Category: Books

In his new book, This Isn’t Happening: Radiohead’s “Kid A” and the Beginning of the 21st Century, author Steven Hyden celebrates and reminisces on the cultural impact of the legendary album

Radiohead’s groundbreaking album Kid A turned 20 this October, and much has been written about it, from the radical reviews published the week it came out, to the best of the decade lists it topped. It now lives high up on many lists of the greatest albums of all time, and its birthday was an excuse for fans and critics to write hundreds of articles and opinions about its impact and legacy. With This Isn’t Happening though, Stephen Hyden has written the cardinal text for the album that has meant so much to so many. Following a prologue, begins with author Stephen Hyden describing the scene before a Radiohead concert following the success of their album OK Computer. The passage details two breakdowns that lead singer Thom Yorke had before and after the show, and how they went on to inspire the album as a whole, and crucial lyrical moments. While surrounded by fans on a train, we enter Yorke’s head, as he tells himself “I’m not here, this isn’t happening,” lyrics which would become the center of one of the albums most impressive tracks, “How to Disappear Completely.” This combined insight into the meaning behind one of the lyrics of the album and the headspace of Yorke comes early into the book and establishes a running theme: that the story of Kid A is the story of Thom Yorke and the times he was living through. As such, the book works to weave context in with stories about the band and each of its members, and explains how they were connected. Though it sometimes leans too heavily into discussing context that doesn’t add much to the narrative, most of the points raised illuminate important details about Kid A and help the reader understand what makes it so important. For someone who is already a fan, the book contains anecdotes and facts to further deepen their love for the album, and the band.

Split into three sections: “Before Kid A,” “During Kid A,” and “After Kid A,” This Isn’t Happening dives headfirst into every detail surrounding the album, its production, and its impact. It is filled with quotes from interviews and analysis from Hyden on the instruments, studios, personnel, and inspirations that led to the album’s creation, while being equally devoted to recounting the social and political climate of the time. Pop culture and politics are treated with similar importance, because they were both key to understanding what Kid A could be about, and why the album sounds the way it does. The anxieties of the internet age and Y2K are repeatedly compared to the lyrics, and the description of the album as relating to our post-9/11 surveillance state is explored. Hyden also gives a lot of time to his own experiences, telling stories of what Radiohead has meant to him throughout his life and how that meaning has evolved. Amnesiac, a second album of songs recorded during the Kid A sessions that was released the next year, is given shine as well.

The insight given into the process of the creation of Kid A is enlightening, exciting, and often inspirational. The book tracks the years of writer’s block that the band faced, their conflicts and near breakup, and the ultimate inspiration that led to a burst of creativity, resulting in two albums worth of material. It theorizes about the possible meanings of cryptic lyrics, and explains the overarching meanings behind more well known ones (“yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon” is referenced often). Deep dives into the methods used by Yorke and his fellow bandmates to write and record the album are balanced by sweeping analysis of the music scene at the time of the album’s release. Putting Kid A in context against the nu metal and britpop of the time, along with previous releases from the band itself, works to place the reader in the headspace of someone experiencing the release of the album for the first time.

Most of the heavy lifting in this area though, comes from Hyden retelling his experiences growing up a Radiohead superfan. Large sections of the book are as much about the author as they are the band, with Hyden recounting his time listening to early Radiohead albums, downloading bootlegs, and hearing Kid A for the first time, along with many other stories that give the reader a glimpse into how the album was received by someone passionate about music, but not yet writing about it for a living. OK Computer and Kid A came out when Hyden was at the age where music discovery is most impactful on a person. During those teenage to young adult years, the music one discovers feels like it’s the most important art in the world, speaking to feelings and experiences that nobody else understands. Through this lens, the window into Hyden’s experiences is invaluable to someone who wants to understand the true impact of Kid A. Though many can write about sonic followers and disciples of the band, firsthand subjective experience elicits a more emotional response that carries throughout the book.

An interesting element for those interested in music criticism is the large section devoted to recounting the reviews given to the album. Reading the critical reception towards Kid A is not only useful for understanding the impact of the album, it’s also entertaining. From the famed Pitchfork review that declared listening to Kid A akin to “witnessing the stillborn birth of a child while simultaneously having the opportunity to see her play in the afterlife on Imax,” to Mark Beaumont’s description of the album as “tubby, ostentatious, self-congratulatory, look-ma-I-can-suck-my-own-cock whiny old rubbish,” the critical response to the album is deserving of its spotlight. It also plays against the fact that the book itself is a critical response, giving Hyden the advantage of hindsight to be able to explore how Kid A’s influence extended even to birthing a new establishment in music criticism. 

The “Before Kid A” and “During Kid A” sections of the book were the most interesting, but as the book went on it fell into some issues with length and content choice. Context of other popular bands of the time is of course useful, but the pages given to recounting the career of Linkin Park didn’t add enough to the understanding of Radiohead to warrant the space they took up. The deep dives into Radiohead’s career after the album also went on too long, especially once the general conceit became that their work was less interesting than what they were putting out at their creative peaks. By the end, the book becomes much more about Radiohead than about Kid A, which isn’t nearly as interesting given that the amount of time dedicated to understanding or at least touching on every detail of the album takes away from the specificity than can be given to the rest of the discography. 

The main distraction though becomes how much Hyden makes the book about himself. For much of the book, his stories and opinions humanize what could have otherwise been a long research paper. His stories of listening to bootlegs and watching concerts transport the reader back to the year 2000, completely immersing them in the head of a superfan. Moments though, such as the subsection of the book entirely dedicated to Hyden’s opinion on how a combined Kid A and Amnesiac record should be sequenced, with long justifications for every choice, don’t teach the reader anything interesting. It’s a perfect prompt for fans to debate endlessly, but doesn’t work as a one-sided lecture. It would have been much more interesting to hear more about why each album’s songs ended up in their respective places, research that would have fit well next to the rest of the material, rather than a tracklist for the non-existent Kid Amnesiac, which read more like a Reddit post.

These issues, just like the rest of the book, spawn from Hyden’s love of Radiohead, and his desire to share that appreciation with the world. As such, these moments don’t come off as arrogant, but rather as a passionate fan getting a little carried away. Anyone who loves an artist or band this much can relate to that feeling and would gain further appreciation for Radiohead from reading this book. For fans of the band of course, This Isn’t Happening is a must read, even if only to relive the moments where Radiohead operated at their creative peak. Looking back on a classic album is a staple of music journalism, but providing interesting criticism and adding a unique perspective to an album while heaping reverence upon it is difficult. Hyden takes a que from Kid A, and successfully writes from a place of passion, exploring themes he cares about through entertaining stories that draw his readers in like the haunting opening notes to “Everything in its Right Place.” Once I finished the book, I complimented it with my most enjoyable listen yet of the album that inspired it. It remains as deserving of celebration today as it was when it came out twenty years ago. The pages of This Isn’t Happening are the perfect place to go for those who want to celebrate.

Written to be enjoyed, the autobiography gives us stories upon stories, in lavish detail, of Elton John’s extravagant life, exploring every conceivable facet of his extraordinary existence.

Sir Elton John. A name and title that can be recognized around the world. A name that has become synonymous with talent and perseverance. A name that embodies the defiance against the status quo and the breaking of norms. Elton John is a musical genius and a trailblazer in so many facets of life. Not many artists ever get the chance to reach the remarkable stature of Elton John and only a few are knighted by Queen Elizabeth II herself. The list of accomplishments and accolades associated with his name are plentiful, leaving many to wonder how anyone becomes an “Elton John.” For those people, I would refer you to the outstanding autobiography of Elton John, Me, ghost written by Alexis Petridis of The Guardian. The incredible piece of work gives us insights into every crevasse of his life, leaving no stone unturned and, for the first time, giving us a comprehensive account of his journey. In the scathingly honest and tell all autobiography, John recounts events from his childhood in Pinner, London, all the way through to his final tour, Farewell Yellow Brick Road, and includes details that may or may not be wanted by the reader, like the use of adult diapers.

Elton John begins by recounting his grueling childhood years in the London suburb of Pinner. Born to a pair of abusive parents, John was frequently the victim of verbal and physical abuse, often for the most bizarre reasons. “I would get into trouble if I kicked my football off the lawn into the flower bed, but I would also get in trouble if I ate celery in what was deemed to be The Wrong Way,” the list of activities that could inspire punishment seemed never ending and each more peculiar than the last. The only approval he would ever win from his parents was from playing the piano, fostering an incredible bond with the instrument from a very young age. “But he liked music, and if he heard me playing the piano, I’d get a “well-done”, maybe an arm around the shoulder,” which may seem trivial to some but can be very rewarding for a child that generally lacks any sort of emotional support/approval. His tough childhood beckons the question: How did this kid end up turning into Elton John? Not to mention that his parents never thought that the music business was a suitable career choice for him. However, from a young age John had always possessed a phenomenal knack for playing the piano. As he relates, “if I heard a tune once. I could go to the piano and play it perfectly by ear,” an impressive talent for any individual to have and an outstanding talent for a young boy to have. Despite his awful relationship with his parents, John was able to seek comfort in his nan, formally his grandmother, “she was the person I trusted the most,” he` says. This trust is made undeniably clear as he goes on to describe how she casually helped to extract his penis from his uncooperating trousers that decided to entrap his foreskin in the zip.

After meeting his songwriting partner and lifelong friend, Bernie Taupin, John’s musical journey seemed to take off. The famous and celebrated song, “Your Song”, was released shortly after this brilliant duo united, almost immediately gaining worldwide recognition in 1970. The song gained so much attention that John felt that a tour in the US was obligatory, where John recounts some extraordinary stories, from stunning audiences with his extravagant wardrobe to throwing oranges at Bob Dylan when the American proved incapable of playing charades, his time in the US seems to have every type of experience conceivable. Perhaps one of the funniest stories was – “In September 1980, I played in front of half a million people in Central Park, the largest crow I’d ever performed to” … in a Donald Duck costume. In light of his lack of foresight, John was left completely immobile and incapable of sitting due to the bulky nature of the costume, creating a memorable experience, to say the least. John could, no doubt, write brilliant music but his eccentric nature and outlandish personality contributed greatly to his success and popularity.

Me isn’t strictly a tale of fun stories and amazing experiences, John opens up about his struggles with addiction and much more, for the first time giving us insight into his seemingly perfect life. At the forefront of his struggles was his cocaine addiction, alcoholism, and bulimia. John describes his first experience with cocaine and how, despite making him sick, he would go back for more, marking the beginning of a dark era in his life. John has never been one to do small things, its either big or go home, so it’s no surprise that he took advantage of his financial status to indulge in copious amounts of cocaine and alcohol. At the height of his addiction, he recounts a story where, after a night of drinking and doing drugs, he was escorted to a hotel room that was left in a disastrous state, almost everything turned upside down, rendering him speechless and determined to figure out who could cause such chaos. Unbeknownst to him, he was the incredible force that left the room in ruins. Upon this eye-opening revelation he finally decided to seek the help he had been denouncing for years. Another sombering moment in the autobiography occurs when John describes the AIDs outbreak and the loss of close friends such as Mercury.  “Not being that interested in having sex myself is the reason I never got HIV”— John highlights, attributing this personal quirk as the reason he lives to this day. Due to its impact on his life, AID’s has always been a very important cause to John which inspired him to found the Elton John AIDs Foundation.

John’s post-rehab life was draped with moments of doubt – “I thought I couldn’t make an album without drink or drugs” – but he would quickly realize that this wasn’t the case and, with the help of his brilliant musical mind, continued to create outstanding music and immerse himself in charity work. Unfortunately, tragedy always loomed close behind. John lost two of his dear friends Gianni Versace and Princess Diana, back-to-back – “I turned on the TV in the bedroom and sat there, watching the coverage, bawling”. Enough to put any ordinary individual out of commission, however, John persevered and tried to continue to do what he did best, somehow never falling back into the dark place he was in before. John reveals that his very successful tribute to the late Princess Diana, “Candle in the Wind 1997,” made him uncomfortable. “It felt as if people were somehow walling in her death,” he said, for a long and unhealthy period of time. An interesting thought that not many would have thought of but was nonetheless, the reality in John’s mind. Finally, John leaves us with one last struggle he has had to endure in the past few years: the onset of prostate cancer. Somehow, he has managed to keep his condition from the world, despite accidentally urinating on a stage in Las Vegas, in front of 4,000 fans. Only John would be comfortable enough to share such intricate details of his life, speaking greatly to the type of person he is. Despite his grueling battle with cancer, he still managed to get up on that stage and perform in front of thousands, another feat that only Elton John could pull off.

Elton John’s journey to paramount success was not an easy one; it took years, extensive amounts of talent and the wow-factor that seems to have been entrenched into his being to become the famous Sir Elton John. Though this autobiography does not detail the genius that went into some of John’s brilliant musical pieces, it offers never before seen insight into his life and his riveting experiences, presented in an incredibly enjoyable way. With pictures interspersed throughout the book to give life to the outlandish descriptions of his extraordinary experiences (the picture of him in the Donald Duck costume was definitely a highlight), this autobiography has everything one could ask for, making it a must read. Whether or not you enjoy his music, after reading this autobiography you will be left with a newfound respect and admiration for the legend that is Sir Elton John.

Vivian Goldman’s new book, Revenge of the She-Punks, which boasts dozens of tales from Goldman’s experiences as a journalist in the early punk scene, offers a refreshing female-centered take on the evolution on punk.

Punk music presents a history of white, working-class males rebelling against authority through brash music and controversial messages. This genre exploded in the late 1960s in London and New York City, and while it is easy to reduce it to a homogenous, angry genre that disappeared in 1978 when U.K. punk band Crass declared punk to be dead, punk still thrives today in spaces where youth rally for change in their communities. New punk scholarship offers a more globalized view of the genre, one that often deals with identity within the scene. In Vivien Goldman’s new book, Revenge of the She-punks: A Feminist Music History from Poly Styrene to Pussy Riot, Goldman further refashions the narrative of punk identity and bridges the gap between academic scholarship and rock journalism through tracing the triumphs and struggles of female-fronted punk bands.

Goldman subverts gender stereotypes from the beginning and discusses in the introduction, aptly named “Womanifesto,” the impact of punk on her own life. After an opening quote from an article that she had written forty years prior in Sounds, a U.K. pop/rock publication, Goldman opens the book stating, “It all began with glitter.” A first read of this quote captures the audience’s attention, but seems odd in a feminist-angled book, as likening women to glitter seems stereotypical at best. That initial reaction makes the quote all the more effective, as Goldman immediately subverts that gender stereotype with the subject of this opening paragraph: David Bowie. Bowie, the international superstar most known for his contributions to glam rock, inspired Goldman’s music tastes from a very young age. She followed this love for music and went on to cover the initial exposure of punk rock in the U.K. as a journalist before becoming an adjunct professor at New York University.

Within the first page, she presents her impressive resume of engagement with the punk music scene. She states that “music has been [her] dance partner throughout life… waltz[ing]” through roles such as “press officer, journalist, author, songwriter, singer, producer, club-runner, documentarian, blogger, editor, video/TV/radio writer, director, host and producer, and publisher.” Through a life-long history engaged not only with punk scholarship, but also directly working in the industry, she holds more than enough credibility to write this book. While it is evident that placing the book’s narrative within the context of her own life makes sense as she engages with storytelling throughout the book, the list of her various roles seems like an attempt to establish credibility. This aspect of her book reads as ironic (although probably necessary within a male-dominated scene): a female music historian needing to list her career highlights so scholars will take her work seriously.

Goldman presents a brief history of women in punk music and the issues they face before she dives into more specific themes, each of which is complete with a playlist of songs that she discusses. To motivate the reasons for the book’s title and why she chose the word ‘revenge,’ she weaves facts about the oppression and silencing of gender minorities with her own experiences as a woman involved in the early punk scene. While some punk musicians felt that they did not “do” revenge, Goldman asserts that “in the case of punky females, revenge means getting the same access as your male peers, to make your own music, look and sound how you want, and be able to draw enough people to ensure the continuation of the process.” A major strength of Goldman’s book is its intersectionality: rather than focus on the prominent punk scenes in the U.K and U.S., she deliberately “assembl[es] at least some voices of various waves of women’s punk from disparate communities and consider[s] their differences and connections.” Intersectionality became important in fourth-wave feminism but was only introduced in the late 1980s, after punk music had already been established. Goldman recognizes the histories of those who were not traditionally represented in these spaces and discussing how they contributed to punk music both globally and locally.

Self-image is an important theme in many musicological narratives but is essential to the re-centering of punk history around females. Goldman tackles the question of who the she-punks are, what they stand for, and how the different movements of female punk gave rise to each other. She first discusses Poly Styrene, the lead singer of early British punk band X-Ray Spex. When Styrene entered the music industry, identity formation was a novel concept, especially for a young mixed-race girl in a white male-dominated scene. Goldman stresses that Styrene was a leader in this field, not only for female punk music but also for defining British punk music in a broader sense. Before the term was even popularized, Styrene was an intersectional role model. Later musicians in the 1990s riot grrrl movement further affirmed the importance of authenticity in music, with Bikini Kill’s “Rebel Girl” creating a safe space for lesbians and those who experienced the negative side effects of simply existing as a woman in a patriarchal society. Goldman draws out this metaphor of Bikini Kill acting as a doctor or therapist for these girls, saying that Kathleen Hanna, Bikini Kill’s lead singer, “realized that her musical clinic was America, and her client list of girls damaged by rape, incest, school bullying, and violence of unimaginable kinds inflicted almost entirely by males seemed to be infinite.” Through stories of she-punks creating communities for themselves and others like them, Goldman holds that bonding together as females lends strength and willpower among generations.

As with most punk musicians, money and consumption were major factors in both the daily lives and music of the she-punks. Goldman recounts a time where she went thrift shopping with Patti Smith, the godmother of punk, in 1976. Smith grew up poor, but thanks to her successful music career in New York City’s Lower East Side, she had more money than her parents ever did. An outsider to wealth but also then an outsider to poverty, she wrote the song “Free Money,” which Goldman notes is about “an expansive rejection of the frugality that she had grown up with in her hardscrabble New Jersey working-class family.” Some blocks north of Smith’s home, funk-rock-dance-punk band ESG made their home in the Bronx. As young artists, they never officially signed a record contract, yet 99 Records, the label that distributed their records, financially exploited them when the business collapsed. ESG’s lead singer, Renee Scroggins, stresses that music is a business, one that is notoriously hard to navigate for yourself. While Goldman does not connect this particular fiscal abuse with the little financial independence or knowledge that women had at the time, in the 1970s, women were hardly financially responsible for themselves. For example, a British woman could not open a bank account in her own name until 1975. The personal stories of Goldman’s interactions with struggling musicians during these times create a fascinating personal connection, and though she later broadens the context of the stories by discussing the gender pay gap in depth, it would have served this theme well to better connect and develop each story with such discourse.

The best — and most nuanced — theme that Goldman traces is that relating to love, sexuality, and abuse. Whether in media or music, women are stereotyped for being overly emotional in romance and are often subject to sexual violence, a topic that has only been widely discussed in recent years. Through these themes, which she discusses as love and unlove, Goldman relays poignant stories of both today and yesterday. While Cherry Vanilla, a New York-based punk singer, wrote one of “punk’s most innocent love song[s],” and the riot grrls pushed for safe spaces for girls at concerts, punk was also ridden with sexual violence against both women and minors. Goldman acknowledges that while the very core of the punk movement was to question structure and boundaries, “some taboos never should have been broken,” and the punk scene’s atmosphere made it at times impossible to speak out against injustice, especially within bands. Many female punk bands did take strong stances against these injustices, especially riot grrrl bands like 7 Year Bitch who wrote songs like “Dead Men Don’t Rape.” However, Goldman stresses that not all bands responded like this — some took very conservative approaches. The Mo-Dettes, an all-female post-punk band, “loved to subvert leftist orthodoxies,” especially with opinions that “fighting for ‘equality’ actually defines you as seeing yourself as ‘less than.’” Similarly, Chrissie Hynde of the Pretenders blamed herself for her own rape and subsequently “was vilified by some feminist factions for her views on date rape.” There is never one side to a story, and although Goldman may not agree with these musicians, their experiences are their own and serve as important moments in both personal histories and the larger narrative of punk. Goldman adopts a feminist viewpoint in this book, but including the diversity in opinions on sensitive subjects allows her to create a more complete history of female punk.

Goldman completes her narrative by highlighting the role that female punk musicians played in protesting both gender inequality and other injustices. Throughout the book, she presents ample evidence for the seminal role that the she-punks have played in advocacy, but the concluding chapters underscore her argument that these musicians have fought for equity that reaches far beyond the music scene. Bands like Colombia’s Fertil Miseria wrote songs with wide-reaching messages of equality and solidarity, but that is only the tip of their advocacy.

Their concerts often serve as sites of mutual aid, with concert-goers donating food, clothing, and toiletries for those in underprivileged living situations. Goldman asserts that music is not the sole avenue for the she-punks’ leadership; rather, “these women all have their own front line — national, global, or domestic — and use punk as their weapon.” This punk barrier-busting proves to be equally, if not more, essential in non-Western countries where freedom of expression remains limited. Spanish punk band Las Vulpes caused major controversy in Spain after releasing “Me gusta ser una zorra” (“I love to be a slut”): not only did their career prospects vanish, one of the members was murdered. For some male punks, the punk lifestyle means nothing more than the old trope, Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll. But for women in punk, it meant the constant need to reaffirm the legitimacy of their very existence.

Goldman’s perspective is unique for academic scholarship in that form fits function: her own experiences in the punk scene serve as proof that other women’s experiences and livelihoods should be taken as legitimate knowledge, especially regarding cultural history. Armed with an accessible yet eloquent writing style, she combines familiarity with scholarship. Though she covers a long list of artists, many of whom won’t be easily remembered after reading a few pages on each, the artists’ stories serve a larger purpose in tracing the evolution of pioneers of female punk to modern-day feminist musicians. The stories Goldman tells demonstrate wide breadth, yet her overall narrative is cohesive down to the last sentence in which she brings back the glitter imagery from the book’s first phrase. “Amid the grime and grit, there will be glitter,” she writes. The grime and grit of both the punk scene and society more broadly do not threaten the glitter that is female punk; rather, the glitter is all the brighter when it stands out. The glitter shines globally in environments where people wish to quell its sparkle, yet as anyone who has ever crafted with dots of childhod magic knows, it is impossible to fully extirpate. As Goldman describes through both personal anecdotes and scholarly research in Revenge of the She-Punks, glitter is here to stay.

Philip Norman’s Slowhand is a must-read biography for all Eric Clapton fans itching to understand the man behind the guitar.

To write a biography about a world-renowned star is a tremendous feat in itself, but to take on a project about a figure whose life was in constant turmoil, with some people thinking he is the devil and others worshiping him as God, is a task for only the elite. Philip Norman establishes himself as a cream of the crop storyteller with his work Slowhand: The Life and Music of Eric Clapton (2018), a biography of Eric Clapton, a cream of the crop guitarist of his own right. Norman has written biographies of several all-star musicians such as John Lennon, Mick Jagger, and Elton John, and Slowhand is a worthy addition to this impressive lineup. What makes Slowhand stand out is its simultaneous breadth and depth about Clapton’s life without conforming to a rigid writing structure; each detail of his life story flows seamlessly from one to the other, giving interested readers and die-hard fans alike the opportunity to learn about this unique and special figure in music history.

Norman begins his book as any other biographical writer would, with a detailed account of Clapton’s childhood. But because of Clapton’s highly irregular and unfortunate childhood, Norman takes on the role of a psychologist by elaborately describing each facet of Clapton’s youth in order to connect exact childhood events to later instances of personal struggle. When reading the first few chapters of Slowhand, it feels as though not a single aspect of Clapton’s childhood is kept hidden from the reader, from familial struggles to friendships to school life. Norman’s abundance of intricate details in the beginning of the book is an early signal that he writes with extreme care, only further drawing in the reader to learn about Clapton’s childhood.

The extensive research Norman conducted for this biography manifests in every sentence that he narrates about Clapton’s life journey, but it becomes even more apparent upon looking back at how he chose to write uniquely about each “era” of Clapton’s life. There are about five distinct phases: early childhood, teenage years and early musical career from The Roosters to the John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, successful years from Cream to Derek and the Dominos with augmented personal stress, extreme drug-abuse to attempts at recovery during his stagnant early solo career, and full recovery to later solo career.

During Clapton’s early childhood, music served as an escape, but it was by no means at the forefront of his attention; his main goal was to make it through the day by calling the least possible attention to himself. Norman resultantly focuses on Clapton’s social life during these years by including quotes from his childhood friends and peers. Clapton then began to develop a knack – which turned into an obsession – for the guitar in his teenage years. Norman recognizes this gradual shift and blends Clapton’s increasing involvement into the primary focus of the narration. Similarly, when Clapton joined his first band The Roosters, Norman conveys Clapton’s overwhelming consumption of Blues music at this time in his life with flurries of American Blues influences that flood the page. But less than five years later, as the stresses of tour life with Cream began to take over and Clapton was forced to mediate the wild drama between fiery bandmates Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker, Norman strategically amplifies the pertinent aspects of Cream’s dynamic that led to its stint at fame and rapid crumbling.

Like many Rock and Roll stars, Clapton was worshiped by his fans as more than human. His deification was confirmed with the famous “CLAPTON IS GOD,” spray painted on a wall in London, as he made his mark on early 1960s Britain with his guitar work in The Yardbirds. While this graffiti art did not personally impact Clapton, it paints a picture of his home country’s adoration for his music that he promoted by no means other than his unworldly playing. Clapton grappled with his desire for anonymity while continuously being thrust into the spotlight, along with his chase of unrelenting love desires, one so great it inspired his hit “Layla” (1970). As the psychedelic 60s faded away, Clapton’s pursuit of Pattie Boyd took over; and as music began to fall by the wayside to drugs, Norman makes the narrational transition to delve into Clapton’s diary to uncover the darkest truths about his three years of consuming death-defying amounts of heroin.

While many biographies spend most of their attention on the prominent moments of an individual’s career, Norman takes the most time to narrate this fourth phase of Clapton’s life, which, while spanned the least amount of time and contained the least amount of music, proved to be the greatest feat to overcome for his journey to self-discovery. Norman does not hold back in his description of Clapton during this stage in his life. Clapton undoubtedly ruined the life of his then-fiancé, Alice Ormsby-Gore, by roping her into his all-consuming addiction, while simultaneously withdrawing from society as a whole and cutting off all relationships that did not feed his worsening habit.

It is in these chapters of Slowhand that Norman brings color to Clapton’s colorless, heroin-induced life by giving voice to the members of his inner circle most affected by his diminishing mental and physical state. During Clapton’s later drinking years, Pattie Boyd’s sister Jenny expressed that he “liked to find your weakness and then play on it. Then, when he’d got you in tears, he’d put his arm around you. And you never knew what was going to upset him.” A familiar image from his upbringing, the entire universe still revolved around Clapton.

Over the course of the biography Norman refers to the motific term “Clapton Luck.” In his youth and later years, Clapton engaged in many dangerous and often illegal activities that put his life at risk an unnerving number of times. With the idea of Clapton Luck, Norman is able to call attention to the perpetual support net Clapton developed around him over the course of his life that saved him from the worst of consequences of his actions. Since Clapton’s biological mother abandoned him to be raised by her parents (his grandparents), Rose and Jack, they felt obligated to ensure that they provided him with the most carefree childhood possible, from gifting him with more toys a child could imagine to no repremandments when he behaved out of line.

Norman pinpoints one of the first instances of Clapton Luck when the teenager got off scot free after waking up in the middle of the woods after his first wild night of substance use. It was just the beginning of Clapton’s several close-calls, but with later events being at the detriment to those who cared (or seemed to care) for him most, from his overwhelmingly admiring grandparents, to his managerial staff, to the women he spent decades bringing into his circle to only later betray.

The Clapton Luck did not fail in granting the lucky man two attempts at recovery during the fourth stage of his life, the first time for heroin and the second time for alcohol, despite being pulled in countless directions by staff members and so-called friends trying to personally benefit from his addictions. In fact, the foundation of many of Clapton’s relationships in the 70s and early 80s were based on how individuals could help him get the substances he needed to “function” while touring from country to country. As much as he was dependent on others for substances, they were also dependent on him for the sake of their own reputations. But despite the deterrents to Clapton’s recovery, the general consensus was that he was in need of help.

Norman describes in frank terms one horrific concert experience in March 1981: “Nigel Carroll [Clapton’s personal assistant] carried what was intended to be the tour’s supply, along with the usual five bottles of Courvoisier and 3,000 Rothmans cigarettes. By the end of the first week, Eric had run through almost all of it and the effect was rapidly diminishing. In Madison, Wisconsin, a doctor had to be called to give him an injection to get him through that night’s performance. When he came offstage, he collapsed in agony and was taken to the hospital in the nearest large city, Minneapolis” (330). This experience ultimately led Clapton to an important realization that he had fallen off the wagon, but without adding any extra color to his narration beyond the facts, Norman indicates to the reader how devastatingly frequent physical and emotional pain had become for Clapton.

Norman hits the bullseye in his approach to many aspects of Clapton’s life, but he lacks proper sensitivity on the topic of the tragic death of Clapton’s son, Connor. In a previous affair, Clapton and Yvonne Kelly, now Robinson, had a daughter named Ruth. While Clapton had not been particularly involved in Ruth’s early childhood, after Connor’s death Robinson opened the door for Clapton to spend more time with Ruth to bring him joy in a time of extreme sadness. However, Norman writes that Robinson “[offered] as much access to his daughter as might bring him comfort.” Since there was no formal agreement on how much time Clapton could spend with Ruth, the word “access” seems a bit out of place and portrays Ruth as a mere prop. From later descriptions Clapton’s intentions for spending time with Ruth were much more than that, since he did “[try] to be a ‘real’ dad.”

Norman transitions into the fifth stage of Clapton’s life on the subject of Connor’s death, portraying Clapton as an increasingly responsible individual who began to use his success to help others. Clapton kicked his debilitating habits for good, and he founded the Crossroads Centre in Antigua, a 12 Step Treatment Center for recovering substance abusers. Norman offers a positive end to a biography filled with dark and tragic events, and it portrays Clapton in the light of a truly changed man. The book concludes with a scene of Clapton taking on the role of design director at a clothing shop. As Clapton was and still is a fashion fanatic, this scene shows Clapton very much in his element and with his charm on full display. Even after years of suffering, the admirable qualities Clapton had as a kid are still part of him, and after the pandemic settles and musicians can begin touring again, Clapton will be sure to do what he does best: tear his audience apart with just one note.

Springsteen prosifies his poetic life in his new autobiography, Born to Run.

There’s an old Randy Newman song that narrates a fictitious conversation with Bruce Springsteen at a posh L.A. hotel. Sighing, Springsteen says “Rand, I’m tired. How would you like to be the Boss for a while?” Many mornings I’ve awakened from this same dream, often burrowing into my pillow in a desperate attempt to fall back into my fantasy. Sometimes it slips into the shower with me. Shedding my consciousness as the water trickles down, I’ll gape at the grand stadium of fans projected across my eyelids. On more than a few occasions, I’ve posed opposite my mirror with my butterscotch blonde telecaster guitar—the Bruce guitar. If I squint tight enough, I can see Clarence Clemons at my side, egging me on as I rip the final solo to “Jungleland.” For the better part of my short life, I’ve longed to be the Boss. After reading Springsteen’s autobiography, Born to Run I’m suddenly not so sure.

I haven’t lost any respect for Springsteen—it’s quite the contrary, really. After poring over the stories of Springsteen’s life, I’ve come to comprehend the Boss’s heavy burden. For five decades, Bruce Springsteen has absorbed the insecurities of the American psyche. He takes the childhood regrets, the daydream delusions, and the working-class woes that live inside Americans’ minds and morphs them into morsels of musical hope. Fans flock to show after show not for a cheap thrill of entertainment, but for assurance. They arrive to see Springsteen transpose their own daily plight into rhyme and rock, and to see that plight validated by thousands of others singing in unison. Throughout this autobiography, Springsteen exhibits an awareness of his shamanistic powers. I’ll always yearn for his musical acumen and poetic potency, yet his role as a rock and roll cleric has responsibilities that I’d be hesitant to accept. Perhaps the fantastical fallacy of Newman’s lyric is that anyone could ever brave a day in the Boss’s shoes.

It may feel like I’m merely waxing poetic, but Springsteen’s autobiography corroborates his role as America’s sole doctor. In one of his most tender confession, Springsteen recalls his experiences on September 11th, 2001. Distressed and disoriented after hearing the grim news, he embarked on a drive to sort out his thoughts. While stopped at a light, a man called out to him from the lane over. “Bruce, we need you” the man begged. “I sort of knew what he meant, but . . .” pondered Bruce. Blanketed by the same morose miasma as the rest of the country, how could he rise to comfort Americans? Rise he did, lending his grief and hope to the songs that filled his twelfth studio album, The Rising. From the languid lament “My City of Ruins” to the innocent tune “Waiting on a Sunny Day,” The Rising extended an empathetic arm to a grieving America.

As a nation, we summon Springsteen in our most daunting moments. Yet, for a smaller group of steadfast devotees, Springsteen becomes a constant crutch of connection. Bruce pushes people together. I recall registering for classes on the first day of high school. Tripping and trembling with nervous energy, I stepped into the office of Mr. Standerski, my notoriously gruff academic advisor. As he fixed his beady eyes upon me, I fixed mine on a “my only boss is the boss” coffee mug sitting atop his desk. “You a fan?” I squeaked. His grimace instantly receded into the thick folds of his cheeks. He proceeded to pull from his desk a scrapbook of ticket stubs, photos, and other remnants from the thirty-some shows he attended. Only for the sake of Bruce Springsteen would the brusquest old man of my school take up scrapbooking. We sat together for half an hour hashing out our favorite tracks and albums like members spontaneously reunited members of the same cult. In the biodiverse jungle of music preferences, connecting with other die-hard Springsteen fans is a “Dr Livingstone, I presume” type of rarity. Our only formal meetings occur once every few years when we gather at our nearest stadium to see our deity himself. Thus, when we do find another one of us, the camaraderie is instant.

Looking back to Newman’s lyric, it another deception should be acknowledged: the idea that Bruce Springsteen could ever exhaust himself. Those who have graced one of his many four-hour, multi-encore concerts can’t help but wonder what source of strength is propelling America’s sturdiest musical workhorse into the most raucous years of his seventies. In Born to Run, Springsteen finally pries the hood on his chrome-plated parts, revealing the secret sealant that holds him together show after show. “If you want to take it all the way out to the end of the night,” as Bruce so often does, you’ll need “a furious fire in the hole that just… don’t… quit… burning.”

If you were curious from that last sentence, the answer is yes: Bruce frames much of his writing as if he were shouting it to a crowd in between songs, often capitalizing whole sentences. Even in prose, he’s a performer. Nonetheless, Bruce’s declaration of a “fire in the hole” is more than syntactical showmanship. It is an axiom that he proves page after page. From days living on the street while he penned his first recorded songs to nights in the studio meticulously making his masterstroke album, Born to Run, we hear story after story of Springsteen’s everlasting resolve. This immutable inertia that tethers him to his craft appeared long before he could sell out a stadium—even before he could strum a single chord. His “Big Bang,” as he refers to it, was watching Elvis, and later The Beatles, debut on the Ed Sullivan Show. The sensual spirit of TV Rock & Roll shattered the stale air of his New Jersey childhood home. Soon thereafter, Springsteen strapped on his Beatle Boots and began shaking his hips like the King.

Before long, Springsteen a king in his own right, seizing a stretch of the New Jersey boardwalk as his fiefdom. Before ever signing a record deal, he reigned atop the bottle-strewn stages of the seaside bars each night, playing to surfers and greasers who shored up from the tide to have a drink and hear his music. Here, Springsteen scouted for fellow musicians who could keep time amidst the police raids and drunken melees. Those brute enough to brave the end of the gig would move on to form the tightest troupe in the land: the E Street Band.

Springsteen’s stretch as a Bohemian beach bum is perhaps the most captivating segment of the entire autobiography. He describes this era as a time when he was completely off the grid—no phone bill, no performing contract, no responsibility to anyone minus the audiophilic night owls flocking to listen to him rock the New Jersey jukes. It’s not hard to imagine that even the most titanic rock stars would dream to enter this easy atmosphere of salt-crusted days at the shore and muggy nights at a microphone. One can still find imprints of this formative time upon Springsteen’s music in the jingle of a quick rhyme and the jangle of a twangy electric guitar.

Out of these early days rises the emotive climax of the book. As Springsteen narrates, it was a “dark and stormy night” on the boardwalk. Waves from the beach collapsed over the ramshackle boards of the dock. An icy wind stirred trash and tattered leaves into small swirling tornadoes, flinging bits of damp debris at unsuspecting passersby. Seeking refuge from the Friday night frigidity, lost souls sauntered into drinking holes across the boardwalk. Down on the corner, one bar’s windows shimmered with a particularly warm and welcoming incandescence. Inside, Bruce Springsteen tuned up his guitar and began his set. He was running through his routine, grooving with the crowd, when a sudden thwack of thunder splintered the soundscape. Almost instantaneously thereafter, as if the storm cloud had thrown a follow-up punch, a gust of wind slammed against the bar’s exterior, knocking the front door off its hinges. As the door rolled and rattled into the night, a new figure had taken its place. The shadow of the colossal Clarence Clemons and his saxophone shone over the entryway. As Springsteen continued to play, Clemons waltzed over to a barstool and turned his ear to the sound.

As the bar neared its final call, Bruce locked eyes with Clarence. Without needing to ask those around him to clear a path—something almost never needed for a man of his stature—Clemons traversed the floor and ascended the stage. When the two struck up a song, soundwaves shook the floorboards harder than any seaside storm. The Boss and the Big Man, side by side for the first time, rocked the bar through the night. Feeding off of each other’s energy and acumen, they forged a sound and show that neither could have achieved individually. As years passed, bars would turn into stadiums, songs would turn into anthems, and Springsteen and Clemons would turn into rock and roll legends. Yet, however circumstances evolved, they continued to awe crowds with their unparalleled synchronicity night after night.