The future of modern music began in Dusseldorf in 1970, when an avant-garde German band, the Organisation re-invented themselves as Kraftwerk and set in motion a train of events which introduced a whole new language into popular culture. By pre-dating electro, house, ambient and techno by more than two decades, they are quite simply the most influentual band of the late 20th century. Having studied composi-tional theory at the Dusseldorf Conservatory, they have more in common with Stockhau...

When the first edition of this book was published in 2004 it caused enormous controversy with author Joel McIver's account of Metallica's rise and fall exposing the multiple myths that had surrounded the band for years. For the first time a book dared to tell the unvarnished truth about their early life on the San Francisco circuit their heyday as the world's most uncompromising metal band and the notorious controversies which plagued their later years. Napster Playboy Rehab St...

David Buckley's unique approach to unravelling the Bowie enigma, via interviews with many of the singer's closest associates, biography and academic analysis, makes this unrivalled biography a classic for Bowie fans old and new. This revised edition of Strange Fascination comes at a time when Bowie is, once again, on a creative roll, and captures exclusive details about the tours, the making of the albums, the arguments, the split-ups, the music and , most importantly, the man himself. Als...

With two of the most successful albums in rock history, the members of Pink Floyd are among a select few rock musicians to have left an indelible mark on the cultural life of their times.Their flamboyant emergence in the mid 1960s put them at the fulcrum of British youth's social and artistic experimentation. In early days, songs like "See Emily Play", written by their initial singer Syd Barrett, helped revolutionize the content of pop music. Later, the group's instrumentals extende...

WINNER OF THE RALPH J. GLEASON AWARDINCLUDES FOREWORD BY JOHNNY MARRAward-winning, Sunday Times bestselling author Jon Savage's definitive history of punk, its progenitors, the Sex Pistols, and their time: the late 1970s.A pop-culture classic full of anecdote, insight and exclusive interviews, England's Dreaming tells the sensational story of the meteoric rise and rapid decline of the last great rock 'n' roll band and the cultural moment the...

'Absolutely hilarious' - Neil Gaiman'One of the funniest musical commentators that you will ever read . . . loud and thoroughly engrossing' - Alan Moore'A man on a righteous mission to persuade people to "lay down your souls to the gods rock and roll".' - The Sunday Times'As funny and preposterous as this mighty music deserve' - John HiggsThe history of heavy metal brings br...

We live in a pop age gone loco for retro and crazy for commemoration. Band re-formations and reunion tours, expanded reissues of classic albums and outtake-crammed box sets, remakes and sequels, tribute albums and mash-ups . . . But what happens when we run out of past? Are we heading toward a sort of cultural-ecological catastrophe, where the archival stream of pop history has been exhausted?Simon Reynolds, one of the finest music writers of his generation, argues that we have ind...

Tenement Kid is Bobby Gillespie's story up to the recording and release of the album that has been credited with 'starting the 90's', Screamadelica.Born into a working class Glaswegian family in the summer of 1961, Bobby's memoirs begin in the district of Springburn, soon to be evacuated in Edward Heath's brutal slum clearances. Leaving school at 16 and going to work as a printers' apprentice, Bobby's rock n roll epiphany arrives like a bolt of lig...

And then there was David Bowie, the uber-freak with the mismatched pupils, the low-tech space face from the planet Sparkle. This was Bowie's third appearance on TOTP but this was the one that properly resonated with its audience, the one that would go on to cause a seismic shift in the Zeitgeist. This is the performance that turned Bowie into a star, embedding his Ziggy Stardust persona into the nation's consciousness.With a tall, flame-orange cockade quiff (stolen from a ...

'A fantastic tribute to an amazingly creative musical period . . . An instant pop classic, worthy of a place on your shelves beside the handful of music books that really matter.' John McTernan, Scotland on SundayPunk revitalized rock in the mid-seventies, but the movement soon degenerated into self-parody. Rip It Up and Start Again is the first book-length celebration of what happened next: post-punk bands who dedicated themselves to fulfilling punk's un...

An electrifying new biography about the four Essex lads who became award-winning stadium superstars and champions of synth pop!Jonathan Miller's groundbreaking book features in-depth interviews with founder member Vince Clarke and producers Gareth Jones and Mark Bell, and contains never-before seen interviews with the band members themselves.With additional input from Gary Human, Howard Jones and Thomas Dolby this is a unique portrait of a band that almost ...

The book that fans of the Skids and Big Country had been waiting for, this is a critical perspective not only of Stuart Adamson's music and its wider cultural influences, but also the excesses of fame and how the music business really works.It tells the story of how a teenager raised in a small Fife village released his first single at 19, wrote three Top 40 albums in the next three years, was written off as a has-been at 23, but then went on to form a new band, sell millions of re...