Here are 100 books that As Time Goes By fans have personally recommended if you like
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I was born in 1954, the same year as rock and roll. I am a product of the era that spawned me. I was that kid at school who would rather read his music mags than his school books. Over a rich and varied career, I have turned those passions into my profession. I have been a singer in a band, a music journalist, a broadcaster with the BBC national radio network, and have had several music related books published by major publishers. I have also been an academic specialist in my field and have managed to turn all those lifelong interests into a Ph.D. and an M.Phil.
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 a sense of how this stuff is in the very soil and landscape we inhabit.
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 and folk tradition from the nineteenth-century to the present day.
'A thoroughly enjoyable read and likely to remain the best-written overview for a long time.' GUARDIAN
'A perfectly timed, perfectly pitched alternative history of English folk music . . . wide-ranging, insightful, authoritative, thoroughly entertaining.' NEW STATESMAN
I was born in 1954, the same year as rock and roll. I am a product of the era that spawned me. I was that kid at school who would rather read his music mags than his school books. Over a rich and varied career, I have turned those passions into my profession. I have been a singer in a band, a music journalist, a broadcaster with the BBC national radio network, and have had several music related books published by major publishers. I have also been an academic specialist in my field and have managed to turn all those lifelong interests into a Ph.D. and an M.Phil.
Julian Cope writes like a fan. He doesn’t write like a musician or a music journalist. That’s why I like his books so much.
I find his views refreshing on everything from glam rock to living in Liverpool in the late 1970s. He may be best known for his music with The Teardrop Explodes and as a solo artist, but he doesn’t serve up a boring discography or describe what life was like on the road. He lets you into his head, and best of all, he doesn’t follow any party line.
Julian Cope's highly acclaimed autobiography and its long-awaited sequel in one extraordinary volume.
Julian Cope shot to fame with eighties band 'Teardrop Explodes' during the Punk era. Hailed as a visionary by those people who recognise his genius and a madman by those who find him perplexing, he has become a cult figure in the music world.
Head-On/Repossessed is written in Cope's own inimitable style and follows his journey through a time of incredible change within the music industry. Head-on is the highly acclaimed autobiography that The Observer viewed as "book of the year" when it was first released. Repossesed…
Like many others, I had an early fascination for pop music, which moved on to rock music as I grew older. I would love to know more about the artists or music figures who made such emotional and stunning music that made the world better and more exciting. British rock and roll music has made a massive impact on the Western life that we all know and love. These five books are the best ones for me, and while all are unique, they have humor and interesting details and let me gain knowledge about these iconic figures.
I found this book to have amazing detail, considering it goes back a long way, and I don’t know how John remembered it all. It’s an entertaining and intriguing book about his life and his amazing, honest story about becoming a performing poet, his battle with addiction, and his unique route to cult status.
This is a memoir as wry, funny, moving and vivid as its inimitable subject himself. A joy for both lifelong fans and for a whole new generation.
'One of Britain's outstanding poets' - Sir Paul McCartney 'Riveting' - Observer 'An exuberant account of a remarkable life' - New Statesman
John Cooper Clarke is a phenomenon: Poet Laureate of Punk, rock star, fashion icon, TV and radio presenter, social and cultural commentator. At 5 feet 11 inches (32in chest, 27in waist), in trademark dark suit, dark glasses, with dark messed-up hair and a mouth full of gold teeth, he is instantly…
I was born in 1954, the same year as rock and roll. I am a product of the era that spawned me. I was that kid at school who would rather read his music mags than his school books. Over a rich and varied career, I have turned those passions into my profession. I have been a singer in a band, a music journalist, a broadcaster with the BBC national radio network, and have had several music related books published by major publishers. I have also been an academic specialist in my field and have managed to turn all those lifelong interests into a Ph.D. and an M.Phil.
I want more than a simple outline of a life when I’m reading a biography. I don’t want a sketch. I want a truly exhaustive account. I want everything.
I want the school reports, the scrapbooks, the family photo album, the letters and diaries, and the gauche snapshots before the child blossomed into a fully formed creative adult.
Well, that’s what you get here. You get first-hand accounts from those who grew up with Nick and a lot of insight from those who saw his music develop firsthand. And who better to collate the lot than his older sister?
'Probably the most ambitious, generous and thorough volume about a musician to see publication' Mouth Magazine
The authorised companion to the music of Nick Drake, compiled, composed and edited by Cally Callomon and Gabrielle Drake, with contributions from Nick's friends, critics, adherents, family and from Nick Drake himself.
Remembered For A While is not a biography. It is, rather, an attempt to cast a few shards of light on Nick Drake the poet, the musician, the singer, the friend, son and brother, who was also more than all of these. We hope it will accompany all those in search of…
My tenure as editor-in-chief of Guitar magazine is well behind me now, but it always lights me up to create content for musicians, and to absorb it. These are my people, you see, a community of curious, empathic, chronically late daydreamers and night owls, good listeners all. I’m not qualified to comment on Adorno’s Aesthetic Theory or Stravinsky’s Poetics of Music, but neither do I want to talk about rock-star memoirs or fawning fictionalizations. No fanfare here, thank you. Instead, these are five books in which musicians may recognize some element of their creative self and come away with a little more fuel for the fire.
That’s right; it’s an entire book of musical notation. Like I said, this list is for players, not civilians.
I love that every note on every original Beatles record is transcribed here, right down to Ringo’s drum fills on “You Won’t See Me” and the guy saying “number nine” a hundred times on “Revolution 9.”
I love sitting down with my kid, who plays guitar, and discovering exactly how to recreate the parts we can’t work out by ear. I love seeing how the Beatles fit the gears together to make the wheels turn on these songs and how they used chords and notes that I have on the piano at my house, too.
(Transcribed Score). A fitting tribute to possibly the greatest pop band ever - The Beatles. This outstanding edition features full scores and lyrics to all 210 titles recorded by The Beatles. Guitar and bass parts are in both standard notation and tablature. Also includes a full discography. Songs include: All You Need Is Love * And I Love Her * Baby You're a Rich Man * Back in the U.S.S.R. * The Ballad of John and Yoko * Blackbird * Can't Buy Me Love * Come Together * Drive My Car * Eleanor Rigby * From Me to You *…
The first record I ever bought was Magical Mystery Tour when I was no more than twelve or so. It’s what made me want to be a musician myself. I’ve got every Beatle record and I am the kind of guy to study carefully who played what, who wrote what, and how they put it all together. Just before Covid shut down everything, I even went to Abbey Road studios where we recorded some of the songs for my novel (we wrote and recorded all the songs of the fictitious band Downtown Exit). Working in Abbey Road was a dream come true – to record in the same rooms that the Beatles used. Imagine that. It was wonderful.
Like none of the others, Dreaming the Beatles is more like a series of reflections from someone who came along well after the Beatles. The book was published in 2017 and it’s a fond look back at what still remains. Not so much a direct history as a sort of compendium of remembrance with chapters like “The Importance of Being Ringo” or “The Cover of Abbey Road.” A distinct pleasure to read.
An NPR Best Book of the Year • Winner of the Virgil Thomson Award for Outstanding Music Criticism
“This is the best book about the Beatles ever written” —Mashable
Rob Sheffield, the Rolling Stone columnist and bestselling author of Love Is a Mix Tape offers an entertaining, unconventional look at the most popular band in history, the Beatles, exploring what they mean today and why they still matter so intensely to a generation that has never known a world without them.
Dreaming the Beatles is not another biography of the Beatles, or a song-by-song analysis of the best of John…
We all know Little Richard’s great hits like "Long Tall, Sally", "Tutti Frutti" and "Good Golly Miss Molly" and Little Richard’s life was as wild as his records. It’s excess all areas as Spencer Leigh tells the story of Little Richard in Send Me Some Lovin. It is a biography of someone who transformed popular music. Spencer Leigh was born in 1945 and hearing Little Richard for the first time in 1956 changed his life. He is a world expert on the Beatles and he has written a series of music-based biographies – Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel – all of which are full of facts and opinions.
I love seeing the scraps of paper on which George wrote his songs like "Something" or "While My Guitar Gently Weeps".
I love seeing all his crossings-out and he offers some good commentary too. George comes over as a thoroughly nice person, but you do need strong wrists to read this book. (Gosh, I’m recommending heavy books!)
"For me, the essence of this book is the lyrics and I believe they stand the test of time because they are written about man's eternal quest, dilemmas, joys and sorrows. George's lyrics were, in my opinion, the most spiritually conscious of our time" - Olivia Harrison
Cherished by fans and collectors, I Me Mine is the closest we will come to George Harrison's autobiography. This new volume has been significantly updated since the 1980 original. For the first time I Me Mine - The Extended Edition covers the full span of George Harrison's life and work, exploring his upbringing…
We all know Little Richard’s great hits like "Long Tall, Sally", "Tutti Frutti" and "Good Golly Miss Molly" and Little Richard’s life was as wild as his records. It’s excess all areas as Spencer Leigh tells the story of Little Richard in Send Me Some Lovin. It is a biography of someone who transformed popular music. Spencer Leigh was born in 1945 and hearing Little Richard for the first time in 1956 changed his life. He is a world expert on the Beatles and he has written a series of music-based biographies – Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel – all of which are full of facts and opinions.
The Beatles in forensic detail up to the first Parlophone single, "Love Me Do".
Mark has interviewed almost everyone who mattered and he knows what to ask them and how to shape a book. I suggest you seek out the two-volume version running to 1,600 pages.
The Beatles are treated with as much reverence as Picasso and Shakespeare, and deservedly so.
Now in paperback, Tune In is the New York Times bestseller by the world’s leading Beatles authority – the first volume in a groundbreaking trilogy about the band that revolutionized music.
The Beatles have been in our lives for half a century and surely always will be. Still, somehow, their music excites, their influence resonates, their fame sustains. New generations find and love them, and while many other great artists come and go, the Beatles are beyond eclipse.
So . . . who really were these people, and just how did it all happen?
I have two major passions in life: music and writing. I started learning guitar aged 16, and my friends and I formed a band as soon as we possibly could. My first professional job was writing about pop music for a monthly magazine, and much later in life, I discovered jazz. Now I’m a bass-player, jazz singer, and composer who works with some of the finest jazz musicians in London, and I play regularly at Ronnie Scott’s club. As well as the Donald Fagen biography, I’ve also written biographies of the great jazz singers Mark Murphy (for me, the greatest of them all) and Jon Hendricks.
You thought you knew everything there was to know about The Beatles. I thought I did. I was wrong.
Craig Brown somehow manages to tell a very familiar story with details that either you never knew or had forgotten. He isn’t scraping the barrel: the book is full of excellent stories about the Fab Four, and sheds new light on where the band came from and where they ended up. It’s more than 600 pages long, and beautifully written, but a very easy read.
SHORTLISTED for the Baillie Gifford Prize's 25th Anniversary Winner of Winners award
WINNER OF THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE 2020
A Spectator Book of the Year * A Times Book of the Year * A Telegraph Book of the Year * A Sunday Times Book of the Year
From the award-winning author of Ma'am Darling: 99 Glimpses of Princess Margaret comes a fascinating, hilarious, kaleidoscopic biography of the Fab Four.
John Updike compared them to 'the sun coming out on an Easter morning'. Bob Dylan introduced them to drugs. The Duchess of Windsor adored them. Noel Coward despised them. JRR Tolkien…
I’ve been an entrepreneur for over 40 years and now pass on that knowledge to mentees and university students. The key to success in business is being able to attract and then learn from mentors, who, in my opinion, always should provide their knowledge, wisdom, and connections free of charge. As an entrepreneur, it’s easy to go down ‘The Dark Side’, especially if the pursuit of money and power becomes overwhelming. Many famous billionaires are not especially nice people. But there are many nice businesspeople out there and I aspire to be one of those, hence my pursuit of a daily advancement in esoteric, hermetic, and other knowledge.
Nobody really understands why The Beatles are still so popular over 50 years after they last played together. Rory Best is the brother of Pete Best (famously replaced in The Beatles by Ringo Starr) and the son of Neil Aspinall (the Beatles Road Manager who later ran Apple Corporation - The Beatles’ own company). This book tells the story of the true origins of The Beatles, centred around his mother, Mona Best, and The Casbah Coffee Club.
The Casbah Coffee Club, which opened in Liverpool on August 29, 1959, was the brainchild of Mona Best, the mother of Pete Best. It is well known that Pete Best was the drummer for The Beatles in their early days in Liverpool and Hamburg. But less well known is that The Beatles’ origins were in fact at Pete’s mother’s club-it was at the Casbah and with Mona Best’s blessing that the greatest popular music phenomenon of the twentieth century began.
And now, the basement club where The Quarrymen, The Silver Beatles, and finally The Beatles played over 90 times before…
