My rating:
add to my books
Loading...
R.E.M. Fiction: An Alternative Biography
R.E.M.'s Public Image Has Always Been Tightly Controlled. Icons of Anti-Celebrity Rock, Who Became Huge Celebrity Rock Stars, They Were, According to the Story, the First U.S. Post-New-Wave Band Who were Both Commercially Successful and Cool. Drawing on Exclusive Interviews with Mike Mills, Peter Buck and Other Members of R.E.M.'s Nuclear Family, Fiction Re-Evaluates the M...more
Paperback, 397 pages
Published
October 28th 2003
by Virgin Publishing
(first published 2002)
There is a good chance some of your friends read this book. Sign in to see!
sign in »
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
This book is currently not featured on any Listopia lists.
Add this book to your favorite list »
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
55)
I actually enjoyed 'Fiction' a lot more than I expected to, especially because its title and exterior seem to emanate "churned out-rock-bio". While not as comprehensive or essential as 'It Crawled From the South', Buckley succeeds in producing something Marcus Gray does not: a cogent, accessible narrative about REM. Buckley's use of quotations from relevant players in the story and from the band members themselves really lends an air of authority to this book. There are often entire pa...more
Probably the definitive R.E.M. bio because it delights in passive aggressive snark and mythbusting instead of just engaging in hagiography and hero worship while still spinning a deep, deep bio and career evaluation. I love that Buckley and the publisher seem to have just skipped the editing process entirely - forget paragraphs, we're talking full-page, unedited quotes that barely have anything to do with the main narrative just mixed in for the hell of it. In almost any other book, it would dri...more
I usually gravitate to these kinds of books because I like the artists/ music and I want to find out more. This is pretty good. It does conform to some unwritten rules;
1. The best stuff is always before they were successful.
2. There are loads of sources at the start, about the early work and this gradually tails off. The more famous/older/ successful the less we know or can find ouit about them.
However, it was good for me to have the actual music on that I was reading abou...more
1. The best stuff is always before they were successful.
2. There are loads of sources at the start, about the early work and this gradually tails off. The more famous/older/ successful the less we know or can find ouit about them.
However, it was good for me to have the actual music on that I was reading abou...more
A charming, engrossing and unpredictable recounting of the band's rise — and some would say fall. I especially like the detailed account of how Peter Buck and Michael Stipe met. Pete was working in an Athens record store and Michael would stop in and soon the record buying turned to talking about records. They chatted up everything from Patti Smith to The Raspberries, Big Star to Television.
A wonderful REM biography for any diehard fan. I found out so many interesting facts about my favorite band. Fiction was engrossing and not dry like some bios can be.
apparently, there are things even i didn't know about r.e.m.--or at least there were before i started reading this book.
Steve Birrell
added it
Andrew
added it
Taylor
added it
Bud
marked it as to-read
Richard Hare
added it
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
