Difference between revisions of "Newest Entertainment Reviews"

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{{newreview
 
|author=Paul Ruditis
 
|title=Battlestar Galactica Vault: The Complete History Of The Series, 1978-2012
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=For those who don't know, or can't remember, ''Battlestar Galactica'' was a '70s piece of American sci-fi TV, launched to great acclaim as a parallel to the rather similar ''Star Wars'' with a full-on TV movie, then one lengthy season of hour-long adventures, that even had Fred Astaire playing a bit part before audiences dwindled and the show died out.  It shot itself in the foot with a sort-of sequel soon afterwards, then languished for decades before two crafty creatives found a way to put more meat on the bones, and to marry the show with much more modern sensibilities.  It's not a programme I would necessarily have entered a 'vault' for, as I was only a fan of the original, and possibly only then as opposed to now.  I've not seen a ''BSG'' entity since my youth – but I know a heck of a lot about what I have pushed to the back of my mind since then, courtesy of these pages.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781313350</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=The Art of Noir
 
|author=Eddie Muller
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=Colour is surely not the first thing one associates with film noir – after all, the clue is in the name.  ''The Third Man'' is only better with the shadows, Fritz Lang never needed gaudy colour, and the whole genre of noir would have been very different if it had been born in Technicolor.  But it did live into the era of Cinemascope and colour pictures, and it was never advertised as black and white, as these superb images testify.  The large postcards and posters that adorned American picturehouse lobbies to plug the films on offer were always lurid, vivid and extremely colourful.  And this book is just as colourful – as well as erudite, comprehensive and extremely entertaining.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715647687</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=The Art of Making Shadows
 
|author=Sophie Collins
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=Winter is almost upon us and the evenings are getting darker. However, rather than bemoaning the lack of sunshine, how about putting a positive spin on the situation and viewing those long, dark evenings as the perfect opportunity to hone your shadow-casting skills? Shadow-play is an art form that has endured through the ages and yet still has the power to enchant and entertain. So grab a lamp, gather round and get ready to create barking dogs, flying birds and a whole menagerie of shadow characters...
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905695454</amazonuk>
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|title=Eminent Hipsters
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|author=Patti Smith
|author=Donald Fagen
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|title=Year of the Monkey
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Entertainment
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|genre=Biography
|summary=Donald Fagen is best known as one half of the partnership that became Steely Dan, one of the more sophisticated names in American rock music.  While at school in the 1960s he was convinced that his vocation would be journalism, until music took over. When the group, or rather duo plus hired hands, went on hiatus, he contributed to various journals. About half of this fairly brief book consists of his articles on films, music and science fiction, and the rest is made up of his entries (including random thoughts concerning the world around him) from a touring diary.
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|summary=On the coast of Santa Cruz, Patti Smith enters the lunar year of the monkey - one packed with mischief, sorrow, and unexpected moments. In a stranger's words, ''Anything is possible: after all, it's the year of the monkey''. As Smith wanders the coast of Santa Cruz in solitude, she reflects on a year that brings huge shifts in her life - loss and ageing are faced head on, as it the shifting political waters in America.  
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099593335</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1526614758
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Walton_Ask
|title=Life on Air
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|title=Ask For Blues
|author=David Attenborough
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|author=Malcolm Walton
|rating=4.5
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|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Autobiography
 
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=I was one of the generation who grew up when David Attenborough was a giant among presenters of wildlife programmes on television, and anything with his name attached was a must-watch.  At the time, I had no idea that he was also one of the pivotal characters in the development of broadcasting, having been controller of BBC2 and director of programming for BBC TV for several yearsThese days, he is probably best remembered for writing and presenting the nine ‘Life’ series, a comprehensive survey of all life on the planet.
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|summary=Malcolm Walton's book is clearly a memoir about his introduction to the Trad Jazz scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s, but he has chosen to write it in the form of a novel, claiming in his prologue that this would give the book a different approach to the music memoir. His protagonist 'Martin' takes on Malcolm's mantle and begins with his first discovery of the Salvation Army band with his grandfatherThis catapults him into a love of music, initially taking piano lessons, and later delving into his true love – the trumpet.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849908524</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Moore Bientot
|title=Hollywood Frame by Frame: Behind the Scenes: Cinema's Unseen Contact Sheets
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|title=A Bientot...
|author=Karina Longworth
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|author=Roger Moore
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=If you ever think of Hollywood you think of it as the home of a certain kind of output.  Superstars, big studio productions, and what they combined to produce – things you might call movies, or films. Once upon a time, of course, they were called moving pictures, without the abbreviation, but the artform – once called the greatest of the 20th Century – was just as recognisable through the still images it produced.  This coffee table book is designed as a catalogue of those still images – whether they be formally posed portraits taken on set, re-enactments of the cinema's scenes shot separately on still camera for the purpose of publicity, or candid stills that formed a matter the star had a final say in, which would go some way to increasing the cult of their personality in the magazines that were then starting to focus on celebrity.
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|summary=The news of the death of Sir Roger Moore in May 2017 came as a great shock: he was one of those people you knew would go on forever. There was just one small glimmer of light in the sadness - the news that a matter of days before his death he'd delivered the finished manuscript of his book, ''À bientôt…'', to his publishers. Just a few months later a copy landed on my desk and I didn't even bother to look as though I could resist reading it straight away.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781579806</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Maslanka Sherlock
|title=The Art of Neil Gaiman
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|title=Sherlock: The Puzzle Book
|author=Hayley Campbell
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|author=Christopher Maslanka and Steve Tribe
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Graphic Novels
 
|summary=An early [[:Category:Neil Gaiman|Neil Gaiman]] book was all about Douglas Adams, and came out at the time he had a success with a book of his own regarding definitions of concepts that had previously not had a specific word attached.  Gaiman himself is one of those concepts.  I know what a polyglot is, and a polymath – but there should be a word for someone like Gaiman, who can write anything and everything he seems to want – a whimsical family-friendly picture book, a behemoth of modern fantasy, an all-ages horror story, something with a soupcon of sci-fi or with a factor of the fable.  He can cross genres – and to some extent just leave them behind as unnecessary, as well as cross format – he was mastering the lengthy, literary graphic novel just as 'real' books were festering in his creativity, and songs and poems were just appearing here and there.  So he is pretty much who you think of as regards someone who can turn his hands to anything he wishes.  He is a poly-something, then, or just omni-something else.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781571392</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=Wanna Cook? The Complete, Unofficial Companion to Breaking Bad
 
|author=Ensley F Guffey and K Dale Koontz
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Cancer. Chemistry. Drugs. The DEA. Heisenberg. Mexico. Fried Chicken. Blood baths (and baths full of blood). Cartels. Criminal lawyers. Bacon birthday breakfasts. This is Breaking Bad, and the only question that remains is… Wanna Cook?
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|summary=Who doesn't love a good puzzle, especially those really fiendish ones that get the brain working extra hard? There really is nothing to compare to that buzz we get from the Aha! moment, when everything falls into place and the solution reveals itself. If puzzles are your thing then you may wish to put your grey cells to the test with ''The Sherlock Puzzle Book'', based on the popular TV series.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190580296X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Corcoran_Dylan
|title=Books that Changed the World: The 50 Most Influential Books in Human History
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|title=Do You Mr Jones?: Bob Dylan with the Poets and Professors
|author=Andrew Taylor
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|author=Neil Corcoran
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Oh the pleasure when, as a book reviewer, one can simply point to the title and say – 'yup, that'. Or, I suppose, as in the non-existent follow-up, Adverts That Changed the World, simply repeat the mantra 'it does exactly what it says on the tin'. This paperback edition of the six year old original, fresh with several typos they had time to iron out alongside putting in Seamus Heaney's departure, makes life even easier, given that subtitle. I'm sure the more bibliophilic are already sold, and there is little influence I can bear on things. I will, however, soldier on.
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|summary=Bob Dylan's award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 'for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition' proved highly controversial. It inevitably led some people in the literary world to take stock and look at his work and reputation with a fresh eye. This volume of essays was first published in 2002, and is now reissued with a new foreword by Will Self.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782069429</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Kyncl_Stream
|title=The Beatles
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|title=Stream Punks
|author=Mick Manning and Brita Granstrom
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|author=Robert Kyncl and Maany Peyvan
|rating=5
 
|genre=For Sharing
 
|summary=''The Beatles'' begins with the childhood of John Lennon at the end of the second world war. The first illustration seems to convey and infant John twisting and shouting on his way to the air raid shelter. The text and illustrations both paint a picture of mischievous but intelligent child. We especially loved an illustration that shows the mixed emotions of the passengers and driver as John plays an old harmonica for hours on the bus. Some of the passengers look desperate to escape, but the driver is so impressed he gives John a better harmonica.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847804519</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=Live At the Brixton Academy: A riotous life in the music business
 
|author=Simon Parkes and J S Rafaeli
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Who on earth would want to buy and run a live music venue in deepest Brixton, and manage to keep it running for fifteen years, transforming it against all the odds into what becomes one of Britain’s most iconic establishments of its kind?  Such an undertaking calls for somebody with special managerial skills who can keep one step ahead of the game, walking a precarious tightrope, keeping gangsters, punters, promoters and the local authorities onside. It also requires a good deal of luck.
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|summary=I watch quite a lot of YouTube. I play music videos when I want to listen to a particular song I don't already have in my collection. I use it to find out how to do things, with the instruction videos they seem to have for pretty much anything. At the gym, I'll stick it on on my phone, prop it up on the cross-trainer and watch some behind the scenes interviews with the cast of my favourite shows. And sometimes I'll treat it as if it is Netflix, to watch series with new episodes releasing every few days, exclusively on YouTube. Having a new smart TV adds an extra, easy way to watch without having to plug in my laptop or squint at a small phone screen. So yes, I like YouTube and I use YouTube. But I didn't know a whole lot about the site it until I read this book.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846689554</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=JVDK_Swing
|title=Let Me Off at the Top!: My Classy Life and Other Musings
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|title=We Can Swing Together: The Story of Lindisfarne
|author=Ron Burgundy
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|author=John Van der Kiste
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=''This book is a testament to my giant balls.''  But it's also a lot more.  The story we've never been able to discern from either of the ''Anchorman'' films is one of surprising hardship, unsurprising hardness, and great hair.  It's a rags-to-riches tale, as Ron Burgundy comes from a Hicksville town in the middle of the outskirts of somewhere the arse end of nowhere (a town perpetually on fire due to the accidents in the mines underneath) and struggles against all the odds – and many of the evens in the shape of women's legs – to get where he is today, thrusting himself and his news at us nightly.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780892241</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=Dedicated to...: The Forgotten Friendships, Hidden Stories and Lost Loves found in Second-hand Books
 
|author=W B Gooderham
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=I have found many strange and unusual things in second-hand bookshopsI have done one or two strange and unusual things in them as well, but that's a different story.  Twice now I have managed to find a second-hand book, completely signed and dedicated by the author, yet discarded by the recipient, and have been able to present the author with the edition at hand and get it re-dedicated(If I'm not mistaken, the discarders were a neighbouring babysitter, and a teacher of the author's children.)  I'll admit that's rarefied, however, and on the whole the scribble you find in second-hand books is from the person who bought it, and gave it as a gift, not the person who wrote itBut even so, the dedication of the donor can be immensely fascinating and open to all kinds of interpretation, as these examples show perfectly clear.
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|summary=It all began with a group of youngsters in North ShieldsRod Clements, Simon 'Si' Cowe, Ray 'Jacka' Jackson and Ray Laidlaw formed ''The Downtown Faction'', soon changing the name to ''Brethren'' when they were joined by singer-songwriter Alan HullAs a US-based group had a similar name they opted to change the name again - and ''Lindisfarne'' (with the name taken from an island off the Northumberland coast) was born.  More than forty years on and with numerous changes of personnel the band is still very much aroundThey might not be touring or producing much in the way of new material, but they still perform, with Rod Clements, one of the original members on his fourth stint with the group.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0593072847</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=JVDK_ELO
|title=Cher: Strong Enough
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|title=Electric Light Orchestra: Song by Song
|author=Josiah Howard
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|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
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|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Having looked at the title and sub-title, the latter being no more than the two-word title of one of her latter-day hits, I assumed this was going to be a fairly comprehensive biography of the American singer. The sub-title, ''Strong Enough'', taken from one of her latter-day hit singles, reveals nothing.  Not until I had almost finished it, a little puzzled at it not being quite what I had expected, did I finally look at the blurb on the back – at which point all became clear.  This was not the full story of a showbiz career which has lasted close on half a century, but for the most part an extraordinarily detailed account of her 1975 TV variety show.
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|summary=My memories of pop music in the early sixties revolve around guitars and drums, sometimes the piano with only occasional excursions into strings and brass. Pop music rarely stands still and it wasn't long before the basic instruments were seen as constraints and The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys began to experiment, with other groups following where they led. Amongst these groups was The Move and their lead guitarist and songwriter, Roy Wood. Wood wanted to develop the group's sound by adding more instruments but was prevented from achieving what he wanted by cost limitations and because the rest of the group didn't really share his enthusiasm.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859654842</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Watkins_Lets
|title=My Life
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|title=Let's Make Lots of Money: My Life as the Biggest Man in Pop
|author=David Jason
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|author=Tom Watkins
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Autobiography
 
|summary=Born in North London in February 1940 during the early years of the Second World War, David John White once had a brief career as an electrician.  Fortunately for the world of entertainment and the public, he soon forsook the world of fuses and wires for that of the stage and small screen. When he joined Equity, they already had a David White on their records, and after a little quick thinking on the phone, he became David Jason.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780891407</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Ruth Goodman, Peter Ginn and Tom Pinfold
 
|title=Tudor Monastery Farm: Life in rural England 500 years ago
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=History
 
|summary=Think of it as time travel.  Three professional historians have travelled back some five hundred years to put what they've learned into practice.  On a monastery farm they've experienced what it was really like in rural Tudor England.  It's a book to accompany the BBC television series but it's still a rich and rewarding experience if - like me - you missed the show.  There's a wealth of experience between the three authors and they write about what they each know best and it's all supplemented by some sumptuous photographs of Bayleaf Farm in west Sussex and the surrounding farmland.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849906920</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=The Story of Music
 
|author=Howard Goodall
 
|rating=4.5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=As an award-winning composer of choral music, film and TV scores and stage musicals, Howard Goodall is well qualified to write and present on the subject. Covering something which has flourished for over 40,000 years in every shape and form imaginable is no easy task, but in this book, written and published to accompany a recent six-part documentary series on BBC2, he has distilled the lot into a very enlightening chronological narrative in just over 300 pages.
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|summary=Who on earth would be a manager in the larger than life, here today gone tomorrow world of pop? Anybody with an ego, a ruthless streak, an opportunity to embrace the chances and accept that it's not going to last, evidently. Tom Watkins is just one of several to have walked the fine line and, for part of the time, quite successfully. As his memoirs suggest, part of the time was achievement enough.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099587173</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Kendrick_Scrappy
|title=Armchair Nation: An intimate history of Britain in front of the TV
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|title=Scrappy Little Nobody
|author=Joe Moran
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|author=Anna Kendrick
|rating=4.5
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|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=All of us have a love-hate affair with television, or ‘the idiot lantern’. Hardly anybody who has ever owned a set, or been part of a family which has had one, can envisage life without it. It has been a source of endless entertainment and escape from the drudge of everyday life, while at some time it has irritated most of us beyond measure.  Love it or loathe it, it has always been part of the fabric of our existence. While to a certain extent it has been superseded by online services which have supplemented if not overtaken or usurped part of its role, its iconic status is unlikely to disappear for the foreseeable future.
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|summary=Celebrity autobiographies. It's a genre long tainted by the examples of people who clearly didn't deserve to be a celebrity, let alone have a ghost-writer create their book, and by those who did so little but managed to churn out five memoirs before they were even thirty. But more recently it's become a way of staking a claim to importance for female comics. They've not all written autobiographies, as Bridget Christie proved, but enough have to provide for a rapidly-filling shelf at the bookstore. 2016 we had Amy Schumer winning a GoodReads award, Lena Dunham's been at it, and we've also got Anna Kendrick. Now she's not a strict comic – not all of her films are designed to make you laugh, and some of them that are just don't – but this has to be in the same bracket.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683912</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Ropek_Tragic
|title=Sounds like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital
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|title=Tragic Magic: The Life of Traffic's Chris Wood
|author=Lloyd Bradley
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|author=Dan Ropek
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=As Lloyd Bradley points out in the introduction to this book, if you stand long enough on any street corner in London today, you will hear music. More often than not it will be black music, whether it is dubstep, hip hop, reggae or any other genre. Once it was in effect the original ‘underground music’ long before the term was ever recognised, it gradually became the mainstream – and here we find out how.
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|summary=Chris Wood was a member of Traffic, the group formed by Steve Winwood in 1967 after he left The Spencer Davis Group. A gifted musician best known for his flute and saxophone work, he also played keyboards, bass guitar and contributed backing vocals as well as having a hand in writing several of the songs and one or two instrumentals. This biography takes its title from the name of one of his compositions for their fifth album.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687616</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Dolby_Sound
|title=Lucky Me: My Life With - And Without - My Mom, Shirley MacLaine
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|title=The Speed of Sound
|author=Sachi Parker with Frederick Stroppel
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|author=Thomas Dolby
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Autobiography
 
|summary=Born in Los Angeles, raised in Tokyo, and schooled across Europe, Sachi Parker had already lead an eventful life before she turned 18. Add to the mix a secretive father with an explosive temper and a Hollywood icon for a mother and you have enough stories to fill a book.
 
 
And that's exactly what she's done.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1592407889</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|title=America's Mistress: The Life and Times of Eartha Kitt
 
|author=John L Williams
 
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Two quotes on the back of the dust jacket testify to the power and public perception of Eartha Kitt during her lifetime.  Orson Welles once called her ‘the most exciting woman in the world’, while to the CIA she was ‘a sadistic nymphomaniac’.
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|summary=From struggling post-punk musician to pop star, from Silicon Valley innovator to university professor, Thomas Dolby has had a remarkable if not unique career, often reinventing himself on the way. This memoir is based on his extensive notes and journals.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857385755</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Morris_Legion
|title=Inferno Decoded: The essential companion to the myths, mysteries and locations of Dan Brown's Inferno
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|title=The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains: Oddball Criminals from Comic Book History
|author=Michael Haag
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|author=Jon Morris
|rating=4
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|rating=5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Here be spoilers.  Not so much in my review, but certainly in its subject, a very quickly produced companion guide to the latest [[:Category:Dan Brown|Dan Brown]] blockbuster.  It's not so much a page-by-page guide, but certainly serves as an educational and intelligent look at the background to the biggest-selling book of 2013.
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|summary=As much as I like comics – and I do, whether superhero ones or not – I have to admit one thing, namely that the villains in them are a bit pants. What is The Penguin but the world's worst Mafioso, with a hobby of waddling along like his pet birds? Where else do you win an Oscar of all things by playing a two-bit killer who just fell in a vat of random chemicals and changed colour, and got mardier as a result (although recently he's become a nanotech genius – but let's not go there)? And what is it with the gimp in the see-through plant pot because he is the embodiment of cold? And that's just some of the better-known enemies of ''Batman'', one of the better goodies. You can imagine how awful the baddies related to the bad goodies can be. And if you can't, this is the perfect primer.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781251800</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Fletcher_Midnight
|title=Boy About Town
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|title=In the Midnight Hour: The Life & Soul of Wilson Pickett
 
|author=Tony Fletcher
 
|author=Tony Fletcher
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=My stepchildren, who were not even born at the time, would disagree with me fiercely.  But for those of us who were growing up during the 1970s, it was a very exciting time to be a popular music fan. Tony Fletcher, who was born almost ten years after me, evidently agrees.  In this memoir of his formative years, covering the years 1972 to 1980, he conveys the thrill of how it was to be a schoolkid who grew up loving and eventually becoming part of the scene. It all started with the purchase of a David Cassidy single and ended up with him becoming founder-editor of a fanzine and interviewing household names while taking his O-levels.  In fact it didn’t exactly end up that way, for these days he is known best for his highly-respected biographies of The Who drummer Keith Moon and R.E.M.
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|summary=Tamla Motown groups and singers apart, in the mid-sixties there were three major names in the soul music field who mattered above all. James Brown was something of a cult name who rarely bothered about or troubled the singles charts, and Otis Redding was on the verge of shooting into the stratosphere when he died in an aeroplane crash. The other was the man from Alabama, 'the wicked Pickett'.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434021679</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Paling_Reading
|title=Cemetery Gates: Saints and Survivors of the Heavy Metal Scene
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|title=Reading Allowed: True Stories and Curious Incidents from a Provincial Library
|author=Mick O'Shea
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|author=Chris Paling
|rating=4
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|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=The way to hell is paved with dead heavy metal stars, or so you might be forgiven for thinking after reading this book.  On the other hand, some have made it back from the brinkIn this book, Mick O’Shea has summarised in twenty chapters the lives and often troubled times of ten 'saints' who ended up inside the cemetery gates, and ten survivors.
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|summary=I once made a comical faux pas in a library when I was younger, but it certainly didn't put me off returning.  I once declared in a self-important way that I would start at the beginning of the books for young children and not stop til the end, then do the same for those for the older children – ''and then do it all over again with them'', I said, pointing at the large-print shelves.  ''I hope not'', was the response – but little me was only aware of a need for large font for my fellow whippersnappers, and not for any other reason.  Since then I've needed libraries, and going to them has been second nature.  On the dole I made sure I could use the free Internet they provided to pay me back for my council tax; later I was intent on finding out if a Senior Library Assistant girl was worthy of her title, and of course, it saved a fortune on books for study and funI'm not alone in sharing the warmth of both their heating system and the very thing they were born to provide – books, but there was still a huge step up between my level of use and knowledge of them to actually working in one.  Which is where Chris Paling comes in.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0859654834</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=Springsteen_Born
|author=Dylan Jones
+
|title=Born to Run
|title=The Eighties: One Day, One Decade
+
|author=Bruce Springsteen
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Most of us can count on the fingers of two hands, perhaps only one, a select few special days when it was as if the eyes of the world were focused on one major event.  These include 9/11; the day Princess Diana was killed; and for those of us with even longer memories the day Kennedy was shot. Add to that grim litany an event which had far more positive results.
+
|summary=No, you haven't stumbled into a music review from the 1970s, I'm talking about The Boss's autobiography.  Lots of books have been written about Springsteen by folk who knew him, worked with him and by others who have only read the cuttings.  Over the last seven years he has been going about – not putting the record straight, exactly – but telling it from his own perspective.  As he puts it: ''Writing about yourself is a funny business''.  By his own admission, it isn't the whole truth, discretion holds him back but ''in a project like this, the writer has made one promise, to show the reader his mind.'' ''In these pages, I've tried to do this.''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848094132</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=JVDK_Beatles
|author=Robert Sellers
+
|title=A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask
|title=What Fresh Lunacy is This?: The Authorised Biography of Oliver Reed
+
|author=John Van der Kiste
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=For rather more of his career than he, his family and closest friends might have liked, the name Oliver Reed was a byword for booze, brawls and all types of laddish behaviour.  As Sellers’ very full and remarkably objective biography reveals, it was a funny yet sad life all at once.  For although he repeatedly played up to the image of the lovable rogue which he had created, underneath the bad boy of popular legend he was at heart a professional actor who could always deliver a first-rate performance on the film set when required.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147210112X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sylvie Simmons
 
|title=I'm Your Man: The Life of Leonard Cohen
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=If you or I wanted to write a story about an imaginary figure who began as a novelist and poet, then became acclaimed as a singer-songwriter in the swinging sixties, made and lost a fortune, became a monk, and returned to a musical career at an age when most mortals are well into retirement, and found himself not only more popular than ever but also playing to the largest audiences in his entire life, it would be dismissed as total fantasy.  Nobody could make it up – and nobody needs to, because in a nutshell that is the life (so far) of Leonard Cohen, the subject of this biography and surely one of the music business’s most unique figures.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099549328</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Nige Tassell
 
|title=Mr Gig
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=Born too late to remember the 60s and early 70s, music lover and journalist Nige Tassell, who has written for ''The Guardian'', ''New Statesman'' and others, lived the life for some years as punter, reviewer, roadie, DJ and promoter.  Then he married and became a father, and the most important gig (if the one with the least comfortable seats) was the kids’ primary school nativity play ten days before Christmas.  Around 2010 the midlife crisis hit with a vengeance, and the urge to hit the road in search of what live music was all about these days came upon him.  That does not just require private transport capable of taking roads the length and breadth of the land in its stride (and the car passed the test - just), it also requires a certain amount of courage.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780721617</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Jean Christophe Castelli
 
|title=Making of Life of Pi - A Film, A Journey
 
|rating=4.5
 
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|genre=Entertainment
|summary=Before I'd seen the film of Yann Martel's novel Life of Pi I knew the end result would leave me either wondering 'how did they make that?!' or 'WHY did they make that?!'.  The fact I ended up watching it twice before the general public had their chance, and lapped up a repeat viewing within a fortnight, says it all.  There's no plot spoiler in the fact that the creators left us with a visually dazzling, splendidly luxurious-looking piece of cinema, one that left me scrabbling for tiny faults to nitpick with and just acknowledging how brilliant the FX and acting were. And, as the resulting question was the right one, I am still interested very much in the answer - luckily for me this book provides it.
+
|summary=You might have thought that just about everything which could be said about the Beatles had been said and certainly, there's been no shortage of books about what went wrong, what happened to the money and even what went right. But what I've never seen before is a 'miscellany' - all those little facts which are so hard to track down and this is where historian John Van der Kiste comes into his own: he's a man with an eye for detail and the ability to bring everything together into a very readable whole. It's a wonderful collection of the small facts.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781166382</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=John Fisher
 
|title=Tommy Cooper 'Jus' Like That!':  A Life in Jokes and Pictures
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Biography
 
|summary=I grew up watching Tommy Cooper, and watching my dad do impressions of Tommy Cooper.  I thought he was hilarious (the real Tommy!) and loved his expressions as he repeatedly tried and failed to do magic tricks!  This book is rather unusual as although it is a biography of sorts, giving information about Tommy's life and his history in the world of entertainment, it isn't text heavy, and so mostly Tommy's story is told through photographs and pictures.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184809311X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=J F Roberts
 
|title=The True History of the Blackadder: The Unadulterated Tale of the Creation of a Comedy Legend
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=If you need to know everything about the history of ''Blackadder'' and all who worked on it, this is probably the book for you. It has in-depth biographies of all of the main actors involved, lots of details about their prior achievements, and a huge amount of information which includes scripts of deleted scenes. That said, it's staggering that a book about one of the funniest TV programmes ever made can be anywhere near this dull.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848093462</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Francine Stock
 
|title=In Glorious Technicolor: A Century of Film and How it has Shaped Us
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Entertainment
 
|summary=Many of us have been captivated from an early age by the world of movies, whether introduced to them by visits to the cinema, or watching them on TV, video and latterly DVD.  Author and presenter Francine Stock’s lifelong love affair with the medium began when she was taken as a child to see ‘My Fair Lady’ on the large screen.  A little later, for her the most memorable thing about the summer of 1970 was not the weather, but repeated viewings of ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535645</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Martin Kelner
 
|title=Sit Down and Cheer: A History of Sport on TV
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Sport
 
|summary=Like many English sports fans, the majority of the calories I burn are used up by shouting at the TV and occasionally going to the shops for more beer and crisps.  Sports books tend to be about the sport itself or biographies of those who expended great effort to reach the top of their chosen sport. But in Martin Kelner's 'Sit Down and Cheer: A History of Sport on TV', there is finally a book for the less energetic among us.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140812923X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
Move on to [[Newest Fantasy Reviews]]

Latest revision as of 16:30, 29 August 2020


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Review of

Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith

4star.jpg Biography

On the coast of Santa Cruz, Patti Smith enters the lunar year of the monkey - one packed with mischief, sorrow, and unexpected moments. In a stranger's words, Anything is possible: after all, it's the year of the monkey. As Smith wanders the coast of Santa Cruz in solitude, she reflects on a year that brings huge shifts in her life - loss and ageing are faced head on, as it the shifting political waters in America. Full Review

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Review of

Ask For Blues by Malcolm Walton

3.5star.jpg Autobiography

Malcolm Walton's book is clearly a memoir about his introduction to the Trad Jazz scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s, but he has chosen to write it in the form of a novel, claiming in his prologue that this would give the book a different approach to the music memoir. His protagonist 'Martin' takes on Malcolm's mantle and begins with his first discovery of the Salvation Army band with his grandfather. This catapults him into a love of music, initially taking piano lessons, and later delving into his true love – the trumpet. Full Review

link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/Moore Bientot/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21

Review of

A Bientot... by Roger Moore

4star.jpg Entertainment

The news of the death of Sir Roger Moore in May 2017 came as a great shock: he was one of those people you knew would go on forever. There was just one small glimmer of light in the sadness - the news that a matter of days before his death he'd delivered the finished manuscript of his book, À bientôt…, to his publishers. Just a few months later a copy landed on my desk and I didn't even bother to look as though I could resist reading it straight away. Full Review

link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/Maslanka Sherlock/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21

Review of

Sherlock: The Puzzle Book by Christopher Maslanka and Steve Tribe

4star.jpg Entertainment

Who doesn't love a good puzzle, especially those really fiendish ones that get the brain working extra hard? There really is nothing to compare to that buzz we get from the Aha! moment, when everything falls into place and the solution reveals itself. If puzzles are your thing then you may wish to put your grey cells to the test with The Sherlock Puzzle Book, based on the popular TV series. Full Review

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Review of

Do You Mr Jones?: Bob Dylan with the Poets and Professors by Neil Corcoran

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

Bob Dylan's award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 'for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition' proved highly controversial. It inevitably led some people in the literary world to take stock and look at his work and reputation with a fresh eye. This volume of essays was first published in 2002, and is now reissued with a new foreword by Will Self. Full Review

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Review of

Stream Punks by Robert Kyncl and Maany Peyvan

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

I watch quite a lot of YouTube. I play music videos when I want to listen to a particular song I don't already have in my collection. I use it to find out how to do things, with the instruction videos they seem to have for pretty much anything. At the gym, I'll stick it on on my phone, prop it up on the cross-trainer and watch some behind the scenes interviews with the cast of my favourite shows. And sometimes I'll treat it as if it is Netflix, to watch series with new episodes releasing every few days, exclusively on YouTube. Having a new smart TV adds an extra, easy way to watch without having to plug in my laptop or squint at a small phone screen. So yes, I like YouTube and I use YouTube. But I didn't know a whole lot about the site it until I read this book. Full Review

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Review of

We Can Swing Together: The Story of Lindisfarne by John Van der Kiste

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

It all began with a group of youngsters in North Shields. Rod Clements, Simon 'Si' Cowe, Ray 'Jacka' Jackson and Ray Laidlaw formed The Downtown Faction, soon changing the name to Brethren when they were joined by singer-songwriter Alan Hull. As a US-based group had a similar name they opted to change the name again - and Lindisfarne (with the name taken from an island off the Northumberland coast) was born. More than forty years on and with numerous changes of personnel the band is still very much around. They might not be touring or producing much in the way of new material, but they still perform, with Rod Clements, one of the original members on his fourth stint with the group. Full Review

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Review of

Electric Light Orchestra: Song by Song by John Van der Kiste

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

My memories of pop music in the early sixties revolve around guitars and drums, sometimes the piano with only occasional excursions into strings and brass. Pop music rarely stands still and it wasn't long before the basic instruments were seen as constraints and The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys began to experiment, with other groups following where they led. Amongst these groups was The Move and their lead guitarist and songwriter, Roy Wood. Wood wanted to develop the group's sound by adding more instruments but was prevented from achieving what he wanted by cost limitations and because the rest of the group didn't really share his enthusiasm. Full Review

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Review of

Let's Make Lots of Money: My Life as the Biggest Man in Pop by Tom Watkins

4star.jpg Entertainment

Who on earth would be a manager in the larger than life, here today gone tomorrow world of pop? Anybody with an ego, a ruthless streak, an opportunity to embrace the chances and accept that it's not going to last, evidently. Tom Watkins is just one of several to have walked the fine line and, for part of the time, quite successfully. As his memoirs suggest, part of the time was achievement enough. Full Review

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Review of

Scrappy Little Nobody by Anna Kendrick

3.5star.jpg Entertainment

Celebrity autobiographies. It's a genre long tainted by the examples of people who clearly didn't deserve to be a celebrity, let alone have a ghost-writer create their book, and by those who did so little but managed to churn out five memoirs before they were even thirty. But more recently it's become a way of staking a claim to importance for female comics. They've not all written autobiographies, as Bridget Christie proved, but enough have to provide for a rapidly-filling shelf at the bookstore. 2016 we had Amy Schumer winning a GoodReads award, Lena Dunham's been at it, and we've also got Anna Kendrick. Now she's not a strict comic – not all of her films are designed to make you laugh, and some of them that are just don't – but this has to be in the same bracket. Full Review

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Review of

Tragic Magic: The Life of Traffic's Chris Wood by Dan Ropek

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

Chris Wood was a member of Traffic, the group formed by Steve Winwood in 1967 after he left The Spencer Davis Group. A gifted musician best known for his flute and saxophone work, he also played keyboards, bass guitar and contributed backing vocals as well as having a hand in writing several of the songs and one or two instrumentals. This biography takes its title from the name of one of his compositions for their fifth album. Full Review

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Review of

The Speed of Sound by Thomas Dolby

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

From struggling post-punk musician to pop star, from Silicon Valley innovator to university professor, Thomas Dolby has had a remarkable if not unique career, often reinventing himself on the way. This memoir is based on his extensive notes and journals. Full Review

Morris Legion.jpg

Review of

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains: Oddball Criminals from Comic Book History by Jon Morris

5star.jpg Entertainment

As much as I like comics – and I do, whether superhero ones or not – I have to admit one thing, namely that the villains in them are a bit pants. What is The Penguin but the world's worst Mafioso, with a hobby of waddling along like his pet birds? Where else do you win an Oscar of all things by playing a two-bit killer who just fell in a vat of random chemicals and changed colour, and got mardier as a result (although recently he's become a nanotech genius – but let's not go there)? And what is it with the gimp in the see-through plant pot because he is the embodiment of cold? And that's just some of the better-known enemies of Batman, one of the better goodies. You can imagine how awful the baddies related to the bad goodies can be. And if you can't, this is the perfect primer. Full Review

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Review of

In the Midnight Hour: The Life & Soul of Wilson Pickett by Tony Fletcher

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

Tamla Motown groups and singers apart, in the mid-sixties there were three major names in the soul music field who mattered above all. James Brown was something of a cult name who rarely bothered about or troubled the singles charts, and Otis Redding was on the verge of shooting into the stratosphere when he died in an aeroplane crash. The other was the man from Alabama, 'the wicked Pickett'. Full Review

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Review of

Reading Allowed: True Stories and Curious Incidents from a Provincial Library by Chris Paling

4.5star.jpg Entertainment

I once made a comical faux pas in a library when I was younger, but it certainly didn't put me off returning. I once declared in a self-important way that I would start at the beginning of the books for young children and not stop til the end, then do the same for those for the older children – and then do it all over again with them, I said, pointing at the large-print shelves. I hope not, was the response – but little me was only aware of a need for large font for my fellow whippersnappers, and not for any other reason. Since then I've needed libraries, and going to them has been second nature. On the dole I made sure I could use the free Internet they provided to pay me back for my council tax; later I was intent on finding out if a Senior Library Assistant girl was worthy of her title, and of course, it saved a fortune on books for study and fun. I'm not alone in sharing the warmth of both their heating system and the very thing they were born to provide – books, but there was still a huge step up between my level of use and knowledge of them to actually working in one. Which is where Chris Paling comes in. Full Review

Springsteen Born.jpg

Review of

Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen

5star.jpg Entertainment

No, you haven't stumbled into a music review from the 1970s, I'm talking about The Boss's autobiography. Lots of books have been written about Springsteen by folk who knew him, worked with him and by others who have only read the cuttings. Over the last seven years he has been going about – not putting the record straight, exactly – but telling it from his own perspective. As he puts it: Writing about yourself is a funny business. By his own admission, it isn't the whole truth, discretion holds him back but in a project like this, the writer has made one promise, to show the reader his mind. In these pages, I've tried to do this. Full Review

JVDK Beatles.jpg

Review of

A Beatles Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Beatles but Were Afraid to Ask by John Van der Kiste

5star.jpg Entertainment

You might have thought that just about everything which could be said about the Beatles had been said and certainly, there's been no shortage of books about what went wrong, what happened to the money and even what went right. But what I've never seen before is a 'miscellany' - all those little facts which are so hard to track down and this is where historian John Van der Kiste comes into his own: he's a man with an eye for detail and the ability to bring everything together into a very readable whole. It's a wonderful collection of the small facts. Full Review

Move on to Newest Fantasy Reviews