Stuff I've been reading: books about musicians

[geri_chan]

Recently I've read a few books about rock musicians, so I thought I'd round them up here (a book by the mom of Nirvana/Foo Fighter's Dave Grohl, and two biographies about The Band's Robbie Robertson).


From Cradle to Stage by Virginia Hanlon Grohl: I saw Virginia on tv with son Dave Grohl promoting this book, a collection of interviews with her fellow "rock moms". They were really funny and sweet together, so I went out and read the book. (I got it from the library, but I do think it's worth buying.) She interviews a diverse group of moms and rock/pop stars, the latter ranging from R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe to Dr. Dre to Miranda Lambert.

There are similarities in their stories: many of the rock stars in the book (including Dave) did poorly in school, not because they weren't bright kids, but because they had trouble focusing on anything but music. For all of them, playing music wasn't simply a hobby, it was an all-consuming need and drive. 

But there are differences in how the parents handled their kids' obsessions. Some families were supportive, like Virginia herself, who let a teenage Dave Grohl go on tour with Scream, or the Stipes, who encouraged Michael to follow his dream of making music instead of going to college. Some, like the Lamberts, went beyond "supportive" and enthusiastically embraced their daughter's dream, promoting and managing her in the early days of her career. And then there is Mary Morello (mother of Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine), who supported her son and inspired him with her own activism.

Others were initially disapproving, like Geddy Lee's mother, who had dreams of her son becoming a doctor until he gave up school in favor of playing with Rush--with the support of his high school counselor, who could see even back then that "Geddy is gonna go far," which is the first time I ever heard of a counselor advising a student to drop out of school to play rock and roll! (Geddy's mom, who eventually became an enthusiastic Rush fan, had a fascinating story of her own, as a Holocaust survivor who narrowly escaped death at Auschwitz.)

Although some of the families endured hardships on the path to success, the tone of the book is mostly lighthearted and upbeat, with the exception of the chapter on Amy Winehouse, which as one might expect, is heartbreaking. Also, Wendy Cobain declined to be formally interviewed for the book, but allowed Virginia to share a few anecdotes about their happier memories of Kurt, which are poignant and a little bittersweet in retrospect.


Testimony by Robbie Robertson: Several years ago I read Levon Helm's This Wheel's on Fire: Levon Helm and the Story of The Band, and mostly what I remember from it was Helm's intense bitterness towards Robertson. So when Robertson wrote his own memoir, I thought it would be interesting to hear his side of the story. (I also borrowed Helm's book from the library and skimmed through it to refresh my memory.)

For the record, I was too young to remember The Band the first time around, and came to their music via Robertson's first solo album (I particularly loved the song "Testimony," coincidentally). So as a fan, my tendency was to lean slightly towards his side in the feud, but didn't have any strong opinions either way.

What impressed me about Testimony was how well Robertson captures the awe and wonder and excitement of his younger self, as he sets out at age sixteen to travel from Canada to the States to join Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks. Even though I know that he's now a legendary musician/songwriter/producer, I was completely enthralled by the young Robbie's story and how vividly he portrays his drive and hunger to play music--practicing, as the cliche goes, until his fingers bleed. And also by the sheer joy he feels at being immersed in the world of music: blowing his first paycheck at a record store, and avidly drinking in the performances of other bands and musicians (some of them legendary themselves) that he encounters during his travels with the Hawks.

He portrays with equal vividness the story of how he met and fell in love with, and eventually married his wife Dominique. Wikipedia says they eventually divorced, but if that's true, you would never guess it from reading the book (which ends shortly after The Last Waltz takes place). I was moved by how completely head-over-heels in love Robertson was, and how he writes about her with great tenderness and affection.

Robertson writes about his bandmates with similar affection. The ill-will that Helm felt towards him doesn't seem to have been mutual, or at least, there's no sign of it in his memoir. Going by Robertson's account, he loved them all like brothers, especially Helm, whom he knew the longest from when he first joined the Hawks, and took Robbie under his wing like a little brother. Even as The Band slowly falls apart due in large part to Helm, Rick Danko, and Richard Manuel's struggles with drugs and alcohol, Robertson's feelings are sorrow and a sense of helplessness rather than anger or resentment.

Helm's account of their early days more-or-less aligns with Robertson's version, but of course it diverges widely later. As most Band fans know, he claims that Robertson stole songwriting credit from the other members, and broke up the Band over the other members' protests. He also says that the "dark days" of The Band had less to do with drug use and more with his growing dissatisfaction with the way that Robertson was taking over The Band shutting the other members out. Although to take his words with a grain of salt, Helm glosses over his drug problems as "I stayed with it [heroin] until I got sick of it a few years later, and went home and cleaned up," which sounds like a huge understatement.

Robertson doesn't directly address Helm's accusations, but his memoir presents his side of the story: he says that he tried urge the other members to participate more in the songwriting so that they could share in the royalties, but their addictions kept them from being more involved. And to be fair, he doesn't hold back in describing his own drug use--mostly weed and coke, though he steered clear of heroin having seen firsthand the devastating effect it could have. 

As for breaking up The Band, he says that he wanted to stop touring (though not necessarily making music) because they were in bad shape and needed time to heal, and he feared that the worst would happen if they continued. He says that the other members agreed that they needed a break, but it's possible that Robertson may be looking back at things through rose-colored glasses because Helm says that he argued against it vehemently.

The book closes shortly after The Last Waltz, ending on a bittersweet high note, and doesn't cover the feud with Helms (though I get the impression that it was mostly one-sided on Helm's part?) or the deaths of Danko and Manuel.

Comparing the two memoirs, I don't know where the truth lies--maybe somewhere in between?--but Testimony was a fascinating and entertaining read.


Around the same time that Testimony came out, I came across Rock and Roll Highway: The Robbie Robertson Story at the library, although it was actually published in 2014. It's a beautifully illustrated children's book written by Robertson's son Sebastian that pretty much depicts the same story told in Testimony, about how teenage Robbie left his home to join the Hawks and eventually formed The Band. Of course, as a children's book, it's a condensed and simplified version that leaves out the drug use and groupie encounters and Helm's bitter accusations. But it tells the basic story of Robertson and The Band nicely, and gets across young Robbie's sense of adventure and love of music, and reads as a loving tribute of a son to his father. It was really nice to read as a companion to Testimony.