When you make a purchase using links on our site, The Week may earn a commission. All reviews are written independently by our editorial team.
Peter Ames Carlin is the author of well-received biographies of Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, and the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson. He turns his attention to music's subsequent generation with his new book, "The Name of This Band Is R.E.M."
'Mystery Train' by Greil Marcus (1975)
The urtext for thoughtful music writers. Marcus' linked essays on Elvis Presley, Sly Stone, the Band, and Randy Newman set their work so deeply in the American grain that it becomes impossible to listen to their music, or anyone's, without hearing echoes of our nation's grand and sometimes horrifying history. Buy it here.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
'Kill' Em and Leave' by James McBride (2016)
When the National Book Award-winning novelist and memoirist turned his attention to James Brown, he captured the artist's brilliance and flaws while revealing how the wormwood logic of institutionalized racism can reduce even the most successful Black artist to a criminal. Buy it here.
'Night Moves' by Jessica Hopper (2018)
Not strictly a music book, but Hopper, who is a great music writer, delivers a tender recounting of life as a newly fledged adult set loose in Chicago in the '00s. Through her eyes, we recall what it's like to be young, free, and in love with music. Buy it here.
'Love Me Do!' by Michael Braun (1964)
In 1963, a smart young journalist spent a few months traveling with the Beatles, observing them on the eve of global Beatlemania. For the last time in their lives, the about-to-be Fabs had everything to prove and nothing to hide, and Braun reveals them with acuity and breathtaking honesty. Buy it here.
'Beatlebone' by Kevin Barry (2015)
In 1967, John Lennon bought a small island off the coast of Ireland. He only visited it twice before moving to the U.S., and he never returned. Barry's gently hallucinatory novel imagines Lennon making a visit in 1978, hoping to cleanse his spirit and revive his muse. In the guise of fiction, the author uncovers his subject's internal currents, and how fantasy and reality can merge in unexpected ways. Buy it here.
'Ball Four' by Jim Bouton (1970)
This hilariously uncensored memoir by a fading athlete has next to nothing to do with music. But Bouton's struggle to survive in baseball while throwing the knuckleball — a pitch that becomes a metaphor for his individuality — triggered a controversy that roiled all of pro sports. Now that's rock 'n' roll. Buy it here.
This article was first published in the latest issue of The Week magazine. If you want to read more like it, you can try six risk-free issues of the magazine here.
-
Political cartoons for February 10Cartoons Tuesday's political cartoons include halftime hate, the America First Games, and Cupid's woe
-
Why is Prince William in Saudi Arabia?Today’s Big Question Government requested royal visit to boost trade and ties with Middle East powerhouse, but critics balk at kingdom’s human rights record
-
Wuthering Heights: ‘wildly fun’ reinvention of the classic novel lacks depthTalking Point Emerald Fennell splits the critics with her sizzling spin on Emily Brontë’s gothic tale
-
6 gorgeous homes in warm climesFeature Featuring a Spanish Revival in Tucson and Richard Neutra-designed modernist home in Los Angeles
-
Touring the vineyards of southern BoliviaThe Week Recommends Strongly reminiscent of Andalusia, these vineyards cut deep into the country’s southwest
-
Nan Goldin: The Ballad of Sexual Dependency – an ‘engrossing’ exhibitionThe Week Recommends All 126 images from the American photographer’s ‘influential’ photobook have come to the UK for the first time
-
American Psycho: a ‘hypnotic’ adaptation of the Bret Easton Ellis classicThe Week Recommends Rupert Goold’s musical has ‘demonic razzle dazzle’ in spades
-
Properties of the week: houses near spectacular coastal walksThe Week Recommends Featuring homes in Cornwall, Devon and Northumberland
-
Melania: an ‘ice-cold’ documentaryTalking Point The film has played to largely empty cinemas, but it does have one fan
-
Nouvelle Vague: ‘a film of great passion’The Week Recommends Richard Linklater’s homage to the French New Wave
-
Wonder Man: a ‘rare morsel of actual substance’ in the Marvel UniverseThe Week Recommends A Marvel series that hasn’t much to do with superheroes
