Songs by Don Walker

$32.99 AUD

Category: Music | Reading Level: 3 Biography

Don Walker is widely considered one of Australia's greatest songwriters. For over forty years - from Cold Chisel and Tex, Don & Charlie to his solo work - he has written songs that capture what it is to be Australian. Collected here, for the first time, are lyrics from his extensive career- from 'K he Sanh' to 'Flame Trees', 'Cheap Wine' to 'Harry Was a Bad Bugger', Walker's words are poetic, moving and incisive. These words live on the page, with or without the memory of music. Interspersed with autobiographical sketches and anecdotes, Songs is a must-have for fans of Walker's brilliant, razor-sharp storytelling. ...Show more

This Searing Light, the Sun and Everything Else: Joy Division: The Oral History by Jon Savage

$39.99 AUD

Category: Music

An exciting new book on Joy Division, featuring never before told stories.   Jon Savage's oral history of Joy Division is the last word on the band that ended with the suicide of Ian Curtis in Macclesfield on 18 May, 1980. It weaves together interviews conducted by the author, but never used in the making of the film Joy Division (2007) which told the story of the band in their own words, as well as those of their peers, collaborators, and contemporaries.   Here are 15 or so vivid witnesses to the band's genesis, meteoric rise, and tragic demise, including Peter Hook, Bernard Sumner, Annike Honore, Deborah Curtis, Paul Morley, Tony Wilson, Rob Gretton, Martin Hannet ... It is the story of young men driven to create and cause rock n' roll havoc inspired by literature, radical ideas, and the wasteland that was post-industrial Manchester in the late 70s. It is as intense and funny and alive on the page as only an oral history can be, recalling masterpieces like Edie by Jean Stein and Meet me in the Bathroom by Lizzy Goodman. It is essential reading. ...Show more

No Way But This: In Search of Paul Robeson by Jeff Sparrow

$32.99 AUD

Category: Music

Film star. Icon. Agitator. Martyr. Paul Robeson was a prize-winning scholar and the greatest footballer of his era, even before he ascended to global superstardom as a singer, Hollywood actor, and activist. The son of an escaped slave, Robeson stunned audiences with 'Ol' Man River' and Othello, as his passion for social justice led him from Jazz Age Harlem to the mining towns of Wales, from the frontiers of the Spanish Civil War to Stalin's Russia. Charismatic, eloquent, and handsome, he had everything - and then lost it all for the sake of his principles. Jeff Sparrow traces Robeson's troubled life and stellar career, in a story that traverses the arc of the twentieth century and illuminates the fissures of today's fractured world. From Black Lives Matter to Putin's United Russia, Sparrow visits the places Robeson lived and worked, exploring race in America, freedom in Moscow, and the legacies of communism and fascism in Europe. Part travelogue, part biography, this is a tale of political ardour, heritage, and trauma - a luminous portrait of a remarkable man, and an urgent reflection on the crises that define us now. ...Show more

When Words Fail: A Life with Music, War and Peace by Ed Vulliamy

$39.99 AUD

Category: Music

Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys by Viv Albertine

$16.99 AUD

Category: Music | Series: Faber Social Ser.

SUNDAY TIMES MUSIC BOOK OF THE YEARROUGH TRADE BOOK OF THE YEARMOJOBOOK OF THE YEARIn 1975, Viv Albertine was obsessed with music but it never occurred to her she could be in a band as she couldn't play an instrument and she'd never seen a girl play electric guitar.A year later, she was the guitarist in the hugely influential all-girl band the Slits, who fearlessly took on the male-dominated music scene and became part of a movement that changed music.A raw, thrilling story of life on the frontiers and a candid account of Viv's life post-punk - taking in a career in film, the pain of IVF, illness and divorce and the triumph of making music again -Clothes Music Boys is a remarkable memoir. ...Show more

Walk This Way - Run-DMC, Aerosmith, and the Song That Changed American Music Forever by Geoff Edgers

$39.99 AUD

Category: Music

Washington Post staff writer Geoff Edgers takes a deep dive into the story behind "Walk This Way," Aerosmith and Run-DMC's legendary, groundbreaking mashup that forever changed music. The early 1980s were an exciting time for music. Hair metal bands were selling out stadiums, while clubs and house part ies in New York City has spawned a new genre of music. At the time, though, hip hop's reach was limited, an artform largely ignored by mainstream radio deejays and the rock-obsessed MTV network. But in 1986, the music world was irrevocably changed when Run-DMC covered Aerosmith's hit "Walk This Way" in the first rock-hip hop collaboration. Other had tried melding styles. This was different, as a pair of iconic arena rockers and the young kings of hip hop shared a studio and started a revolution. The result: Something totally new and instantly popular. Most importantly, "Walk This Way" would be the first rap song to be played on mainstream rock radio. In Walk This Way, Geoff Edgers sets the scene for this unlikely union of rockers and MCs, a mashup that both revived Aerosmith and catapulted hip hop into the mainstream. He tracks the paths of the main artists--Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, Joseph "Run" Simmons, and Darryl "DMC" McDaniels--along with other major players on the scene across their lives and careers, illustrating the long road to the revolutionary marriage of rock and hip hop. Deeply researched and written in cinematic style, this music history is a must-read for fans of hip hop, rock, and everything in between. ...Show more

Grace Jones a to Z - The Life of an Icon - from Androgyny to Zula by Steve Wide; Babeth Lafon (Illustrator)

$29.99 AUD

Category: Music

An illustrated A-to-Z, celebrating the unparalleled artistic impact of the cultural icon Grace Jones.   Singer, songwriter, supermodel, record producer, actress, and iconoclast, Grace Jones is truly one of a kind, equal parts intriguing, intimidating, and indefatigable.   From her early da ys as a model working with Yves Saint Laurent and Kenzo, to her rise to disco stardom in New York City's Studio 54, followed by her storming the New Wave with her reggae-infused post-punk sound, through to her arresting, decade-defining work, Jean-Paul Goude, and featuring her eclectic and iconic film career and her continuing artistic output in the current day, Grace Jones A to Z charts her incredibly rich life. This book looks at her life, her art, creative collaborations, films, friendships, and fun--all in a brilliantly illustrated A-to-Z format. ...Show more

The Book of Daniel: From Silverchair to DREAMS by Jeff Apter

$32.99 AUD

Category: Music | Series: .

The highs, lows and incredible life of the enigmatic Daniel Johns, from Silverchair to Dreams.

Sunbury: Australia's Greatest Rock Festival by Peter Evans

$49.95 AUD

Category: Music

After 45 years, here is the first book on the SUNBURY rock festival, the festival that is often referred to as 'Australia's Woodstock', that heralded a revolution in Australian music and culture. This book explores the history of the Sunbury rock festivals which were staged over the Australia Day long w eekends of 1972, 1973, 1974 and 1975. These, and the festivals which immediately preceded them, were staged at a time of renewal in Australian political and cultural life and a new awakening of national identity. The emphasis is on the first festival in 1972 as this was the ground-breaking event which, if it did not conceive Aussie pub rock was, at the very least, the midwife. In that birth can be seen the beginnings of Australian rock music transitioning from a poor cousin to that in America and the United Kingdom to an active export industry. Sunbury '72 is covered in detail, with the emphasis on subsequent festivals being on the changes which occurred both in the event and in the dominant music scene at the time. The book identifies the strength of the Sunbury festivals in the organisation that lay behind them, which allowed them to be more than just a single event. It also explores the musical highlights of the festivals and the experiences of those who attended. The book is heavily based on official documents and an extensive oral history program undertaken by the author. ...Show more

30-Second Jazz - The 50 Most Fundamental Concepts in Physics, Each Explained in Half a Minute by Dave Gelly

$19.99 AUD

Category: Music | Series: 30 Second Ser.

For its initiates, jazz is instinctive and engaging--the way that popular music should be. For non-aficionados, it can be slippery and difficult to grasp: without familiar forms or a hard-and-fast format, and largely ruled by improvisation, jazz leaves the novice baffled, not sure how to listen, an d asking "how is it that they know what to play?" 30-Second Jazz explains, in easy, short riffs that keep you engaged, taking readers from the African-American roots of jazz all the way to today's global mix of musicians and styles. Along the way, it looks at the shape, style, and instruments of jazz, at key personalities and recordings in the jazz canon--and at what might be expected next from this most diverse of musical forms. ...Show more

Strange Stars - David Bowie, Pop Music, and the Decade Sci-Fi Exploded by Jason Heller

$27.99 AUD

Category: Music

As the 1960s drew to a close, and mankind trained its telescopes on other worlds, old conventions gave way to a new kind of hedonistic freedom that celebrated sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll. Derided as nerdy or dismissed as fluff, science fiction rarely gets credit for its catalyzing effect on this revol ution. In Strange Stars, Jason Heller recasts sci-fi and pop music as parallel cultural forces that depended on one another to expand the horizons of books, music, and out-of-this-world imagery. In doing so, he presents a whole generation of revered musicians as the sci-fi-obsessed conjurers they really were- from Sun Ra lecturing on the black man in the cosmos, to Pink Floyd jamming live over the broadcast of the Apollo 11 moon landing; from a wave of Star Wars disco chart toppers and synthesiser-wielding post-punks, to Jimi Hendrix distilling the "purplish haze" he discovered in a pulp novel into psychedelic song. Of course, the whole scene was led by David Bowie, who hid in the balcony of a movie theater to watch 2001- A Space Odyssey, and came out a changed man... If today's culture of Comic Con fanatics, superhero blockbusters, and classic sci-fi reboots has us thinking that the nerds have won at last, Strange Stars brings to life an era of unparalleled and unearthly creativity-in magazines, novels, films, records, and concerts-to point out that the nerds have been winning all along. ...Show more

Porcelain by "Moby"

$22.99 AUD

Category: Music

In the late eighties and early nineties, Moby, then an underground DJ and musician, was scraping out a living in New York City. In a scene popular chiefly among working-class African-Americans and Latinos, Moby - a poor, skinny, white Christian, vegan and teetotaller - looked like he would never make it . By the late nineties, contemplating the end of his music career, he released what he assumed would be his swansong, Play, which went on to become a multi-million-selling album, opening up an astonishing new phase in his life. Porcelain is an unfailingly honest, funny and brilliantly written memoir about making it, losing it, loving it, hating it and everything in between. ...Show more