From: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org (idealcopy-digest) To: idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Subject: idealcopy-digest V10 #71 Reply-To: idealcopy@smoe.org Sender: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk idealcopy-digest Monday, April 16 2007 Volume 10 : Number 071 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [idealcopy] Bowie Bolan & The Brooklyn Boy ["Keith A" Subject: [idealcopy] Bowie Bolan & The Brooklyn Boy Just finished reading Tony Visconti's autobiography and have to recommend it to anyone who's interested in either of the two artists mentioned in the title. It's a good read. Visconti is pretty open and honest, which means he doesn't always come out of it as well as he could have. However, he undoubtedly keeps most of negative stuff for Marc Bolan (conveniently forgetting that Bolan left him ten grand - not a insignificant amount of money in the late 70's - in his will!), but this was to be expected. Also, I can't help thinking that if TV hadn't been working with Bowie again in recent years, he may have been a little harder on him, too. Indeed, there's something a little arse-lickey about his attitude to Bowie towards the end. He obviously wants to work with him again! You get a similar feeling about Morrissey (who provided an excellent foreword), too. The book is less successful when it moves onto the 80's and 90's, not just because he's dealing with artists I don't like as much as Bolan, Bowie, Sparks, etc (and artists he doesn't like as much!), but because he didn't know these people as well as Bowie and Bolan, who he worked so closely with and who he was mates with. Ultimately, the end reads more like a list of who he worked with (I also arranged a track for Mercury Rev, etc), rather than the indepth insight into the earlier artists. Still, it's a very readable book with some great anecdotes, which is likely to appeal to a lot of people here. Hot on the heels of Joe Boyds recent book, it seems that it's the producers who are writing the must-reads at the moment! K. ------------------------------ End of idealcopy-digest V10 #71 *******************************