie; this was the Sulphate Strangler. The Strangler, having taken a lot of LSD in the 60s, was prone to depression, anger and hallucinations. He was also, as the name suggests, a drug dealer. What could possibly go wrong?In a period that we can now only imagine, a young Baxter ricocheted from one adventure to another, narrowly swerving one disaster only immediately to collide with another. At times, his situation was perilous in the extreme - the world is lucky to have him at all. CHAISE LONGUE is an intimate account of those escapades, evocatively illuminating a bohemian west London populated with feverishly grubby characters. Narrated in Dury's candid tone, both sad and funny, this moving story will leave an indelible imprint on its readers.

    Telling the story of her family, growing up in California in the '60s and '70s, her life in visual art, her move to New York City, the men in her life, her marriage, her relationship with her daughter, her music, and her band, Girl in a Band is a rich and beautifully written memoir.Gordon takes us back to the lost New York of the 1980s and '90s that gave rise to Sonic Youth, and the Alternative revolution in popular music. The band helped build a vocabulary of music—paving the way for Nirvana, Hole, Smashing Pumpkins and many other acts. But at its core, Girl in a Band examines the route from girl to woman in uncharted territory, music, art career, what partnership means—and what happens when that identity dissolves.Evocative and edgy, filled with the sights and sounds of a changing world and a transformative life, Girl in a Band is the fascinating chronicle of a remarkable journey and an extraordinary artist.

    For the two years leading up to his murder, Ivers had hosted the underground but increasingly popular LA-based music and sketch-comedy cable show New Wave Theatre.The late '70s through early '80s was an explosive time for pop culture: Saturday Night Live and National Lampoon were leading a comedy renaissance, while punk rock and new wave were turning the music world on its head. New Wave Theatre brought together for the first time comedians-turned-Hollywood players like John Belushi, Chevy Chase, and Harold Ramis with West Coast punk rockers Black Flag, the Dead Kennedys, Fear, and others, thus transforming music and comedy forever. The show was a jubilant, chaotic punk-experimental-comedy cabaret, and Ivers was its charismatic leader and muse. He was, in fact, the only person with the vision, the generosity of spirit, and the myriad of talented friends to bring together these two very different but equally influential worlds, and with his death the improbable and electric union of punk and comedy came to an end.The magnetic, impishly brilliant Ivers was a respected musician and composer (in addition to several albums, he wrote the music for the centerpiece song of David Lynch's cult classic Eraserhead) whose sublime and bizarre creativity was evident in everything he did. He was surrounded by people who loved him, many of them luminaries: his best friend from his Harvard days was Doug Kenney, founder of National Lampoon; he was also close to Harold Ramis and John Belushi. Upon his death, Ivers was just beginning to get mainstream recognition.In Heaven Everything Is Fine is the first book to explore both the fertile, gritty scene that began and ended with New Wave Theatre and the life and death of its guiding spirit. Josh Frank, author of Fool the World: The Oral History of a Band Called Pixies, interviewed hundreds of people from Ivers's circle, including Jello Biafra, Stockard Channing, and David Lynch, and we hear in their own words about Ivers and the marvelous world he inhabited. He also spoke with the Los Angeles Police Department about Ivers's still-unsolved murder, and, as a result of his research, the Cold Case Unit has reopened the investigation. In Heaven Everything Is Fine is a riveting account of a gifted artist, his tragic death, and a little-known yet crucial chapter in American pop history.

    Founded by Jerry Dammers, their fusion of punk, reggae, and ska created a new musical fashion—spearheaded by their own Two Tone record label—that stood for unity and racial harmony in a polarized society. This musical odyssey with The Specials moves from their early days on Coventry's punk circuit, to their chart-storming success with singles like Too Much Too Young and the eerily prescient Ghost Town, released as the race riots of 1982 saw Toxteth and Brixton go up in flames. Written with wry humor, this affectionate look at a band whose sublime music remains influential today is a must for all fans of The Specials.

    

    David Nolan's 'I Swear I Was There' describes the early days of the Sex Pistols, their first gig at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1976 and the long-term effects of that first concert.

    Her memoir tells the story of how, through sheer will, talent, and fearlessness, she forced herself into a male-dominated industry, became part of a movement that changed music, and inspired a generation of female rockers.After forming The Flowers of Romance with Sid Vicious in 1976, Albertine joined The Slits and made musical history in one of the first generations of punk bands. The Slits would go on to serve as an inspiration to future rockers, including Kurt Cobain, Carrie Brownstein, and the Riot Grrrl movement in the 1990s. This is the story of what it was like to be a girl at the height of punk: the sex, the drugs, the guys, the tours, and being part of a brilliant pioneering group of women making musical history. Albertine recounts helping define punk fashion, struggling to find her place among the boys, and her romance with Mick Jones, including her pregnancy and subsequent abortion. She also gives a candid account of what happened post-punk, beyond the break-up of The Slits in 1982, including a career in film, surviving cancer, and making music again, twenty-five years later.A truly remarkable memoir told in Viv’s frank, irreverent, and distinctive voice, Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys. is a raw, thrilling story of life on the frontier.

    Everywhere she goes and every video she posts has one basic message: this is real, this is life, and we all go through it. Whether it’s acne, boyfriends, faith, stress, or having fun, Natasha’s view is to simply be honest, simply be real, no matter what you face. Natasha’s real and relatable tone paired with personal notes and stories will help readers see that living a “real” life is the best life. The dust jacket features embossing.