1 of 9
2 of 9
3 of 9
4 of 9
5 of 9
6 of 9
7 of 9
8 of 9
9 of 9
A spate of new books for music lovers of any genre.
Blues Legacy: Tradition and Innovation in Chicago (University of Illinois Press), by David Whiteis
Although David Whiteis focuses on the Windy City’s contemporary scene in Blues Legacy, he can’t help but honor such relative forbears as James Cotton and Eddy Clearwater with interviews. Whiteis shows the stylistic diversity of many current blues musicians (drawing from jazz, rock and hip-hop), even as some younger ones play the tradition-keeper role. The author casts his net widely, including The Kinsey Report, Tomiko Dixon and Shemekia Copeland, along with Sugar Blue and everybody’s favorite living Chicago blues guitarist, Buddy Guy. Blues Legacy runs into a conundrum that Whiteis more or less acknowledges: Despite the effort to see blues as a living aspect of African American culture, most blues artists market their recordings and perform for white audiences. Many front otherwise all-white bands. The dynamic is complex.
Earl Scruggs and Foggy Mountain Breakdown: The Making of an American Classic (University of Illinois Press), by Thomas Goldsmith
Although its roots are long and extend to the Old World, bluegrass is sometimes given a birthdate, Dec. 11, 1949—the day Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs recorded “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.” Of course, that’s a convenient point on a timeline that includes Bill Monroe’s high-pitched harmonies and white-lightning playing at the Grand Ole Opry. Author Thomas Goldsmith manages to include all salient details in his succinct, insightful biography of Scruggs. By 1945, Flatts and Scruggs were in Monroe’s band, the Blue Grass Boys, and according to Goldsmith, Scruggs shucked the jive comedy expected from banjoists in those days; his “skill in playing backup could be compared to that of a harpsichordist in the Baroque era, improvising over a figured or designated bass line.” Goldsmith drew from interviews with family and friends in the last years before Scruggs’ generation expired.
Stay on top of the news of the day
Subscribe to our free, daily e-newsletter to get Milwaukee's latest local news, restaurants, music, arts and entertainment and events delivered right to your inbox every weekday, plus a bonus Week in Review email on Saturdays.
Guitar King: Michael Bloomfield’s Life in the Blues (University of Texas Press), by David Dann
Virtuoso or not, question: a 700-word biography of Michael Bloomfield? David Dann lays out the life of this esteemed but half-forgotten blues-rock guitarist in great detail. The suburban Chicago musician learned his licks by watching the great bluesmen on the city’s South Side. If The Rolling Stones were the bridge to the blues for many white American kids, Bloomfield cut a pathway for many white blues musicians. He was with Bob Dylan and Janis Joplin at turning points and played with great groups such as the Paul Butterfield Blues Band and The Electric Flag. Although admired by his peers, he was eclipsed by Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page. Dann quotes Bloomfield: “I didn’t relate to being a rock star at all.” His solo career was poorly marketed; his records received bad reviews; hard drugs killed him. Bloomfield’s emblematic life is tirelessly documented in Guitar King, yet Dann never quite delivers on his promise to show that his subject “unquestionably affected the direction popular music took in the 1960s.” He was a supporting actor in the drama of that decade. Guitar King might encourage readers to seek out the music he left behind.
The History of Rock: For Big Fans and Little Punks (Triumph), by Rita Nabais and Joana Raimundo
Joana Raimundo’s bright illustrations position The History of Rock as a children’s book. And yet, Rita Nabais’ easy-to-read text can teach even old fans a few things about a music whose history has grown long and complicated. Nabais avoids common mistakes: She makes it clear that Elvis Presley didn’t invent rock and roll and defines rockabilly properly by emphasizing its country roots. Virtually all important artists get their due (Milwaukee is represented by Violent Femmes), and major genres and parallel developments (from prog to hip-hop) are included. You couldn’t ask for more from a 110-page book on a subject as extensive as rock.
The Life of Lou Reed: Notes From the Velvet Underground (Diversion), by Howard Sounes
“To some extent, he was simply disagreeable,” writes Howard Sounes, assessing the subject of his latest biography. Many incidents from Lou Reed’s life recounted here make “disagreeable” sound like a mild rebuke. Nastiness masked emotional insecurity and yet—at his best—Reed transmuted his troubled behavior into art. His greatest accomplishment was the Velvet Underground, a collaborative band that sold poorly but helped new generations to reimagine rock music. In his last years, the author of “Vicious” found a measure of peace under the influence of his wife, Laurie Anderson, and Buddhism. The Life of Lou Reed clears up a trail of misinformation, some of it spread by Reed himself.
Listening for America: Inside the Great American Songbook From Gershwin to Sondheim (Liveright), by Rob Kapilow
Until Lin-Manuel Miranda came along, Broadway had sunk to mediocre lows, adapting pre-sold Disney products and ideas from the tune-dead. Little wonder that Rob Kapilow jumps from an analysis of “Send in the Clowns” to a coda on Hamilton, skipping decades of dreck. Listening for America is a close reading of Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, Harold Arlen, George Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers, Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim; it’s also a thesis about how America’s self-definition derived in part from the great musicals of the last century. Kapilow is a perceptive writer, musically and historically, as he explores how the romantic operettas and song-and-dance revues made way for compelling stories of contemporary life set to music that drew from all sectors of the American experience.
|
|
Mexican Waves: Radio Broadcasting Along Mexico’s Northern Border, 1930-1950 (University of Arizona Press), by Sonia Robles
Mexican radio was celebrated by ZZ Top and Wall of Voodoo for its role in cross-border transmissions of American music (ignored by U.S. stations). But those “high-power border blasters” aren’t the subject of Mexican Waves. Instead, Sonia Robles investigates a less-storied chapter in Mexican broadcasting. Lower frequency stations began operating on the border as early as the 1920s with a more specific audience in mind: Spanish speakers on the other side of la frontera. They were commercial stations supported by ads from American businesses seeking Mexican American customers. They were bound by law for some years to devote significant airtime to Mexican music. Robles compiles some amusing anecdotes, including broadcasters who pretended to have popular singers live in the studio when the only performances were on record.
On Time: A Princely Life in Funk (Da Capo), by Morris Day with David Ritz
Music biographer David Ritz receives co-credit for On Time, but Morris Day composed his memoir as a bitchy, ongoing conversation with Prince. As the spectral collaborator continually reminds Day, no one would read the book (or know of its author) if not for the mentoring role of the Man in Purple. Day cites drummers as his big musical influence even as he argues with the ghost of Prince who insists he was already a famous musician in high school. “That’s just another myth you made up in your mind,” Day shoots back. “Truth is, I hadn’t heard shit about you.”
Why Lhasa de Sela Matters (University of Texas Press), by Fred Goodman
Most Americans have never heard of recording artist Llasa de Sela. Onetime Rolling Stone editor Fred Goodman wants to correct that gap in our knowledge. Why Lhasa de Sela Matters is an eloquent argument on behalf of the late singer who died in 2010 at age 37. Her final recording was “mesmerizing and ambitious, musically sophisticated and emotionally advanced,” he writes, adding, it was “the most intelligent pop record I had heard in a very long time.” She was the migratory child of hippies, an American mother and a Mexican father, exposed to many books and cultural experiences. Sela came to “world music” more organically than most. Singing in Spanish, French and English, she synthesized the music of Eastern and Western Europe, Latin America and jazz “into her own unique and remarkable work.” Goodman’s book also provides insights into the 1960s counterculture, its spiritual striving and its failures.
