Rating: 
Summary: Interesting read...but not enough.
Review: After reading David Browne's book, I was left with the impression that all these people who surrounded Jeff Buckley had no idea who he was or how sick he was. He needed help, serious help and everyone -- from people who were friends with him to the record company and management, had no clue how to deal with this person who had a lot of pain and never really dealt with it. The book doesn't mention whether Jeff actually had some therapy done, if anyone pushed for Jeff to get some help, and the book doesn't seem to go into much depth as to who this Jeff Buckley was. There are no indepth readings of his journal, just bits and pieces, fragments. It's mentioned he reflected everything and everyone around him -- which would happen when one has a loss of self. The book is amiss of what happened to him in Los Angeles -- it's sketchier than Tim Buckley's bio part, which is a surprise, knowing that Jeff's history is more recent than Tim's. I was left with the impression that Jeff was having a nervous breakdown, a serious one, and that no one was equipped or aware enough or cared enough to commit Jeff or do what needed to be done to help him and have him confront his inner demons. It is said Jeff joked about tortured souls yet the one light this book shed showed that Jeff seemed to follow his father's steps in every chapter. And that his tortured good looks brought about his downfall -- everyone seemed so charmed by him in the book that no one helped him. His physical appearance during the final months screamed help yet no one seemed to be really listening -- not even his lovers, apparently. All we see are people being or getting uncomfortable with him and walking away towards the end, like they could smell death coming and they were too alive to get sucked in. What I also found interesting is that despite Jeff's claim that he did not want to be compared to Tim his father, he was drawn to anyone or anything that was related in some way shape or form to Tim. Jeff would go after it. Jeff never fully grieved for his father and his one outlet, music, was his release. When his music became "work", he started to dry up and his one outlet, his one lifeline, started to choke him. The picture of his life with his mother was dramatically toned down. Although some of it was written up, there is the fact his mother had some say in this book, which makes me wonder how much was left out. We will never really know. All we have are his own references from various interviews of stuff that happened that he would sort of mention. His childhood, one of constant uprooting (clothes literally thrown into a paper bag for god's sakes!) and shuffling around with various father figures that came and went with a mercurial immature mother was something that would certainly have a lot to do with why Jeff turned out the way he did. Jeff was basically left to raise himself with the knowledge he was basically abandoned by his father who didn't love his mother enough and had deep emotional wounds from both parents that were left unattended and left to fester for years. I grieve that Jeff never got a chance to have some peace on this earth -- and I'm angry too! This world will miss the talent he had. I don't think Jeff committed suicide out in the Mississippi waters but I can't help but think that if the tide sucked him under, he wasn't going to fight it. This book taught me some very valuable lessons -- get therapy, grieve til you pass out, and find yourself. Get strong enough to get rid of people or distance yourself from those who only hurt you even if they are your own parents. Make a binding will so that the estate doesn't fall into the wrong hands. And thank your lucky stars if you have people around you who TRULY care. It made me grateful that I was able to forgive my parents for their f-kups. Otherwise, I would've destroyed myself. This book also brings to mind the mystery of how some manage to triumph over their childhood traumas while others do not. You got old before your time. Rest in peace, Jeff.
Rating: 
Summary: Music is the key
Review: Although I have yet to read the book, it would be a travesty for all of you out there who don't listen to Jeff Buckley's album, GRACE, before reading the book itself. I have read all of the articles and reviews about Jeff Buckley's musical work and about his death, so I am quite intrigued with the book, but his music is truly AMAZING. It may take a few replays to really get into it, but his lyrics are haunting and penetrating and if you ever get a hold of a video recording of him, (which I am lucky enough to have) you can see the intensity by which he croons. Please don't berate my somewhat irrelevant 'review' but the music truly is the key to understanding Jeff Buckley, the incredible and sorely missed man and musician.
Rating:
Summary: AMAZING!
Review: An amazing book that gives you incredible insight and appreciation for these two talented musicians!
Rating: 
Summary: Two stories that work unbelievably well as one...
Review: As a huge fan of Jeff Buckley and a fan of Tim, I approached David Browne's "Dream Brother" with a real wariness. After all, hadn't Jeff always protested people's inability to keep him and his father separate? Couldn't someone have told his story on its own merits? Browne, too, repeatedly acknowledges Jeff's open antipathy toward the penumbra of his father's career. This biography of both artists, though, while sympathetic and fair in its treatment of father and son, is convincing evidence that reading the lives of the Buckleys together sheds better light on both; Browne gives fair airing to their trouble as true artists in a market-driven field, their rise from near-crippling early financial woes, and their tragic, early ends. "Dream Brother" manages to avoid many of the clichés of musical biography that can grate on a reader. Browne refrains from self-indulgent descriptions of the music itself (which NEVER translates well into words), keeps from canonizing his subjects while yet emphasizing their contribution and originality, and fairly measures their accomplishments--huge ones, in this case. All the same, when Browne finally states the obvious--that we'll never really know how much better Tim or Jeff could have gotten--the strain of his objectivity is palpable, and the book feels a lot like a dry, outside look. The structure changes this feel for the better, though. Jeff is certainly the main focus here, despite the manner in which Tim's career seems to overshadow the book's first chapters. Excerpts from Jeff's journal, usually relating to his distant father, introduce every chapter in the book, the structure of which creates its own small miracle. Browne could have been conventional, starting at the start, with Tim's story, and then dealing with Jeff's. "Dream Brother"'s chapters, though, alternate between slices of Tim's life and periods of Jeff's, and this alternation often highlights both the distance and the biographical similarities between them: fantasies of stardom and uncompromising artistry blended with lack of focus and on-again/off-again desire to connect. Browne structures the two stories so that they build together toward an earned emotional climax: the meeting between father and son mere months before Tim's death. The next chapter must detail, in a prose that is no less caring for its economy and simplicity, Jeff's more recent death. By the end of "Dream Brother," grief piles itself on grief, but Browne makes it clear as well that both Buckleys were in resurgent mode at the time of their respective passings, having rediscovered, before the end, the artistic voices they had despaired of ever hearing again. It becomes clear that, to all their loved ones and fans, the early deaths of Tim and Jeff were not simply loss doubled. They were loss multiplied exponentially. This book is a fitting and often sensitively crafted tribute.
Rating:
Summary: Two stories that work unbelievably well as one...
Review: As a huge fan of Jeff Buckley and a fan of Tim, I approached David Browne's "Dream Brother" with a real wariness. After all, hadn't Jeff always protested people's inability to keep him and his father separate? Couldn't someone have told his story on its own merits? Browne, too, repeatedly acknowledges Jeff's open antipathy toward the penumbra of his father's career. This biography of both artists, though, while sympathetic and fair in its treatment of father and son, is convincing evidence that reading the lives of the Buckleys together sheds better light on both; Browne gives fair airing to their trouble as true artists in a market-driven field, their rise from near-crippling early financial woes, and their tragic, early ends. "Dream Brother" manages to avoid many of the clichés of musical biography that can grate on a reader. Browne refrains from self-indulgent descriptions of the music itself (which NEVER translates well into words), keeps from canonizing his subjects while yet emphasizing their contribution and originality, and fairly measures their accomplishments--huge ones, in this case. All the same, when Browne finally states the obvious--that we'll never really know how much better Tim or Jeff could have gotten--the strain of his objectivity is palpable, and the book feels a lot like a dry, outside look. The structure changes this feel for the better, though. Jeff is certainly the main focus here, despite the manner in which Tim's career seems to overshadow the book's first chapters. Excerpts from Jeff's journal, usually relating to his distant father, introduce every chapter in the book, the structure of which creates its own small miracle. Browne could have been conventional, starting at the start, with Tim's story, and then dealing with Jeff's. "Dream Brother"'s chapters, though, alternate between slices of Tim's life and periods of Jeff's, and this alternation often highlights both the distance and the biographical similarities between them: fantasies of stardom and uncompromising artistry blended with lack of focus and on-again/off-again desire to connect. Browne structures the two stories so that they build together toward an earned emotional climax: the meeting between father and son mere months before Tim's death. The next chapter must detail, in a prose that is no less caring for its economy and simplicity, Jeff's more recent death. By the end of "Dream Brother," grief piles itself on grief, but Browne makes it clear as well that both Buckleys were in resurgent mode at the time of their respective passings, having rediscovered, before the end, the artistic voices they had despaired of ever hearing again. It becomes clear that, to all their loved ones and fans, the early deaths of Tim and Jeff were not simply loss doubled. They were loss multiplied exponentially. This book is a fitting and often sensitively crafted tribute.
Rating:
Summary: Captures his grace and spirit
Review: Being a huge JB fan, I mourned his passing and the loss of any future gifts he had to give. Now reading the book nearly 6 years later, I mourn him all over again. But this time not just as a voice, but as a relentlessly creative, humorous, mooody, beautiful person as well. Although you do get the sense that a lot of pieces are missing about Jeff's erratic behavior and scattered personality, you are able to connect with his music in a much more profound way, knowing from which place this art emerged.
Rating:
Summary: Captures his grace and spirit
Review: Being a huge JB fan, I mourned his passing and the loss of any future gifts he had to give. Now reading the book nearly 6 years later, I mourn him all over again. But this time not just as a voice, but as a relentlessly creative, humorous, mooody, beautiful person as well. Although you do get the sense that a lot of pieces are missing about Jeff's erratic behavior and scattered personality, you are able to connect with his music in a much more profound way, knowing from which place this art emerged.
Rating:
Summary: "You left some stars in my belly...." (from JB song)
Review: Browne gives a balanced rendering of both Tim and Jeff Buckley. The chapters alternate back and forth chronicling one and then the other. The transitions between chapters aren't jarring, and Tim's story keeps pace or runs parallel to Jeff's all the way through the book. ****Father and son led lives almost entirely exclusive of one another. Tim was a folk singer of the 60s with aspirations in jazz and country. He died when Jeff was only eight and never saw Jeff become the grunge era non-conformist with an uncanny mixture of altar boy and rock star vocals. ****I can't pretend to be a Tim Buckley fan. My interest only acknowledges that his specter loomed over or behind Jeff's life. ****For me, Jeff is the standout as a musical talent and as a person. Browne implies that Jeff had or felt a dark destiny pulling his life towards an untimely death. But Browne also gives the practical truth -- that Jeff was a passionate soul with mordant and gloomy moods like anyone else but possessing a gift for music that mesmerized his family, friends, and fans. He wasn't always recognized or easily understood by everyone, but once he came into your radar, you never forgot him. ****One big gripe against David Browne and the publishers however -- they failed to include a bibliography of resources (newspaper and magazine articles) or a discography of Jeff's (or Tim's) recordings and others related to him. Ultra-enthusiastic fans would probably love a timeline of Jeff's performance tours and a listing of those who influenced Jeff musically and mentioned in the main text of the book (Nina Simone, Bob Dylan, the Smiths, the Grifters, Cocteau Twins etc.).
Rating:
Summary: A flat characterization of two dynamic musicians
Review: Covering the lives and music of two complex men in just 350 pages is a virtually impossible task. Perhaps it is for that reason I found the biography of the Buckleys to be a bit simplistic and one-dimensional, particularly with regard to Jeff. The author alludes to the multidimensional nature of his personality but then seems to focus on just one facet when discussing a number of events. For example, Jeff's behavior in the months leading to his death is portrayed as erratic, bizarre, and unstable. Yet, the contradictory comments of people who were close to him suggested to me that his behavior was also normal and together. For me, both sides needed to be presented in order to be completely accurate. Each aspect of both Tim and Jeff's history are covered in brief and never with the depth necessary to satisfy my curiosity about these intriguing musicians. Overall, the book left me feeling there was much more to this story that was left untold.
Rating:
Summary: takes away some of the mystery of the mystery white boy
Review: david browne had a daunting task when preparing to write "dream brother"--taking the life of jeff buckley, who came to fiercy guard his privacy, and make sense of it for the general public. much of buckley's life--and death--has remained shrouded in mystery in the four years since he disappeared into the wolf river, and browne ferociously attacks his research. jeff was always determined to separate his life and career from his father, 60's folk/jazz singer tim buckley, so one could imagine the reaction jeff might have had had such a book been in existance while he was still living. however, browne clearly illustrates why both buckley's lives need examining, showing similarities between the two throughout the years. any buckley fan will be interested in reading "dream brother" and discovering aspects of jeff's (or tim's) life he or she was unaware of. just as jeff's music forces the listener to pay complete attention, reading "dream brother" requires full concentration; the names and roles of people involved form a complex web that can get confusing. the book destroys some of the mystery surrounding jeff buckley, but fans will enjoy being able to learn more about the buckleys and their incredible talent--both taken away too soon.
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