"I cannot live without books." -- Thomas Jefferson

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

"The Record Players: DJ REVOLUTIONARIES by Bill Brewster & Frank Broughton

Bill Brewster and Frank Broughton's previous book "Last Night A DJ Saved My Life" is probably one of the best music orientated books ever. The mighty two here goes into the culture of the DJ with all its subtitles and layers of what that means. "Last Night..." deals with the history of someone playing a recording for someone else - and therefore many sub-cultures were invented for this purpose. I think what was remarkable about this book is that I had very little interest in DJ Music. But then I read the history..... Oh man its interesting. And totally open to anyone who likes to read about pop culture history. Excellent book. 
And now we have their "The Record Players" and it too is fascinating, but it is a weaker book due that we don't have the dynamic narrative to go with it. Yet, who gives a shit. This is an essential group of interviews with important and very top DJ's. Everything from late 50's British DJ's to Techno and beyond. What is conveyed in this book is the love of the recording and its music. A lot of the key people are interviewed such as John Peel, Tom Moulton, Jimmy Savile (yes even him!), Frankie Knuckles, Afrika Bambaaataa, Francois Kevorkian, and so on. So yeah get "Last Night A DJ Saved My Life" first, but then go to this one. One can smell the DJ Booth off the page.

No comments: