Electric Eden
Book description
A new edition as part of the Faber Greatest Hits - books that have taken writing about music in new and exciting directions for the twenty-first century.
Rob Young's Electric Eden: Unearthing Britain's Visionary Music is a seminal book on British music and cultural heritage, that spans the visionary classical…
- Coming soon!
Why read it?
2 authors picked Electric Eden as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
I like books that take me via the scenic route. If I’m reading a history of folk music, I don’t just want dry old discographies and lists of bands and their lineups. I want a living, breathing account of where this all came from and what the modern era has inherited.
I want to know about the collectors and archivists and famous composers like Vaughan Williams and Holst who went from town to town and village to village getting information from people of my Grandad’s age about the songs that were passed down to them through the generations. I want…
Young traces the history of Britain's visionary music from the Edwardian era to the end of the Seventies with such a powerful voice that he manages to re-enchant a lost landscape.
From the trove of folk songs collected by Cecil Sharpe's and Ralph Vaughn Williams' forays into the farmyards and fishing villages yet to be decimated by WWI to the melancholy, autumnal sunsets captured by Joe Boyd discoveries Nick Drake and The Incredible String Band, his luminous writing is as bewitching as it is informative.
It awoke memories of my own Seventies childhood and all its magical undercurrents – from…
From Cathi's list on the magical and horrible history of Goth.
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