Meet me in the bathroom - book recs

[internetjef]

Evening all.

Not a Glasto direct question but I think there could be some helpful posters on this forum to help me out .

Just finished reading the book meet me in the bathroom , about the early 2000s New York music scene (strokes / yyys etc).

I haven’t read any books like this before about music scenes / time periods. Really enjoyed it, esp when I found a 5 hr playlist on Spotify that had every track mentioned in the book  which I could put on quietly in background while reading.

Does anyone have any good recommendations for music books of a similar nature?

I’m 40 so I guess it helps that the one mentioned here was a time I was really getting into music while at uni etc.

ps - the one other music book I have read is the Glastonbury book that came out a few years back 

 

 

Edited July 4, 2023 by internetjef

[PassingCloud]

Not yet read it, but it’s in my Amazon basket. 
 

I enjoyed David Byrne’s book ‘How Music Works’. 

[gigpusher]

I love a music book so have tons of recommendations on this front. One of the absolute best of recent years isn’t about a particular scene at all but it’s about how a young boy from an immigrant family fell in love with music and I simply adore it. That young boy grew up to be Pete Paphides (always writes articles for the Glastonbury free press so even a Glasto link) The book is called Broken Greek and it also has a playlist of all the songs from the book. 
 

The Sound of being human by Jude Rogers is also good. She actually incorporates interviews with psychologists about the impact music has on us. 
 

I ‘m not with the band by Sylvia Patterson is good as well. 
 

Lots of great biographies and autobiographies out there as well. Me by Elton John and Le Freak by Nile Rogers are good. 
 

Tracy Thorn has written some great books as well. 

[Tiesto13]

24 hour party people (the book) is good, if you can take Tony Wilson bigging himself up with a pinch of salt. Although I guess there isn’t much in there that isn’t in the film.

[PassingCloud]

A good, honest and brutal autobiography is Mark Lanegan’s. Also narrates it, if you choose the audiobook. 

[dirtysteve]

The absolute best music book I've ever read is Playing The Bass With Three Left Hands by Will Carruthers. It's his memoir of being in Spacemen 3 and then the early days of Spiritualized and it is a phenomenally good book, highly recommend.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Playing-Bass-Three-Left-Hands/dp/0571329977

Here's an extract to give you a taste: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/sep/26/spacemen-3-will-carruthers-playing-the-bass-extract

He also has an earlier book available for purchase as PDF on his website, Book Of Jobs. It's very amusing and very bleak.

After reading both of these I felt very fortunate that I'd never been involved with the music industry.

 

[Supernintendo Chalmers]

The Dirt: Confessions of the World's Most Notorious Rock Band - Motley Crue

Superstar DJs, Here We Go - Dom Philips

The Second Summer of Love - Alon Shulman 

[efcfanwirral]

I really enjoyed Graham Coxon's book 

[Yokel Again]

Love a music biog.

Just Kids by Patti Smith is the best I've read. 

A book called Mr Gig is quite good if you are turning/close to 40. About one guys relationship with live music as he reaches middle age. Can't remember the author!

 

[Avalon_Fields]

My favourites are Elvis Costello’s Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink and John Cooper Clarke’s I Wanna Be Yours. 
 

Both very well written and plenty of anecdotes of a wide range of well known people in music. 

[The Nal]

25 minutes ago, Yokel Again said:

Love a music biog.

Just Kids by Patti Smith is the best I've read. 

Reading that at the moment. Loving it.

[Padjeq]

Feel by Chris Heath is the best I've read. A Rolling Stone journalist embeds himself with Robbie Williams during his imperial phase. Some great anecdotes about his time in Take That and beyond, along with meditations on fame. Nothing else, including multiple autobiographies, has come close to explaining what it's really like at the top of the tree.

[gigpusher]

35 minutes ago, Yokel Again said:

Love a music biog.

Just Kids by Patti Smith is the best I've read. 

A book called Mr Gig is quite good if you are turning/close to 40. About one guys relationship with live music as he reaches middle age. Can't remember the author!

 

Can second the Patti Smith one. Great writer (unsurprisingly)

33 minutes ago, Avalon_Fields said:

My favourites are Elvis Costello’s Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink and John Cooper Clarke’s I Wanna Be Yours. 
 

Both very well written and plenty of anecdotes of a wide range of well known people in music. 

The John Cooper Clarke one I have also read and is great - never has a book been more in someone's voice than his. Even though I didn't read the audiobook I absolutely felt like he was in my head narrating every word.

[garc1a]

1 hour ago, dirtysteve said:

The absolute best music book I've ever read is Playing The Bass With Three Left Hands by Will Carruthers. It's his memoir of being in Spacemen 3 and then the early days of Spiritualized and it is a phenomenally good book, highly recommend.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Playing-Bass-Three-Left-Hands/dp/0571329977

Here's an extract to give you a taste: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/sep/26/spacemen-3-will-carruthers-playing-the-bass-extract

He also has an earlier book available for purchase as PDF on his website, Book Of Jobs. It's very amusing and very bleak.

After reading both of these I felt very fortunate that I'd never been involved with the music industry.

 

 

1 hour ago, dirtysteve said:

The absolute best music book I've ever read is Playing The Bass With Three Left Hands by Will Carruthers. It's his memoir of being in Spacemen 3 and then the early days of Spiritualized and it is a phenomenally good book, highly recommend.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Playing-Bass-Three-Left-Hands/dp/0571329977

Here's an extract to give you a taste: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/sep/26/spacemen-3-will-carruthers-playing-the-bass-extract

He also has an earlier book available for purchase as PDF on his website, Book Of Jobs. It's very amusing and very bleak.

After reading both of these I felt very fortunate that I'd never been involved with the music industry.

 

I was just about recommend this...

Great wee book.

 

[balti-pie]

The Dirt, the Motley Crue book, is an absolutely excellent read - it doesnt matter than you might not particularly like the band, if anything its even better as a result of them being really pretty ordinary - its the classic rock n roll tale of debauchery and nonsense but through four different sets of eyes with all the classic arguments and recriminations.

All four of them seem like really terrible people, but especially Tommy and Vince 😄  

[Avalon_Fields]

12 minutes ago, balti-pie said:

The Dirt, the Motley Crue book, is an absolutely excellent read - it doesnt matter than you might not particularly like the band, if anything its even better as a result of them being really pretty ordinary - its the classic rock n roll tale of debauchery and nonsense but through four different sets of eyes with all the classic arguments and recriminations.

All four of them seem like really terrible people, but especially Tommy and Vince 😄  

I once met the driver for Tony Iommi and Black Sabbath. He said the whole band including Ozzie were real great guys and gentlemen. He then told me he’d worked for Motley Crue who he refused to talk about except to say they were disgusting animals! 

[dumski]

Wayne Anthony - Class of 88

A great summary of illegal raves and acid house by a promoter who operated from almost the start 

[goonerben]

There was a great book published last year called "Exit Stage Left: The Curious Afterlife of Pop Stars", by Nick Duerden. 

He tracks down and talks to all manner of people who have ridden the rollercoaster to the top - and then back down again (and some back up again).  Lots of musicians' stories feature in it - would thoroughly recommend it.

[CaitNeeDee]

If you have any affinity to Brixton Academy, 'Live at the Brixton Academy' is a decent easy read about the history and all the goings-on in the venue.

[Boomtowner]

Recent reads that I can recommend are 'Ska'd for Life' by Horace Painter - covering the Specials until they broke up - loved this. Shows the difference between touring now and then. 

Also, 'Before we was we' - the Madness early days

Just about to start 'Me' by Elton John, had it for years but only just starting it

 

 

[internetjef]

Just wanted to say thanks for all these responses , I don’t seem to have enough likes available to like/thanks all 

[gigpusher]

11 hours ago, goonerben said:

There was a great book published last year called "Exit Stage Left: The Curious Afterlife of Pop Stars", by Nick Duerden. 

He tracks down and talks to all manner of people who have ridden the rollercoaster to the top - and then back down again (and some back up again).  Lots of musicians' stories feature in it - would thoroughly recommend it.

I read that one as well. Very interesting. Showed that even some of the biggest stars are really just happy reliving a relatively small number of years of their lives over and over.

[evilduck]

Please Kill Me, the oral history of punk is a great favourite of mine, and the same kind of oral history format of Meet me in the bathroom.

[Padjeq]

12 hours ago, goonerben said:

There was a great book published last year called "Exit Stage Left: The Curious Afterlife of Pop Stars", by Nick Duerden. 

He tracks down and talks to all manner of people who have ridden the rollercoaster to the top - and then back down again (and some back up again).  Lots of musicians' stories feature in it - would thoroughly recommend it.

I'm on that one at the moment. I'd heard of Sigue Sigue Sputnik before but I never knew much about them.

[Acid Loafers]

My friends family had this book in their bathroom, spent a fair time flicking through, reading bits. Gave me insight to a world we'd only hear his parents talk about at parties, "the good old days, real parties".

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hacienda-How-Not-Run-Club/dp/184739177X