Who wrote the book of love? The MB book thread

Just picked this bad boy up

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The first biography of superstar rapper Drake At a time when album sales were plummeting, Drake’s 2010 debut album, Thank Me Later, went platinum, hit number one on the Billboard 200 chart, and spawned numerous Top 10 hits including “Over,” “Best I Ever Had,” and “Find Your Love.” His sophomore release, Take Care, also debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart, went platinum, and has been downloaded at a record pace. In Far From Over, award-winning writer and hip hop expert Dalton Higgins examines the life of Aubrey Drake Graham, whose path to superstardom has been anything but typical. Raised in Toronto’s upscale Forest Hill neighbourhood by his Jewish mother, the multi-talented entertainer first made a name for himself as an actor on the popular teen drama Degrassi: The Next Generation before becoming one of the world’s most successful rappers. Featuring original interviews, Far From Over reveals the life story of a musician and actor whose star will only continue to rise

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"Music writer Dalton Higgins combines original interviews and extensive research to tell the story of Aubrey Drake Graham." —The Globe and Mail (October 2012)


"Any music library strong in hip hop culture will welcome this survey." —www.MidwestBookReview.com


“Toronto music lovers holiday gift guide.” —BLOGTO


"it's a good bet that Far From Over will become the definitive book about Drake for years to come." —Exclaim!

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The Wrecking Crew looks interesting.

From The Wrecking Crew:

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“Hello?”

“Don, this is Joe Adams. I’m Ray Charles’s manager. We’ve heard some good things about you. Can you come down here right now to the corner of Washington and Western for an audition at Ray’s studio?”

Peake hesitated.

“But, Joe, I’m white,” he finally said, still unsure as to whether Adams and his famous client were actually aware of his ethnicity. Brother Ray was blind, after all.

“But can you play?”

“Yes.”

“Then get yourself down here.”

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After a couple of weeks of rehearsals and a few shows in Los Angeles at major venues like the Shrine Auditorium and the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, it was time for the Ray Charles Orchestra to head out on tour and make some money.

First stop: Montgomery, Alabama.

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As they neared the main entrance to Garrett Coliseum, the city’s largest concert venue, Don Peake’s jaw dropped and his heart sank, both at the same time. Passing by outside his window, in what seemed like some kind of perverse, slow-motion, neorealist-style post-war film about life behind the Iron Curtain, were row after threatening row of razor-sharp barbed wire strung across an endless procession of poles, completely encircling the building and its grounds. Heavily armed state troopers were also standing in groups around the perimeter. And, in case anybody missed the point of the whole display, a large red Confederate flag flapped prominently in the breeze atop a tall, gleaming, floodlit pole.

Uh-oh, this can’t be good, Peake thought.

But before he or anyone else on board could further process the frightening scene, the band’s bus slowed to a stop. As the front door of the huge, now-silent vehicle hissed open, several grim-faced, shotgun-carrying state troopers immediately climbed inside. As they spoke with the driver in a series of hushed tones, it became apparent they had something—or more likely someone—on their minds.

“What do they want?” Ray Charles asked his tour manager, Jeff Brown, who was sitting nearby. As a famous black entertainer, Charles was a high-profile target and had every reason for concern. He had grown up in the South and had experienced the evil and unpredictability of racism firsthand.

Straining to hear the conversation going down in the front of the bus, Brown finally deciphered exactly why Ray and his band had been stopped.

“They want the white boy,” Brown said.

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Word had apparently traveled with speed uncommon on the day that Don Peake and the Ray Charles Orchestra had flown into Alabama. The assembled state troopers had been told that Charles was carrying a white musician in his entourage. They had also been told that Governor Wallace had decreed that there would be no white people allowed at the Ray Charles concert in Montgomery that night, either audience or band. The black population could have their little show, fine. But by the grace of the good Lord—and the boot heel of the law—there would be no mixing.

As the troopers began to menacingly shine their flashlights up and down the aisle of the stranded bus, looking for the purportedly Caucasian interloper, Ray Charles had to think fast. He wasn’t going to allow anyone to take one of his band members away.

“Tell them he’s Spanish,” Charles whispered to Jeff Brown. “Maybe the crackers will go for it.”

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Lowering his head, Peake inched down in his seat and tried his best to look and act the part of a non-English-speaking guitar player, mumbling a bunch of random Spanish-sounding gibberish that he vaguely recalled from a class he once took in high school.

After Brown passed the word along that there was indeed a Spanish band member aboard, the state troopers huddled in the front. After about a minute of discussion, they suddenly stepped off the bus and motioned it down the ramp toward the stage entrance. Twenty different sets of lungs exhaled as one. Alabama’s finest had bought the story.

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LINK

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"Pynchon flashes the Sixties rock references faster than a Ten Years After guitar solo: His characters walk around wearing T-shirts from Pearls Before Swine, name-drop the Electric Prunes, turn up the Stones' 'Something Happened to Me Yesterday' on the radio. (I had never heard of Bonzo Dog Band's "Bang Bang" before, but it's on my iPod now.) The rock & roll fanboy love on every page is a feast for Pynchon obsessives, since we've always wondered what the man listens to….The songs are fragments in the elegiac tapestry for the Sixties, an era full of hippie slobs who just wanted to be left alone and so accidentally backed into heroic flights of revolutionary imagination. Can you dig it?" --Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone

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Larry "Doc" Sportello is a private eye who sees the world through a sticky dope haze, animated by the music of an era whose hallmarks were peace, love, and revolution. As Doc's strange case grows stranger, his 60s soundtrack--ranging from surf pop and psychedelic rock to eerie instrumentals--picks up pace. Have a listen to some of the songs you'll hear in Inherent Vice—the playlist that follows is designed exclusively for Amazon.com, courtesy of Thomas Pynchon. [For those who don't know, Pynchon is legendary for his Salinger-level reclusiveness and aversion to publicity - K]

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"Bamboo" by Johnny and the Hurricanes
"Bang Bang" by The Bonzo Dog Band
Bootleg Tape by Elephant's Memory
"Can't Buy Me Love" by The Beatles
"Desafinado" by Stan Getz & Astrud Gilberto, with Charlie Byrd
"Elusive Butterfly" by Bob Lind
"Fly Me to the Moon" by Frank Sinatra
"Full Moon in Pisces" performed by Lark
"God Only Knows" by The Beach Boys
The Greatest Hits of Tommy James and The Shondells
"Happy Trails to You" by Roy Rogers
"Help Me, Rhonda" by The Beach Boys
"Here Come the Hodads" by The Marketts
"The Ice Caps" by Tiny Tim
"Interstellar Overdrive" by Pink Floyd
"It Never Entered My Mind" by Andrea Marcovicci
"Just the Lasagna (Semi-Bossa Nova)" by Carmine & the Cal-Zones
"Long Trip Out" by Spotted Dick
"Motion by the Ocean" by The Boards
"People Are Strange (When You're a Stranger)" by The Doors
"Pipeline" by The Chantays
"Quentin's Theme" (Theme Song from "Dark Shadows") performed by Charles Randolph Grean Sounde
Rembetissa by Roza Eskenazi
"Repossess Man" by Droolin’ Floyd Womack
"Skyful of Hearts" performed by Larry "Doc" Sportello
"Something Happened to Me Yesterday" by The Rolling Stones
"Something in the Air" by Thunderclap Newman
"Soul Gidget" by Meatball Flag
"Stranger in Love" performed by The Spaniels
"Sugar Sugar" by The Archies
"Super Market" by Fapardokly
"Surfin' Bird" by The Trashmen
"Telstar" by The Tornados
"Tequila" by The Champs
Theme Song from "The Big Valley" performed by Beer
"There's No Business Like Show Business" by Ethel Merman
Vincebus Eruptum by Blue Cheer
"Volare" by Domenico Modugno
"Wabash Cannonball" by Roy Acuff & His Crazy Tennesseans
"Wipeout" by The Surfaris
"Wouldn't It Be Nice" by The Beach Boys
"Yummy Yummy Yummy" performed by Ohio Express

Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay: The Dodgy Business of Popular Music by Simon Napier-Bell



The author has been a successful songwriter (Dusty Springfield's hit single "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me") but is best known as a manager, most notably for the Jimmy Page-era Yardbirds, T. Rex, and Wham. So he clearly has experience inside the music business.

That is to say, he has experience with people trying to rip him off.

For Napier-Bell the music business is just one big racket, and has been ever since the days of Stephen Foster.

His book is a historical overview, from the age of "broadsides" sold in the streets of London to the digital downloads of today. He tells how music publishers took control of the industry, only to see that control challenged by record companies.

I noticed some factual errors and messed up chronologies -- the book could have used a better editor. Still, I learned quite a bit here, such as how much Bob Dylan was ripped off by his first manager Albert Grossman. Curiously he ignores some other legendary manager-as-thief stories, such as Allen Klein's embezzlement from the Rolling Stones (Keith Richards described the band's time with Klein as "$25 million worth of experience") and Terry Knight's slave contract with Grand Funk. Somebody should write a book about rock managers.

This is very breezily written and easy to read. If you're a music fan and unfamiliar with the business side of things, you should definitely check it out.