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Ask Bethany: FAQs: Surfing, Faith & Friends
Bethany Hamilton - 2007
In her chatty and breezy style, typical of any online conversation, Bethany Hamilton shares information on a wide variety of topics about her life and faith.
Clandestino: In Search of Manu Chao
Peter Culshaw - 2013
That's Manu in a nutshell. He does everything differently. He is a multi-million selling artist who prefers sleeping on friends' floors to five-star hotels, an anti-globalisation activist who hangs out with prostitute-activists in Madrid and Zapatista leader Comandante Marcos in Chiapas, a recluse who is at home singing in front of 100,000 people in stadiums in Latin America or festivals in Europe.Clandestino has been five years in the writing, as Peter Culshaw followed Manu around the world, invited at a moment's notice to head to the Sahara, or Brazil, or to Buenos Aires, where Manu was making a record with mental asylum inmates. The result is one of the most fascinating music biographies we're ever likely to read.
J.K.Rowling
Colleen Sexton - 2005
K. Rowling wrote her first story at age six. From then on, writing was her passion. In 1990, an idea popped into her head that changed her life. She envisioned an orphaned Harry Potter, who learns he is a wizard. Rowling began to write amazing tales and became one of the world's most famous authors.
Ian Gillan: The Autobiography of Deep Purple's Lead Singer
Ian Gillan - 1993
This is the autobiography of their lead singer, Ian Gillan. Here he tells his life story, and that of the band he helped to make great. Stories of friction and violence, groupies and non-stop partying, drugs and alcohol, and how, finally, it all spiralled out of control to destroy the band.
Guitar Lessons: A Life's Journey Turning Passion Into Business
Bob Taylor - 2011
From the "a-ha" moment in junior high school that inspired his very first guitar, Taylor has been living the American dream, crafting quality products with his own hands and building a successful, sustainable business. In Guitar Lessons, he shares the values that he lives by and that have provided the foundation for the company's success. Be inspired by a story of guts and gumption, an unwavering commitment to quality, and the hard lessons that made Taylor Guitars the company it is today.
Starting Over: The Making of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's Double Fantasy
Ken Sharp - 2010
The most acclaimed singer/songwriter of his generation, first a Beatle and then a boundary-pushing solo artist, was senselessly silenced forever at age forty; immediately, his final musical statement, an intimate, pop-infused collection called Double Fantasy, released only weeks before his death, skyrocketed to #1 worldwide, as did its poignantly titled single, "(Just Like) Starting Over." His first studio recording since 1975’s Rock ’n’ Roll—and his first musical endeavor of any kind since taking a much-needed hiatus to raise Sean, his son with Yoko Ono—Double Fantasy represents more than a comeback album to Lennon fans and music critics alike. It captures a cultural icon at the pinnacle of his creative success and personal fulfillment; thirty years later it remains a musical touchstone and an affecting reminder of what could have been.Starting Over is an oral history of the making of Double Fantasy and the definitive account of John Lennon’s last days. From early demos to sessions at New York City’s The Hit Factory, from the electrifying chemistry of the studio band to keeping the project under wraps to the album’s release and critical reception, here is fascinating, insightful commentary from all of the key players involved in its extraordinary creation: Yoko Ono, David Geffen, producer Jack Douglas, engineers, arrangers, session musicians, music journalists, and even Lennon himself via archival interviews.Featuring never-before-seen photos of John and Yoko in the studio, candid images taken by David M. Spindel and Roger Farrington, Starting Over is the essential portrait for anyone who hears both a beginning and ending in the tracks of Double Fantasy.
Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison: The Making of a Masterpiece
Michael Streissguth - 2004
The concert and the live album, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, propelled him to worldwide superstardom. He reached new audiences, ignited tremendous growth in the country music industry, and connected with fans in a way no other artist has before or since.Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison is a riveting account of that day, what led to it, and what came after. Scrupulously researched, rich with the author's unprecedented access to Folsom Prison's and Columbia Records' archives, illustrated with more than 100 photos, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison shows how Johnny Cash forever became a champion of the downtrodden, as well as one of the more enduring forces in American music.
The Eternal Summer: Palmer, Nicklaus, and Hogan in 1960, Golf's Golden Year
Curt Sampson - 1992
Here was Arnold Palmer, the workingman's hero, "sweating, chain-smoking, shirt-tail flying"; Ben Hogan, the greatest player of the fifties, a perfectionist battling twin demons of age and nerves; and, making his big-time debut, a crew-cut college kid who seemed to have the makings of a champion: twenty-year-old Jack Nicklaus. And of course, the rest: Ken Venturi, Chi Chi Rodriguez, Doug Sanders, Gary Player, and the many other colorful characters who chased around a little white ball--and a dream. Would Palmer win the mythical Grand Slam of golf? Could Hogan win one more major tournament? Was Nicklaus the real thing? Even more than an intimate portrait of these men and their exciting times, The Eternal Summer is also an entertaining, perceptive, and hypnotically readable exploration of professional golf in America.
Keith Richards on Keith Richards
Sean Egan - 2013
The result was usually an interview free of phoney claims or self promotion, even if it might occasionally be tricky to follow - depending on what condition Keith was in when he gave it.Now, Sean Egan has done a sterling job of organising a huge number of Richards’ published utterances drawn from GQ, Melody Maker and Rolling Stone, plus many more never before seen in print.Taken together they form a riveting commentary on Keith Richards’ half-century progression from gauche young pretender to craggy elder statesman of rock music.They also reveal an unexpectedly warm, unpretentious, articulate and honest man who occupies a unique and rarefied role in the history of rock ’n’ roll.
McBusted: The Story of the World's Biggest Super Band
Jennifer Parker - 2014
McBusted takes an exclusive look at the birth of Busted and McFly, two ground-breaking pop-rock bands who journeyed through sell-out arena tours with number-one hits, and the unique friendships that the boys shared from the very beginning. Packed with behind-the-scenes gossip, it follows the boys through the years, revealing the truth behind Busted's shock break-up and McFly's hiatus, the secrets of their private lives, and the roller-coaster ride that fame took them on - both the good times and the bad. In September 2013, McFly staged their tenth-anniversary show at the Royal Albert Hall and James and Matt were invited along as special guests to perform a medley of hits with the band. The reaction to the six-piece supergroup was stratospheric and the boys decided to take the new superband on tour - and lo, McBUSTED was born. McBusted walks side by side with Tom, James, Danny, Dougie, Matt and Harry as they build the band and provides a backstage pass into the tour, the fans and what the future might hold.
(R)evolution: The Autobiography
Gary Numan - 2020
He has been lauded by everyone from Prince ('His album Replicas never left my turntable . . . There are people still trying to work out what a genius he was') through the Foo Fighters and Nine Inch Nails to Lady Gaga ('[He] proves music has always been really inventive for the masses'). (R)evolution is Numan's long-awaited memoir; one that charts his two lives. The first: from growing up in west London, where he was expelled from school and beaten up daily for looking different, before discovering his first synthesiser and conquering the music world in rapid time; to the extravagance, the undiagnosed Asperger's and the slow decline of a career that faded into near obscurity. The second: a twenty-plus year renaissance, catalysed by the date with a super-fan, which has allowed Gary to rediscover his creativity, produce some of his best music and become the true Godfather of electro-pop. This will be the story of one man, several dozen synthesisers, multiple issues and two desperately different lives.
My Brother's Keeper: The Official Bra Boys Story
Sean Doherty - 2009
Ringed by a jail, a sewerage works, a rifle range and a housing commission estate, it was where the streets of Sydney met the beach. It was a place where the local boys surfed hard and partied harder. It was also a place where trouble easily found you. Adopted by Maroubra Beach at a young age, the four Abberton brothers, all born to different fathers and a mother in the clutches of heroin addiction, grew up at a time when the area was shadowed by drugs and gang violence. Raised largely by their grandmother, Sunny, Jai, Koby and Dakota found solace in the surf, and solidarity with their mates, the Bra Boys.The official biography of the Abberton brothers follows their story from a turbulent upbringing on the sands of Maroubra to international surf stardom, and the fateful events of 5 August 2003, when Jai shot dead Maroubra underworld figure and childhood friend Tony Hines, only to be acquitted on the grounds of self-defence. The Official Bra Boys Story: My Brothers Keeper is raw, gritty, from the heart ... and everything you won′t read about in the newspapers.
Keep Smiling
Charlotte Church - 2007
She talks of her life, career, family and loves and impending motherhood with surprising intimacy and, being true to her outspoken reputation, complete honesty.
Stuart Adamson: In a Big Country
Allan Glen - 2011
Stuart Adamson: In a Big Country tells the story of how a teenager who was raised in a small Fife village released his first single at 19, wrote three Top 40 albums in the next three years and was written off as a has-been at 23, but then went on to form a new band and sell more than 10 million records worldwide, touring with the Rolling Stones and David Bowie. Although Stuart Adamson was one of the most respected and popular figures in the music industry, his personal life was complex - depression, alcoholism and estrangement - and ultimately tragic, ending with his suicide in a Hawaiian hotel in December 2001.
Roadie: My Life on the Road with Coldplay
Matt McGinn - 2010
Behind-the-scenes touring and recording stories are featured, as well as humorous and engaging anecdotes about Matt's relationship with Coldplay as they travel the globe and become one of the biggest bands in the world.