Category: Books Page 4 of 125

A Dream About Lightning Bugs by Ben Folds

Sure, the big appeal of this book is to learn more about the career of Folds and the Ben Folds Five, and there’s some good material on the ups and downs of Folds’ personal life. What he says about music and the creation of it–both his and others’, that gets it on this list. Also, I’m a pretty big fan of the author, that doesn’t hurt.

Soundtrack of Silence by Matt Hay

It’s dangerous to put this here because I’ve barely scratched the surface of the book as I compose this. But something about the premise and the early execution, the nice way that he’s working in references and lyrics to music makes me think it’ll be worth calling one of my Top 5.

Dear Mr Pop Star by Derek & Dave Philpott

It’s kind of a stretch to include this one, but this book brought me so much joy that I don’t care. I’ll vigorously apply a shoehorn to get it to fit. It’s not about music or musicians, per se. It’s a collection of “deliberately deranged letters to pop stars from the 1960s to the 90s to take issue with the lyrics of some of their best-known songs.” For example, they write to Starship about “We Built this City” going into a great amount of detail about the nature of foundations, different types of them, etc. and how this makes their “design project” the “most ludicrous” in the history of architecture. But what separates this book from similar tomes, what makes it special is that on the very next page, you get to read a response from Martin Page, who co-wrote the song. Page mounts an impassioned defense of the song — full of references to Rock classics as proof. Each letter printed in this collection is answered by a songwriter, musician, or other representative of a musical act. Some of these responses debate the premise of the Philpott’s letter, some answer in the same vein, others take the premise and run with it in their own way — some appear to be in on the joke, others appears to be flummoxed that anyone would take their lyrics in this insane manner.

Sundry Notes of Music by Ian Shane

We all know how a song can tie you to a moment in your personal history. Just hearing it can take you back to a moment, to a feeling, etc. There’s also how the lyrics of a song can hit you just right and inform a period of time in your life. We all know it, but few of go where Shane did and write a memoir (of sorts) tracing significant songs.

Love is a Mix-Tape by Rob Sheffield

A stray thought about this book led to this list. This is simply a fantastic book, a chronicle of Sheffield’s time with his wife, Renée, from their meeting to her untimely death at the age of 31. He frames his account in discussions of mix tapes he or she made for various times/events in their lives. The songs, and the feelings they evoke, are just as much part of their story as anything else. There’s a lot of humor, a lot of heart–and then some heartbreak and the aftermath. I really should make some time to re-read this.

Thank you, Goodnight by Andy Abramowitz

A pretty successful lawyer/one-time rock star takes one more swing at music success–if only he can get his band to forgive him for how he treated them when they were at their peak. Until I read my post about it, I honestly remembered very little about the book (it’s coming back to me now)–but I recall being blown away by Abramowtiz’s depiction of the highs and perils of superstardom, and the way the character had to work to get his old friends to see past his faults.

See also: Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby, The Jackals by Adam Shaw, The Rome of Fall by Chad Alan Gibbs, The Love Song of Johnny Valentine by Teddy Wayne

The Buffalo Nickel Blues Band by Judie Angell

I don’t remember what grade I was in when this book came into my life–I’m pretty sure it was due to a Scholastic Book order form. I can’t remember if my mother or I picked it for me–but it’s almost certainly the first book I read about a band/musicians (outside of Fflewddur Fflam, anyway). So, yeah, pretty much every book in this post owes the fact that I care about novels about music/musicians. I haven’t touched the book since the Reagan administration, and don’t know what happened to that copy. But I could still probably muster a full blogpost about it. It got into my blood, the way a great song will do. It’s about the shortlived career of I-want-to-say-middle-schoolers in a local band playing music that appealed to both adults and their peers.

See also: Rock On by Denise Vega

The Commitments by Roddy Doyle

I’m fairly certain that I’ve used this book on 1/3 of the book tags I’ve done over the years. That’s hyperbole, but it feels true. It’s one of those books (see the last on this list) that was so formative for me that I still use it as a filter for books/films/shows that I read/watch to this day–and it all started with the video for “Try a Little Tenderness” from the movie soundtrack–the four of us in my freshman dorm room stopped whatever we were doing when it came on–and naturally, I had to rush to the arthouse theater when it finally arrived. When I saw it was based on a book, you can believe I wasted no time in getting my hands on it. More than any book on this list, you can hear the music this band listens to or performs. Doyle is able to catch the rhythm and sound so perfectly I can’t imagine anyone else coming close (but would love to see it).

Charm City Rocks by Matthew Norman

Maybe it’s recency bias that puts this here. I’m not sure I care–Norman captures the joy associated with performance and the joy of watching an excellent performance in a way that few others do. He also captures the feeling so many of us had about 90s rock and the culture around it.

See also: This Bird Has Flown by Susanna Hoffs, Not Famous by Matthew Hanover, Runaway Train and Grenade Bouquets by Lee Matthew Goldberg, About a Boy by Nick Hornby

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

Is there anything more cliché than this choice for a white dude of my age? Probably not. But I’ll defend this choice. There’s a reason that every guy my age talks about this book–Hornby hit something in all of us. Rob (and the rest of the gang) were able to find a passion in the music of their lives, and through that were able to find ways to express their feelings outside of that. What Rob (and the rest, but especially Rob) says about music and its power would probably be co-signed by every character in these books, and most of the readers of them.

What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?

See also: Post-Graduate and Radio Radio by Ian Shane, About a Boy by Nick Hornby