Saturday, April 4, 2009

The Dark Stuff


I've been a sucker for novels most of my reading life, and I might be a bit behind schedule with a lots of other stuff. These days I'm reading Nick Kent's "The Dark Stuff". Originally it's from 1994, but my edition is an updated version from 2007 (Faber & Faber). Nick Kent wrote for NME in the 70s and later for Melody Maker, so i've probably read parts of this earlier. Several of the pieces are from The Face.
You get a good mix here, with artists like Iggy Pop, Roky Erickson, Miles Davis, Roy Orbison, Syd Barrett, The New York Dolls, Sid Vicious, Johnny Cash and lots of others. Kent is writing from the inside of the cirkus, he is not an outsider describing what he sees. My favourite piece in the book is the longest one, on Brian Wilson ("The Last Beach Movie Revisisted: The Life of Brian Wilson"). Not only perfect waves, sunshine and California Girls there.
If you are as slow as me on reading up on your "must read" music books, this is a good one for Easter.

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