we have but if "Songs they never play on the radio" counts then I'd suggest it---one I was pointed to by people here and an extraordinary book.

Otherwise I think the one that most influenced me was actually a jazz one-Mingus' "Beneath the Underdog".

I read Shakey - Neil Young´s Biography by Jimmy McDonough a couple of weeks ago and I must say it´s one of the best biographies I´ve read.

Most books about musicians follow the same broken home/bullied in school/found music (it became my only friend)/met some people I could connect to (even if I didn´t really know how to connect to people still)/made it big/took all the drugs and shagged everything in sight/ realised I had a problem and became sober/found the love of my life and finally realised what it meant to be rich/grew up emotionally and learned to enjoy the small things.

But. Shakey is not one of them. Surely most of the above appears at one point or another, but Young being Young isn´t likely to do things 1A.

McDonough had full access until Young changed his mind. It´s well written, so well researched it claims autism and its 750 pages is not enough.

I´m not sure if the late Ian MacDonald´s great A Revolution In The Air counts as a biography, but I keep returning to it. It´s one of my favourite books.

Anyone who´s read Dancing With Demons about Dusty? Is it good?

Best: Anything by Johnny Rogan
Worst: Anything by George Tremlett

by Andy Summers is fascinating for several reasons. Success eluded him for years, He was close to many of the characters and bands that were aligned with the jazzier / proggier end of mid 70s music and he was a musician first and never seemed to take the business of stardome very seriously , despite the success of the Police. He's also an excellent writer with an astonishing memory.

The worst was probably I Was A Robot, by Wolfgang Flur, which was self-aggrandizing and astonishingly dull. My copy was missing several pages, but I couldn't be bothered to take it back for a new one.

I'll Sleep When I'm Dead - Warren Zevon biog is a great read ( not sure if it's funnily tragic or tragically funny! ).

Bill Wyman's Stone Alone
Mandy Smith's It's All Over Now

I wholeheartedly salute Walker's choice of 'Head On', and NickW's choice of 'Songs They Never Play on the Radio' by James Nice. That absolutely counts, not a biog in the strictest sense but a compelling story of the fag end of Nico's career when she swaps Warhol's NYC for John Cooper Clarke's Prestwich, Lancs.

Worst, but in a good way, has to be 'If I Was' The Midge Ure Story. It is unintentionally hilarious, not least for his claims to have invented at various times Glam Rock, Punk, New Wave, New Romantics, Synth Pop, Techno and House Music. His barely concealed bitterness at getting bumped up the Live Aid bill by Geldof thus missing the chance to play for Princess Di is astonishing.

(Word blogger hazeyjane suggested it should have been called 'Force Midge Ure' which would have been a way better title.)

Hearty thumbs up for the Julian Cope and Warren Zevon recommendations. I've also enjoyed the following of late:

To Live's To Fly: The Ballad of the Late, Great Townes Van Zandt by John Kruth

Twenty Thousand Roads: The Ballad of Gram Parsons & His Cosmic American Music - David Meyer

one Man In Black and it wasn't Johnny Cash. So I'm finding the biography of Ritchie Blackmore I'm reading at the moment fascinating. I'm only halfway through it but it's very strong on his 60s work with the likes of Screaming Lord Sutch and loads of sessions for Joe Meek.

It's called Black Knight and it's by Jerry Bloom.

Best : "The Restoration of Edwyn Collins" by Grace Maxwell. Confirms he's the greatest living Scotsman.

Worst : "Phil Collins Biography" by Paul Russell. Confirms he's a twat.

But the 'worst' one has to be the drivel that is Ronnie Wood's self-aggrandising, self-mythologising, hopelessly dull and meandering twaddle.

To be accurate as well as honest, I haven't fully read it, as I gave up about two thirds of the way through. The FPO gave it to me for Christmas; if that hadn't been the case, it would have meant that I'd have given up half way through. He's a plonker, simple as.

... waiting for me. Anyone read this? Obviously his Elvis books are essential but I have a worry about 700 pages of Sam.

its not really an autobiography, 'Diary of a Rock'n'Roll Star' by Ian Hunter is the best attempt at conjuring up the glory, misery and boredom of life on the road. I have recently re-read it and it still reminds me to not forget my six-string razor!

Luke Haines - Britpop My Part in it's Downfall
worst - every other one I've read

I absolutely loved the first half of this autobiography, where McLagan talks about his time with the Small Faces and the Faces. There's lots of nice bits about Ronnie Lane in it. The book rather runs out of steam in the second half, when 'Mac' is basically playing in the Rolling Stones' road band and taking lots of drugs. Still, he always comes across as a diamond geezer.

Andrew Loog Oldham's biog is brilliant. I really like the way it portrays just how cool London was before the swinging 60's kicked in.

A complete waste of time. Avoid at all costs.

I agree, the Warren Zevon book ain't half bad. But, lest we forget, Peter Guralnick's double Elvis whammy is the greatest tragedy ever told about show business.

http://www.play.com/Books/Books/4-/591391/Last-Train-to-Memphis/Product....

David Lee Roth is no doubt full of himself, but he does at least come across as a man of some substance.

Clapton's autobiog is a good read. He doesn't paint a sympathetic portrait of himself by any means.

I enjoyed Simon Ford's "Wreckers of Civilisation" about Throbbing Gristle - a better read than one might think about thee innovators of Industrial Musick (like what I did with the spelling there?) which benefits from Ford's slightly academic tone and contextualising it within the art-scene of early 70's Britain.
John Cale's excellent "What's Welsh for Zen" (with V.Bockris) is illuminating - his sparky relationship with Reed , drugs, marriage, Kevin Ayers shagging his missus etc etc.
I also enjoyed the Andy Summers book. Stewart Copeland's isn't bad, but feels slight against Summers.
The Walker Brothers book isn't much good-no Scott, no real story (Sorry John and Gary, but it reads like "I did this and then I did that").
There's a good book about the American Music Club - Eitzels' a conflicted fuck-up and thanks to him the band frequently snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.
Jah Wobble's is good- very honest. Memoirs of a Geezer indeed.
There's a very good book on the post-punk scene (Coil/ NWW/ Current 93 / Psychic TV / Death in June / Whitehouse) called "England's Hidden Reverse" by Dave Keenan. An under-appreciated area of British Musick.
I also enjoyed Dave Buckley's book on Roxy Music.
David Sheppard's book on Eno is excellent, with "our Brian" being painted as the flawed human being he is, not something his cultists might want to engage with.

If you enjoyed the Haines, Cope and Wobble efforts, try this - it's a good 'un. The LP of the same name is a belter too.

well, a lot really, but one of my favourite music books is Michael Azzerad's Our Band Could Be Your Life, about the American alternative / punk scene of the 80s. There are chapters on The Replacements (authors of the Official Best Song Ever*), Minutemen, Husker Du, Big Black, Dinosaur Jr, Butthole Surfers and others of that ilk. I've had it years and still leaf through it fairly regularly, and it does the thing all good music books should do, make you want to listen to the records again.

*Here Comes A Regular, fact fans

Read X-Ray by Ray Davies, I enjoyed it but feel none the wiser about Ray or The Kinks. It's like listening to a loved but slighty loopy uncle yap about the olden days.

He confesses his love of Picasso and Bob Dylan and how they would wind people up with their work and I could never tell if the book was a massive put-on. I don't know enough about the facts of his life to judge.

One minute he is an unbeatable schoolboy runner, the next he is in the boxing ring with the champion of Great Britain and Northern Ireland getting his lights punched out.

His two favourite topics are homosexuals and law suits, one day he'll find himself in a lawsuit about homosexuals and he'll be the happiest man on earth.

He's very coy about sex, through a long drawn out anecdote he implies he "did it" with Marianne Faithfull. Come on Ray spill the beans! I would if I were him. In fact I would have been tempted to call the book "I Did It With Marianne Faithfull"

I've never read an autobiography where he discusses his own obituary as though it were printed in the past. It was apparently only two paragraphs!

by Bruce Thomas is a really funny and scathing account of his time on the road with Elvis Costello. The writing is brilliant.

According the Wikipedia "How To Be Dumb" on "Mighty Like A Rose" is about Bruce, Elvis at his most acerbic.

Not a rock biography I know but I just like telling people about it!

was a major disappointment to me. As a lifelong Clapton fan, I wanted intricate details about his music and his guitars, including the story of where/how he bought his first Les Paul, the instrument which changed the entire look and sound of rock music forever. But of that we got scarcely a word.

What we got instead were endless tales of Eric's time in rehab, interspersed with a roll call of the Italian models he's had, er, dalliances with.

The Pattie Boyd book Wonderful Today was, by contrast, much more heartfelt and honest, despite a series of elementary and jarring factual errors (the Beatles played Let It Be on the Apple rooftop concert, you know).

By all accounts Pattie was treated very shabbily by both George and Eric and one comes away from the book feeling desperately sorry for the poor woman.

Mentioned in passing by the OP but worthy of an entry all its own. No, it's not quite up there with Head On/Repossesse, but its a brilliant read and a superb look at the bitterness caused by a career that starts off promisingly, stalls almost immediately and never gets going again (at least commercially). The 'writing without hindsight' idea makes it very immediate and shows just how bitchy, petty and downright unpleasant the music biz is.

Worst: Johnny Cash autobiography. Sanitised to the nth degree and very boring as a result.

Hardcore Troubadour - forget the name of the lady who wrote it, but it's a helluva story - and well told. And, like the best rock biogs makes you hunger to hear the music again.

Top Witchseason folkie producer chappie Boyd has an elegant prose style. A very worthwhile book.

Does Stanley Booth's The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones count>?

It's a splendid, immediate portrait of the Stones' woven together with Booth's first-hand account of the tour that led up to Altamont.

Johnny Rogan's biography of the band, Timeless Flight, is a tremendous work.
He revised and updated the work. The version I've read is the revised edition.
One part I particularly like was when Rogan interviewed David Crosby. He asked him about a song he wrote, that was recorded during the 5th Dimension sessions, called Psychodrama City. Crosby denies this song ever existed and that he's remember such a title. Time passed and Rogan was invited to search through CBS archives and contribute to the reissue of The Byrds catalogue, by enhancing them with outakes, alterenate versions and unreleased material. What should he uncover but a song called Psychodrama City, that poor Crosby, in his drug befuddled state had erased from his memory.
That said the song is as dreadful as the title would indicate. McGuinn probably buried it, hoping it would never be heard and so sully the Byrds lecacy.

Marc Almond Tainted Love
well written, and like Cope's, will make your heart burst

A Cure for Gravity. It finishes just when he starts to become successful in his mid-twenties, because he thinks fame isn't interesting. He has a slightly odd background for a rock musician - simultaneously studying at the Royal Academy of Music and playing in bands on the South Coast, and then becoming musical director of the second Playboy Club in the UK (in Portsmouth!), before managing to join the post-punk wave. Very well written and interesting.

The Severed Alliance - The Morrissey and Marr tome by Johnny Rogan
The Stone Roses (The Rise and Fall of British Pop) by John Robb
Chronicles by Dylan
Tainted Life by Almond (possibly the best one I've ever read)
Everything (A Book about the Manic Street Preachers) by Simon Price.
No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs by Lydon
Dear Boy - Keith Moon's biog
Last Train to Memphis - Elvis biog

Not sure of poor ones as they never last long enough for me to take much notice.

Dave Marsh's hagiography on Springsteen is way too much of a love in and his book on The Who veers into similar territory.

"I Know This Much" is a cracking book. It got good reviews and, as I was looking for a good audiobook - and he reads it himself - I downloaded it. It accompanied me on my early morning walks for a few weeks. He writes very well, had an engaging story to tell and he read it with passion. I'm not a fan of his band or his music but if I met him in the street I would tell him that his book made my life better. Oh, and on 2 occasions, listening to it made me get something in my eye.

Rather scholarly, dry and restrained perhaps, but a commendable attempt to sum up Miles's career and life.

Fred & Judy Vermorel's first go at a Kate Bush bio, circa 1980 ?

A slim volume ...

Julian Cope bio - Head On/Repossed is, as previously mentioned so good, I've bought it and forced others to read it and had to buy myself a new copy at least twice. The Modern Antiquarian, although not a biography, has accompanied me on holiday many times, and is highly recommended.

The Real Frank Zappa book is brilliant, I don't really like Frank's music particlularly, but he was a true raconteur, and its a very entertaining read which I revisit often.

Anthony H Wilson's Factory stuff is great, as is Bez's effort "Freaky Dancing". I loved Goldie's auotbiography too, very technical, but really made you realise what a genius he is in many fields.

The metal contingent can't go wrong, Motley Crue "The Dirt" is unputdownable, despite them all being thoroughly objectionable human beings, "Hell for Leather" by Seb Hunter is pariochially entertaining, and whatever Dave Lee Roths atuobiography is called, is fantastically clever, objectionable, entertaining, obscene and appalling all at once.

I must confess as an anti-Elvis fan, I took perverse pleasure in Albert Goldman's hatchet job on the poor fat dead man. But it is certainly a book that may upset a true Elvis fan, and it would be mean of me to recommend it.

would be Eamonn Forde on Cathal Coughlan in conversation on various double deckers called '(Not) Only Losers Take the Bus'. I'd buy that.

Is a terrifying account of jazz, smack, rehab and recovery. Horrible guy, horrible life and a beautiful musician: go figure.

Just awful and as a I am not an HJH aficionado I felt I couldn't trust any of it given the mistakes I noticed... ie Sunderland is in Scotland and people from Liverpool eat something called 'chick butties' which, he goes on to explain helpfully is a sandwich with pieces of chicken in it (obviously something he was told verbally and misheard).

The Ballad Of Joe Strummer which I thought was excellent, painting a well rounded and sympathetic portrait of a complex and often conflicted man, obviously written by a fan and a friend yet at the same time not afraid of shining a light on some of Strummer's more unlikeable qualities. I will admit that as the story made its inevitable way towards December 2002, I found myself wiping away a tear or two...
If I also can stretch the definition of rock biog, I would also like to add Jon Savage's classic "England's Dreaming", and recent newcomer "Can't Buy Me Love"

"Rhinos, Winos and Lunatics" and the prequel "Maybe I Should Have Stayed In Bed" are about the Welsh group Man and the Welsh rock scene of the early-to-mid '60s respectively. Both books are good reads. Well-written, very informative and very funny. The first also has on it's cover the most hilarious hippy-era band-photo I've ever seen.
Supposedly he has another book in the pipeline.

I don't read many music biographies and have yet to pick a particularly bad one.

...and the British Folk and Blues Revival".

I know we've mentioned this book in a previous thread - including some contributions by the author himself, as I recall - but it's worth retierating what a wonderful piece of work it is.

I'm not a fan.

They are ludicrous.

But...

'The Dirt' - Motley Crue, is savage, honest, moving, funny and jaw dropping.

If you dont like it, I will donate my fee for this post to a charity of your choice.

David Nichols' out of print Go-Betweens biography on Verse Chorus Press is brilliant
Nina Antonia's Homme Fatale on SAF Publishing is a great biography of Peter Perrett, even if it has a terrible title.
The late Sean Body's Wish the World Away is the great biography of American Music Club also on SAF Publishing
I loved the Clinton Heylin biogs of Van and Dylan.

by by Levon Helm, great stuff about touring with the Hawks in the 50's. Also Black Monk Time, co-written by the Monks bassist and his east german wife, highly recommended.

by Levon Helm, great stuff about touring with the Hawks in the 50's. Also Black Monk Time, co-written by the Monks bassist and his east german wife, highly recommended.

He REALLY doesn't like Robbie Robertson!

Yes, which stops it being anything like a well told story if you ask me. Far too much bile and not very well written either.

james young funny /tragic account of touring in a barely competent back up band to tragic late period junkie nico

http://www.amazon.com/Nico-End-James-Young/dp/0879515457

a lousy book is on curtis mayfield

http://www.amazon.com/Curtis-Mayfield-Peter-Burns/dp/1860744575/ref=sr_1...

boring as bat shit little of intrest but masses of chartlisitings

currently reading the ginger baker autobio. Pretty funny what a lad, ratbag, and as the title says- Hellraiser. Useful counterpoint to Eric and Jack's books- especially Jack who he still hates with a passion.

http://www.amazon.com/Ginger-Baker-Hellraiser-Autobiography-Greatest/dp/...

a lot of readers complian that there is not enough in books on the songs , musical intricacies , how they were recroded etc. Understandable but in the case of ginger Baker he was writing about his life andn music was only a small part of it.

If we're talking about autobiographies, can I nominate Chuck Berry’s as the worst I’ve ever read - in any category, not just music. For a start, he writes like a cocky teenager who’s just discovered effects like alliteration and assonance and is determined to show off his new skill at every opportunity. The content is similarly juvenile - he writes about various conquests as ‘My First White Woman’, 'My First French Woman’ and so on, and you can picture him carving the notches on his bedpost.

There is some stuff about music in there, but reasoned analysis takes a back seat to the usual ‘I invented everything’ bragadoccio (to be fair, he has a point in many cases). A thoroughly dispiriting read.

This week I have been mostly reading Graeme Thomson's bio of La Bush and am v impressed. well written, informative and insightful. Del Palmer may not like it (saying we should wait for Kate's version - yeah, right!) but its a fascinating read that treats its subject with respect.

I finished Under The Ivy last week. It's a beautiful and very astute book and I learned a lot.

about his touring with Black Flag is excellent. I think that really captures the atmosphere of the early hardcore scene, the violence, grime and hardships. As far removed from the romantic rock&roll image of "life on the road" as you can imagine.

Anything by Julian Cope is definitely worth reading whether it's about himself, ancient stone circles or weird Japanese psychedelic bands. As already mentioned above, his Head On/Repossesed autobiographies are fantastic, especially the sections on how he dealt with his unexpected almost accidental "fame". Needless to say he coped with it by taking huge amounts of mind expanding drugs and doing all he could to sabotage his own success.

I like Victor Bockris books too - Uptight about the Velvets being my favourite. Then as I am fascinated by the New York CBGBs Punk scene, I've enjoyed Clinton Heylin's "From The Velvets to the Voidoids" and Legs McNeil's "Please Kill Me".
Gary Valentine the original bassist in Blondie wrote a great book call "New York Rocker", he writes really well and I think he did actually become a music journalist.
Monte Melnick's "On The Road With The Ramones" shattered all my illusions of the goofy cartoon "brothers". It's probably one I wish I'd never read as it just laid bare all their secrets, in-fighting, love triangles and hatred of each other. Sometimes ignorance is bliss!

I think I preferred Pat Gilbert's "Passion Is A Fashion" about The Clash more than Chris Salewicz's "Redemption Song".
Will Birch's "No Sleep Til Canvey Island" was a good trawl through the Pub Rock scene.

John Cale's "What's Welsh for Zen", Mark E Smith's "Renegade" and John Lydon's "Rotten: No Irish No Blacks No Dogs", Jah Wobble's "Memoirs of a Geezer" also entertaining autobiographies.

Interesting to see some mentions of a good Kate Bush biography, I'll check that out. I've read a couple of really awful ones in the past.

On the bookshelf waiting are the Andy Summers one and Eels' Mark E Everett's "Things The Grandchildren Should Know", looking forward to that.

is superb.

'Wonderland avenue' is a fantastic read. Much of it can be taken with a pinch of salt, and Jim Morrison rarely does anything wrong in Sugerman's eyes, but it's a great tale of excess. 'Stone Alone' by Bill Wyman is just rotten. It reads like a very dull shopping list, you'd never guess he was in one of the most exciting bands of all time

Just read 'Magazine-The Biography' by Helen Chase whilst on holiday. Flew through it. Really really interesting. Written at a good pace that's just completely infectious. Couldn't put it down. Covers the band's formation/early days as individuals (all members past and present)and all the way through to the tour dates of 2009.....Brilliant book.

HELLFIRE is the Jerry Lee Lewis story. It is written in the language of Southern Baptists, and it tells the intertwining stories of Jerry Lee and his cousins Mickey Gilley and televangelist Jimmy Swaggert. A great deal of the story is about how it is to grow up poor in the American South, saturated in damnation religion and set against poor blacks. Tosches finds metaphors there for a man exhilarated by walking a tightrope over hell. His account of Chuck Berry replacing Jerry Lee as the last act (top of the bill), Jerry Lee playing 'Great Balls of Fire', setting his piano alight and murmuring 'Follow that, nigger' to Berry as he slopes off-stage, is just one of a hundred great stories, all of which illuminate the man, the place and the time. One of my favourite books ever.

cross town traffic - charles shaar murray, eddie kramer's Hendrix Book, Bird Lives by Ros Russel, Straight Life; Really the Blues by Mezz Mezzrow; But Beautiful by Geoff Dyer, a Riot of our Own (the story of the Clash) by Johnny Green; My Magpie Eyes are Hungry for the Prize -the Creation Records Story, by David Cavanagh; Kill Your Friends by john Niven; 2Stoned by Andrew Loog Oldham; Revolution in the Head, Ginger Geezer, Head On/Repossesed, Memoirs of a Geezer by Jah Wobble; One Train Later by Andy Summers; Maybe I should Have Stayed in Bed by Deke Leonard and more i'VE FORGOTTEN.......

by Larry "Ratso" Sloman is an excellent and very entertaining account of Bob & Co's "Rolling Thunder Review". A real page turner that doesn't get bogged down by analising Dylan's work and myth. More like a tour diary. (You may be familiar with the author if you have read any books by Kinky Friedman. "Ratso" is one of the "Village Irregulars" and is Dr Watson to Kinky's Sherlock. Very funny series of crime novels.)

"Hey Ho Let's Go" the Story Of The Ramones" by Everett True is pretty dire. A real fan-boy's perspective. Read Dee Dee Ramone's "autobiography" instead.

Another vote for Jah Wobble - great book, well worth a read