For four decades, Depeche Mode dominated electronic music, from the naive melodies of 1981's Speak & Spell through to 2023's Memento Mori. Through changing line-ups featuring Vince Clarke, Alan Wilder, and Andy Fletcher, singer Dave Gahan and main songwriter Martin Gore have been the band's core.
A retrospective of one of Britain's most successful bands. Spanning the period 1970 to 1984, the creative peaks and troughs of all the songs recorded by 'The Frantic Four' are examined in detail by a fan who can play guitar a bit, and also knows his Bach from his byte.
This installment of the On track series examines the vast The Smiths back catalogue in detail, from their debut single 'Hand In Glove' (1983) to Morrissey's vinyl single release of a live version of 'Cosmic Dancer' in 2021, recorded with David Bowie back in 1991 - and all the songs from all the albums and singles in-between.
Celebrating 50 years as a band in 2022, Magnum remain a musical enigma, much loved by legions of fans despite never fitting easily into the sub-genres favoured by rock music critics. Formed in the West Midlands of England around a nucleus of guitarist and songwriter Tony Clarkin and vocalist Bob Catley, the band dabbled with pomp rock and progressive sounds in the late 1970s before achieving success in the 1980s with records like Chase the Dragon, On a Storyteller's Night and their commercial highpoint, Wings of Heaven. They even had two top thirty singles in the UK, with 'Start Talking Love' and 'Rockin' Chair'. The changing musical landscape of the 1990s led to a split, but the band returned in 2001 and continue to release records of remarkable consistency while entertaining live audiences across Europe. This is the first book on the history and music of Magnum. It covers each of the band's twenty-two studio albums, as well as live recordings, compilations and the late 1990s Hard Rain project. Charting the ups and downs in commercial and artistic achievement, it is an essential guide to one of Britain's most underappreciated rock bands.
Long, unfurling tracks; huge stacks of gear; music like that of no other group; trailblazing live gigs based on improvisation. This is the legacy of Tangerine Dream, the legendary German group piloted by Edgar Froese, whose impact on music, and electronic music in particular, has been profound.
Little Feat on track dives into the ups and downs of their 50-year career and discusses every album and song, from their idiosyncratic 1971 debut to the post-pandemic optimism of 2021's When All Boats Rise.
This books analyses Porcupine Tree's ten studio albums and two EPs in forensic detail, illuminating them for existing and potential new fans alike.Porcupine Tree folded in 2010, but band leader Steve Wilson has gone on to massive chart success as a solo artist.
No period of Bob Dylan's six-decade career confounds fans more than the 1980s. The singer began the decade with Saved, the second in a trio of explicitly religious records, and a tour in which he declined to play his older songs because of concern they were anti-god.
As well as examining all of ELO's recorded catalogue, the author has spoken to many people who have been involved with the band over the decades, uncovering along the way previously unseen photographs and new information about the group and their recordings, making this one of the most comprehensive guides to ELO ever published.
In 1992, Singer, pianist and composer Tori Amos achieved fame with the intensely personal solid gold record, Little Earthquakes, the first of fifteen studio albums. Each new recording cut new ground both musically and thematically. Since then, Amos has performed world-wide, both as a soloist and also accompanied.
For many, T. Rex founder Marc Bolan remains forever frozen in time as the poster boy of glam, the pop-rock genre he effectively launched with his March 1971 Top of the Pops appearance to promote 'Hot Love', the band's first number one single. This book examines all aspects of Bolan's career.
The 1980s encapsulated Marillion's birth, commercial apex, and near-implosion. This book combines meticulous history with careful musical analysis to chronicle their most turbulent decade from their first gig, through the dizzying success and destructive decadence of their time with frontman Fish.
This book gives an overview of Steely Dan's career while investigating every track recorded across the nine Steely Dan studio albums, plus Becker and Fagen's six solo albums.
Blue OEyster Cult On Track is a song-by-song analysis of the discography of Long Island's greatest sons, the Blue OEyster Cult. Dubbed "the thinking man's heavy metal band" and celebrated by critics, fans and musicians since their debut album in 1972, the band carved a unique path in hard rock history by combining chops, humour,
Thestory of the Groundhogs spans the most exciting years British rock will everenjoy. Springing from the same early roots as the Animals, Pretty Things andRolling Stones, they soon garnered a reputation as a blues band backing thelikes of John Lee Hooker and many other giants of the genre.
The Kinks burst onto the British music scene in 1964, propelled by the historic guitar riff of 'You Really Got Me'. In Thank You for the Days, fans from around the world share how The Kinks have inspired and shaped their lives.
You could consider Kate Bush's The Dreaming to be her finest moment, depending on whether you value the rejection of compromise and see that as a sign of authenticity. Ultimately, The Dreaming is just art. .
Everynow and then, a band comes along that defies convention, refuses to bepigeon-holed, thumbs its nose at comfy predictability and blows raspberries atcommercial wisdom. That band is Gong.
Rush. In their own words, 'The World's Biggest Cult Band', started from humble beginnings: three suburban teenagers. Alex Lifeson, Geddy Lee, and John Rutsey formed a Led Zeppelin-influenced trio, eventually scratching a living playing the bars and clubs of their native Toronto. A hard work ethic, no small amount of talent, and a slice of good fortune enabled their first, self-financed and distributed album to gain a foothold in the American market. And then, on the eve of their first American tour, drummer Rutsey quit. Fortune smiled on them again when auditions for a replacement shed builder produced Neil Peart, who could not only drum like a demon but was adept at lyric writing. Sharing a love of the then emerging progressive rock scene, the trio embarked on crafting a series of albums from the 'second' debut, Fly By Night, to the career-defining and best-selling masterpiece Moving Pictures; records which would secure them a permanent place in the rock hierarchy. This book reviews all these albums up to Signals, their 1982 release, which saw the band embracing keyboard technology and severing their connections with long-time producer Terry Brown, the unofficial fourth member of the trio.
'Just a city boy. Born and raised in South Detroit...' so begins the iconic 'Don't Stop Believin'' heard in countless karaoke bars and classic rock stations around the world. It is one of over 250 tracks discussed in Journey: On Track, which covers 50 years of recordings, from the extended jams of their early days to the heights of their popularity as an R&B-influenced powerhouse among America's arena rock gods, and beyond, to their controversial career in the 21st century without 'The Voice', Steve Perry. They were the brainchild of Walter 'Herbie' Herbert, the visionary who steered them through their most successful period. He built Journey from the remnants of Santana, keyboardist and singer Gregg Rolie, and guitar wunderkind Neal Schon. They surged into the limelight with singer Steve Perry. After adding keyboardist Jonathan Cain, they soared to superstardom. Their post-Perry history is filled with new music and the incredible story of Arnel Pineda. Critics dismissed them throughout their heyday as 'corporate rock', but they've somehow managed to thrive commercially and culturally on the heritage rock circuit, releasing new albums, and being inducted into the Rock Hall. They still fill arenas and stadiums with their legions of fans.
In ten short years, Roxy Music made two of the most experimental albums in popular music history and one of the most smoothly romantic.The members of Roxy Music have had long and distinguished careers outside the band, but nothing can surpass the eight albums they made together.
Three music-obsessed, suburban London teenagers set out to make their own kind of pop music: Kate Bush became an overnight star, while success came to David Sylvian (and Japan), and to Mark Hollis (and Talk Talk) after years of struggle. But when their unique talents brought them international acclaim, they turned their backs on stardom.
Arguably the greatest album by the best rock band ever, The Beatles - also known as The White Album - proved to be a watershed recording.The album's diversity and creation are analysed and its background and dynamics revealed. This extraordinary double album reflects a remarkable time and period. As the sixties came to an end, so too did the band.
Against the odds, 90125, released towards the end of 1983, was Yes' best-selling album. Yet it was never intended to be a recording by one of the 1970s rock dinosaurs, but a combination of commercial expediency and luck saw an album by a new band called Cinema - featuring Yes stalwarts Chris Squire, Alan White and Tony Kaye alongside talented multi-instrumentalist Trevor Rabin - become Yes following the last-minute recruitment of vocalist Jon Anderson. A US number one hit single, 'Owner Of A Lonely Heart, ' led to a triple platinum record and a massive world tour, giving this band a new lease of life in the 1980s. Featuring new interviews with several of the main protagonists, including Jon Anderson and Trevor Rabin, this book traces the story of the album from its rudimentary demos in 1981, right up to the end of the world tour in early 1985. 90125 is reviewed in full, and the book also includes a detailed look at the somewhat complex and contrived process that created it, followed by an examination of the album's legacy and remarkable afterlife. The 90125 story is possibly the most astonishing in this legendary group's nearly six-decade history. This is how it happened.
The J. Geils Band were the original Bad Boys from Boston, getting down to it and blowing your face out every night. With classic albums like Full House, Bloodshot, Love Stinks, and the massively successful Freeze-Frame, Geils have been nominated for the US Rock and Roll Hall of Fame no fewer than five times since 2005. From their early days as R&B and blues purists, through defining tracks like 'Looking for a Love, ' the instrumental 'Whammer Jammer, ' and the US Top 40 'Give It to Me, ' to global fame with radio staples' Love Stinks, ' 'Centerfold, ' and 'Freeze-Frame, ' The J. Geils Band created a unique sound and turned every show into a house party. Though it took time for record sales to catch up to their live reputation, by the early 1980s there were few hotter act than J. Geils. The definitive companion to the music of this hard drivin' band, The J. Geils Band - on track is a comprehensive overview of every track on Geils' 11 studio albums, with a look at their official live releases and a rundown of the musicians' projects beyond the band. on track makes clear why Geils, often referred to as America's answer to The Rolling Stones, were the funkiest band in the land.
Wendy Carlos is one of the most influential electronic musicians of the 20th century, whose ground breaking LP, Switched-On Bach, was pivotal in elevating the Moog synthesizer to iconic status. At the same time, her highly evocative score for Stanley Kubrick's film, A Clockwork Orange, redefined the sound of electronic music for a generation of popular musicians in the US and Europe. Known in particular for her adventurous sonic re-imaginings of the music of classical composers from Bach to Beethoven, it is often forgotten that Carlos was also an accomplished composer in her own right, whose original work on albums such as Sonic Seasonings, Digital Moonscapes and Beauty In The Beast deserves equal recognition for its progressive compositional innovations and sound design techniques. With the aim of addressing this imbalance, this book offers a detailed track-by-track survey of all Carlos's unique album releases from Switched-On Bach to Tales of Heaven And Hell, placing each recording in context in relation to musical influences, technology and thematic concepts, as well as providing many analytical pointers to assist the listener in navigating her classically influenced musical aesthetic. To provide a fully rounded picture the last section of the book considers a number of Carlos's miscellaneous one-off projects and evaluates the remastered editions of her earlier LPs released on the East Side Digital label during the early 2000s.
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