Unknown Legends of Rock 'n' Roll

Rating:
Summary: Not mindblowing by any means, but worthy.
Review: "The Unknown Legends Of Rock'n'Roll" is a most interesting book and it does give a valuable reference to a large number of acts who never achieved any commercial success on album charts - Unterberger is much less strict regarding singles charts - and the factors that may have contributed to this.

It is interesting to note that there are some acts from the 1950s and early 1960s who never made it commercially, though these never get the attention in the critical world that artists from the era after about 1966 do. However, the early part of the book is devoted to British Invasion bands such as The Creation and the garage bands who are now seen as pioneers of the "punk revolution" before the Velvets, Stooges and MC5 (all household names today and not included) emerged. The next part is focused on obscure psychedelic innovators of the late sixties such as the Great Society (which featured household-name singer Grace Slick), the Blossom Toes and The Deviants.

Following that is a number of fairly superfluous inclusions in Nick Drake and Love, both of whom are extremely familiar in most record guides, and Roky Erickson and Syd Barrett, who are similarly well-known in musical circles and among critics. The next part of the book deals with punk groups who didn't receive the critical slaving so typical of most commercially unsucessful punk groups of the 1970s and 1980s, though at least one (the Raincoats) is quite familiar today owing to Kurt Cobain's championing of them. There are also (fairly superfluous in parts) entries on Krautrock giant Can and on the rock bands of Stalinist Eastern Europe and the persecution they suffered.

The next part deals with the lo-fi bands of the 1980s and 1990s, with a major focus on New Zealand's Flying Nun label, well-known to certain sections of the US rock crit establishment. The second last part deals with artists who could only make one album, the troubles that making it caused and the significance of that sole release; and the final chapter deals with the exact opposite: long-lived artists such as the Red Krayola who have never attempted to confirm to commercial trends.

All in all, most of it is well done, and the introduction is most interesting with its illustration of how unique and strange "Forever Changes" sounded to someone raised on the ultra-conservative commercial radio of the late 1970s.

However, the book does lack the feeling of sheer wonderment and sense of having discovered something new: we are seeing things that are often found in the writings of eccentric critics such as Joe S. Harrington, whose Top 100 Albums on the webzine Blastitude should be read by all interested in music. Also, there is (as often with rock criticism) a shortage of female artists such as Essra Mohawk, Annette Peacock and Judee Sill, who could have formed another chapter by themselves but are probably disliked by Richie because eccentric women tend to be too much acquired tastes.

The focus in the late 1970s and beyond does tend to be too narrow - in part for the reasons mentioned above.

All in all, eminently worth reading, but scarcely some wonderful revelation.

Rating:
Summary: There's something here for any rock fan to learn/enjoy...
Review: ....You may pick it up to see what it says about your own favorite "legend," and find yourself reading....reading....reading. The author manages to blend respect for the artists, critical/historical judgement, and enthusiastic enjoyment of the music; this balance prevents the common pitfalls of similiar projects (a pedantic survey on one hand or another fanzine on the other). Eminently readable; the pieces are short enough for the casual reader to enjoy browsing but the whole thing fits together. Sequel time?

Rating:
Summary: This book changed my music collection forever
Review: A friend gave me this book as he knew I was interested in this sort of thing, and I thank him every so often for doing so. As a musician and a music fanatic, I must say Rithchie Unterberger's book really opened my eyes to some incredible stuff I had never dreamed existed.
I must give my profound gratitude to Mr. Unterberger again (I emailed him a couple years back) for introducing me to some criminally underrated music groups that are now among my favorites. To name a few: The Music Machine, John's Children, United States of America and Savage Republic. I remember diligently tracking these groups down after reading this book and buying their albums even though I had only heard one or no songs of theirs at all. Mr. Unterberger's writing style seemed to speak to me exclusivley, and precisley communicated to me EXACTLY what the music sounded like in his words. When I bought the albums, I wasnt very surprised by how good they were on the first listen, as I already "heard" the music based soley on his descriptions alone. That proves how good this book really is. I am a rock fan in general, from new-wave to psych to mainstream alt-rock to aggro-japanese-noise-core, and this book gave me a profound new respect for the sixties. Being a child of the eighties, I did not have the luxury of hanging out at the Factory and/or Haight Ashbury in their '60s beatle-boot heydays. So ostensibly, the only way I could have found out about these wonderful groups is through a book such as this (god knows even NPR would not play most of this stuff during their interludes). Hats off to Ritchie Unterberger for his scholarly knowldege of the TRULY great groups of the sixties.

Rating:
Summary: Yes, but...
Review: Everything the previous reviewers have stated is very true - Unterberger did a fantastic job picking from various genres and time periods, and most importantly, he told THE STORIES without clogging the pipes with his own opinions (which is crucial for a book like this).

But, -1 star for the "unknown" premise. The Creation, John's Children, Chocolate Watchband, Deviants, Barrett, Love, Can, Sandy Denny, Avengers, X-Ray Spex, Tall Dwarves, etc., etc... unknown!

That's not exactly digging at the deep, dark roots of rock, "the underground cabal", like the intro or the title suggests. All of those examples above probably sold AT LEAST 100,000 of their most popular albums. They're all well known to a large segment of rock fans, and have been for a long time.

It would be no big deal if the book didn't half come off like a daring excursion 10 miles deep into the rock 'n roll forest when it's really just a few hundred feet in. I have around 7,000 albums and don't think I know half of what I should know, ya know? Minor point in what is a great book, but it still rubbed me the wrong way.

Rating:
Summary: AWESOME!
Review: Hey I LIKE reading about Syd Barrett, me being a Syd Barrett freak and all. This book was EXCELLENT, except seriously WHERE'S BIG STAR? They're one of the greatest bands of all time, despite their lack of commercial success. And too few 80s and 90s bands. No Flaming Lips? No rap at all? No Godfathers? No Gang of Four? Oh well... Still deserving of five stars though, because what's there is great.

By the way here's something that has to be one of the coolest things of all time, and I swear to God I'm not making this up, ok? Allright, in the article about the Misunderstood it talks about how they wrote a word down on a piece of paper and put it in an envelope, then they played a song and after it was over they asked people in the audience what that song meant to them. People kept saying stuff like "applesauce" and "apple orchard" and then they opened up the envelope and there was a piece of paper that had the word "apple" written on it. Then everybody got really scared, saying stuff like "They're witches! They're witches!". If anybody out there knows anything more about this whole "making sound conjure up images in your mind" way of making music, please get in touch with me immediately.

Rating:
Summary: AWESOME!
Review: Hey I LIKE reading about Syd Barrett, me being a Syd Barrett freak and all. This book was EXCELLENT, except seriously WHERE'S BIG STAR? They're one of the greatest bands of all time, despite their lack of commercial success. And too few 80s and 90s bands. No Flaming Lips? No rap at all? No Godfathers? No Gang of Four? Oh well... Still deserving of five stars though, because what's there is great.

By the way here's something that has to be one of the coolest things of all time, and I swear to God I'm not making this up, ok? Allright, in the article about the Misunderstood it talks about how they wrote a word down on a piece of paper and put it in an envelope, then they played a song and after it was over they asked people in the audience what that song meant to them. People kept saying stuff like "applesauce" and "apple orchard" and then they opened up the envelope and there was a piece of paper that had the word "apple" written on it. Then everybody got really scared, saying stuff like "They're witches! They're witches!". If anybody out there knows anything more about this whole "making sound conjure up images in your mind" way of making music, please get in touch with me immediately.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent....as far as it goes
Review: I agree with the previous reviewers that some of the choices of "unknowns" are questionable (Syd Barrett's practically a cottage industry!), and, personal taste or not, some absences glare at you (Judee Sill? The Groundhogs? Stories? Big Star? And WHY NOT something about Pearls Before Swine?) But there are a lot of musicians and albums here that warrant the attention Ritchie Unterberger lavishes on them, and the best part is that so much of what's discussed here is readily available on CDs. The histories themselves are terrific; the chapters on Swamp Dogg and Lee Hazlewood are worth the entire price of the book. Definetely worthwhile reading and I hope there's a Part II in the future. I mean, hey, there's Kensington Market, The Soft Boys, Amon Duul II, Klaus Nomi.............

Rating:
Summary: Excellent book, but you can't totally please everyone...
Review: I am truly impressed by what Unterburger has attempted (and to a large degree accomplished) here. He is pretty much charting unexplored Rock Journalism territory, and just finding a publisher and backing for such a project was probably a monumental challenge within itself. Many of the bands in this book have been written about before (and many of them haven't), but rarely with this much depth and research, and Unterberger succeeds in putting his own personal spin on their histories. Even though it makes sense, it's kind of sad that it has taken this long for a book like this to be published. Thank God Unterberger was up to the task! I am a huge fan of a few of these bands (Love, the Monks, United States of America, The Music Machine, Skip Spence, the Chocolate Watch Band) am somewhat familiar with even more (Martin Newel, Tommorow, X-ray Spex, Roky Erikson, to name just a few), and completely in the dark, but now interested in a small handful of them, (Mystic Tide, Blue Things, Swamp Dogg, etc.). I like the way Unterberger compartmentalizes the bands and artists into categorical chapters such as 'One Shot Wonders', 'Mad Geniuses', etc. I also like the way he forgoes the typical smugness and hipness that is typical of Rock Journalism, and focuses on the people and the music itself to tell the story. Even so, his voice and opinions shine through with little interference, making this read fascinating and far from dry.

What I DON'T like, and I'm sure that other Rock 'Obscurists' like myself have the same complaint, is the ommision of some crucial artists that are more than highly deserving of coverage in a book such as this. Most affected are the 60s Garage and Psychedelic artists. What Unterberger has so far is a start, but it still doesn't even begin to delve deeply enough into these fertile areas. Where, for example, are the Charlatans? The Kaleidoscope? Pearls Before Swine? Autosalvage? The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band? HP Lovecraft? The list goes on.... and on. Eliminating some of the more 'popular' artists such as Syd Barret, Sandy Denny and the Rutles (the only truly unecessary inclusion in this book) to make room for some of the ones mentioned above might have solved this problem somewhat. Perhaps the only way to really do justice to the unsung heroes of this period would be to devote a whole book to them. To be fair, the author does mention this shortcoming and even explains his reasoning, but this still does not compensate for this otherwise outstanding Rock reference book's major flaw. Here's hoping that there's a volume 2 on the way. Other than that, great job, Richie!

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating reading
Review: I bought this book yesterday and haven't been able to put it down since. My jury is not all the way in on this (I have to give it four stars to make room for Greil Marcus' MYSTERY TRAIN and, perhaps, Lester Bangs' PSYCHOTIC REACTIONS AND CARBURETOR DUNG), but I'm clearly hooked on it for the short haul. I'm not sure I've read a book like this before. There is plenty of sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll here (especially the latter two), interesting tales of quirky, sometimes insane, behavior, as well as some strong arguments for why these people deserve more attention. It's easy to praise the merits of, say, the Beatles or the Clash, but Unterberger successfully engages me in (what is for most of us) musical terra incognito. I've only heard of about 1/3 of the artists Unterberger covers (I wouldn't say that Nick Drake, Syd Barrett, and Sandy Denny are exactly "unknowns"), but he makes me want to try and track down the records of some of these people (e.g., Skip Spence, Aisha Kandisha's Jarring Effects, etc.). This book reminds me--a little--of Nash's BLOOD LETTERS AND BAD MEN (for some reason--I guess I'm thinking of the Joe Meek piece) as well as Kenneth Anger's HOLLYWOOD BABYLON (b/c so many of the artists discussed come to bad ends via alcohol, drugs, insanity, etc.). The CD (45 minutes long) is interesting, but my jury is nowhere near decided on IT. At around $20, this book is a very good deal. It's not for everyone, but if you think you MIGHT be interested in it, you probably will. Here in a few days I might kick myself for not giving it five stars.

Rating:
Summary: Hugely entertaining
Review: I love books like this. Despite the fact that many of these acts would be considered failures, they obviously mean or have meant something to someone. Not everyone in this book can be considered a true unknown, but it would take a knowledgable person indeed to have heard of a few of them. One of my favorites is a fifteen year old kid named Joe Docko. Joe's band, the Mystic Tide, is one of the bands whose songs have been included on the cd that comes inside the back cover. "Frustration" is one of the great undiscovered moments in garage rock history, and Joe Docko tossed out the original masters because he didn't think anyone would care. If that isn't a tragi-comedy I don't know what is.