Books By Famous Musicians

[Lisnaholic]

Not sure, but I suspect that this is a relatively small sub-genre of books. Of course there's a huge quantity of books on music theory, music history, biographies of musicians, etc, etc, but I hope the topic of this thread is more manageable. Off the top of my head I can only think of a handful of famous musicians who have had the time, discipline or inspiration to write a book, but I am prepared to be surprised:

Brian Wilson: Wouldn't It Be Nice
John French: Beefheart Through the Eyes of Magic
Leonard Cohen: Beautiful Losers
Bob Dylan: Tarantula (which generated this huge thread: https://www.musicbanter.com/media/60...tarantula.html)
Bob Dylan: Chronicles
John Lennon: In His Own Write and A Spaniard In The Works (frequently published in one volume)
Gerald Moore: Am I too loud?
Eric Clapton: The Autobiography
Posh Spice: Learning To Fly

So this is an invitation to expand that list, and talk about the books by famous musicians that you've read, would recommend, or have just heard of and wondered about.

[Plankton]

Neil

[grindy]

Derek Bailey - Improvisation
A great look into the way improvisation was and is prevalent in lots of diverse musical styles.

Chris Cutler - File Under Popular
A collection of essays about mostly experimental music and and its political and societal aspects. Some good stuff there and lots of bands that one should check out.

[Frownland]

Can't really go wrong with any of John Cage's books. So far I've read For the Birds and Silence: Lectures and Writings and both were brilliant.

Harry Partch's Genesis of a Music is a pretty enlightening look at microtonality, equal temperament, and music education but it is a damn chewy read that I'd only recommend for those willing to put a lot of effort into it. It was tough for me, at least.

Deathconsciousness is a booklet that accompanies the album of the same name by Have a Nice Life. Daniel Barrett of HANL repeated this concept with the self-titled debut from his project Giles Corey. I've yet to read either.

Originally Posted by grindy

Derek Bailey - Improvisation
A great look into the way improvisation was and is prevalent in lots of diverse musical styles.

I read this recently and predictably loved it. He gets pretty snarky about non-improvisers at the end.

[Marie Monday]

I've only read two books by musicians: the memoirs of Keith Richards and Carrie Brownstein

[OccultHawk]

Bob Dylan: Chronicles

Boring af

[Lucem Ferre]

What about Violent J's Behind The Paint?

He talks about how he used to throw bricks at prostitutes and the time he sexually assaulted Sheryl Crow at the final Woodstock.

[Lisnaholic]

Originally Posted by OccultHawk

Boring af

I wonder if you arrived at this conclusion after going through the same reactions as me:
i) Relief that it wasn't Tarantula vol II
ii) Surprise at how accessible and unpretentious Bob's writing was
iii) Disappointment at how little it ultimately revealed about the great man
__________________________________________________ _________

Originally Posted by Frownland

Harry Partch's Genesis of a Music is a pretty enlightening look at microtonality, equal temperament, and music education but it is a damn chewy read that I'd only recommend for those willing to put a lot of effort into it. It was tough for me, at least.

Originally Posted by Lucem Ferre

What about Violent J's Behind The Paint?
He talks about how he used to throw bricks at prostitutes and the time he sexually assaulted Sheryl Crow at the final Woodstock.

I guess I'll forever be a dillitante about music because Violent J's book sounds so much more interesting than Harry Partch's.
__________________________________________________ ______

I'd forgotten that Keith Richards wrote a book, Marie. Thanks for the reminder. His book falls into what is probably the biggest category of musicians' books: Memoirs and autobiogs. And if your journals get published posthumously, does that count as writing a book? If so, Kurt Cobain deserves a mention here too.

To judge from grindy and Frownland's reading, the next category could be Musical Analysis and Manifestos, with a last category of Other. I don't know how big the "Other" category might be, but it includes a fair amount of self-indulgent material that probably doesn't appeal much today. That certainly describes Cohen's Beautiful Losers, which I once attempted to read - and here are two samples from books by J Lennon and J Morrison, whose books at least share the great virtue of brevity:

...

[Psy-Fi]

Originally Posted by Lisnaholic

To judge from grindy and Frownland's reading, the next category could be Musical Analysis and Manifestos, with a last category of Other. I don't know how big the "Other" category might be, but it includes a fair amount of self-indulgent material that probably doesn't appeal much today. That certainly describes Cohen's Beautiful Losers, which I once attempted to read - and here are two samples from books by J Lennon and J Morrison, whose books at least share the great virtue of brevity:

...

The first time I read 'The Lords and the New Creatures' by Jim Morrison, I was tripping on acid and I thought the book was brilliant psychedelic poetry. I re-read it later, after the LSD wore off, and I thought it was silly, self-indulgent twaddle.

[Lisnaholic]

Originally Posted by Psy-Fi

The first time I read 'The Lords and the New Creatures' by Jim Morrison, I was tripping on acid and I thought the book was brilliant psychedelic poetry. I re-read it later, after the LSD wore off, and I thought it was silly, self-indulgent twaddle.

That's interesting, Psy-Fi: perhaps you had a wilder youth than I imagined.

Of course your confusion of judgement is what many of us go through: consumers, critics and artists themselves. In Brian Wilson's autobiog he details a cocaine-fuelled writing frenzy with Van **** Parks one weekend; after some all-nighters of drugs and inspiration, they had no ability to assess the worth of what they'd written.

I haven't read "The Lords and New Creatures", but just on that one page I posted, this bit seems very good to me:-

We are not constant
We are an arrow in flight
The sum of the angles of change
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And as for John Lennon, I should have praised his books more. They are not just brief, they are fun. JL is not trying to be an artist with some exhaulted, portentious message, he's just enjoying the English language, and is a worthy heir to a long tradition going back to Edward Lear and Lewis Carrol.
At one pre-internet time I used to regulary dip into his books to enjoy the likes of the following:-

Spoiler for Quotes from In His Own Write:

In His Own Write Quotes

“I'm a moldy moldy man
I'm moldy thru and thru
I'm a moldy moldy man
You would not think it true
I'm moldy til my eyeballs
I'm moldy til my toe
I will not dance I shyballs
I'm such a humble Joe.”
__________________________________________________ __________
“I sat belonely

I sat belonely down a tree,
humbled fat and small.
A little lady sing to me
I couldn't see at all.

I'm looking up and at the sky,
to find such wondrous voice.
Puzzly puzzle, wonder why,
I hear but have no choice.

'Speak up, come forth, you ravel me',
I potty menthol shout.
'I know you hiddy by this tree'.
But still she won't come out.

Such softly singing lulled me sleep,
an hour or two or so
I wakeny slow and took a peep
and still no lady show.

Then suddy on a little twig
I thought I see a sight,
A tiny little tiny pig,
that sing with all it's might.

'I thought you were a lady'.
I giggle, - well I may,
To my suprise the lady,
got up - and flew away.”
__________________________________________________ ___________________

“I was bored on the 9th of Octover 1940 when, I believe, the Nasties were still booming us led by Madolf Heatlump (who only had one). Anyway they didn't get me. I attended to varicous schools in Liddypol. And still didn't pass -- much to my Aunties supplies. As a member of the most publified Beatles my (P, G, and R's) records might seem funnier to some of you than this book, but as far as I'm conceived this correction of short writty is the most wonderfoul larf I've every ready.

God help and breed you all.”


― John Lennon, In His Own Write

And yes, Frownland, now you mention it, Hey Garland sounds much more like an extract from a story than a song.