Pick Up the Pieces: Excursions in Seventies Music

by John Corbett

Unless you lived through the 1970s, it seems impossible to understand it at all. Drug delirium, groovy fashion, religious cults, mega corporations, glitzy glam, hard rock, global unrest—from our 2018 perspective, the seventies are often remembered as a bizarre blur of bohemianism and disco. With Pick Up the Pieces, John Corbett transports us back in time to this thrillingly tumultuous era through a playful exploration of its music. Song by song, album by album, he draws our imaginations back into one of the wildest decades in history. Rock. Disco. Pop. Soul. Jazz. Folk. Funk. The music scene of the 1970s was as varied as it was exhilarating, but the decade’s diversity of sound has never been captured in one book before now. Pick Up the Pieces gives a panoramic view of the era’s music and culture through seventy-eight essays that allow readers to dip in and out of the decade at random or immerse themselves completely in Corbett’s chronological journey. An inviting mix of skilled music criticism and cultural observation, Pick Up the Pieces is also a coming-of-age story, tracking the author’s absorption in music as he grows from age seven to seventeen. Along with entertaining personal observations and stories, Corbett includes little-known insights into musicians from Pink Floyd, Joni Mitchell, James Brown, and Fleetwood Mac to the Residents, Devo, Gal Costa, and Julius Hemphill. A master DJ on the page, Corbett takes us through the curated playlist that is Pick Up the Pieces with captivating melody of language and powerful enthusiasm for the era. This funny, energetic book will have readers longing nostalgically for a decade long past.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, History

503 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 1, 2019

About the author

John Corbett is a writer, curator, and producer based in Chicago. He is co-owner of Corbett vs. Dempsey, an art gallery. Corbett is the author of several books, including Extended Play: Sounding Off from John Cage to Dr. Funkenstein (Duke U. Press, 1994), Microgroove: Forays into Other Music (Duke, 2015), A Listener’s Guide to Free Improvisation (University of Chicago Press, 2016), Vinyl Freak: Love Letters to a Dying Medium (Duke, 2017), and Pick Up the Pieces: Excursions in Seventies Music (University of Chicago, 2019). As an essayist and reviewer, Corbett has written for numerous academic and commercial publications, including DownBeat, The Wire, The Chicago Reader, The Chicago Tribune, NKA, Bomb, LitHub, and Lapham’s Quarterly. Corbett has edited or co-edited many books, including several on the musicians Sun Ra and Peter Brötzmann, as well as the 125 books and catalogs that his gallery, Corbett vs. Dempsey, has produced, and he has contributed to major museum monographs on artists including Jim Lutes, Charline Von Heyl, Christopher Wool, Albert Oehlen, and Sadie Benning, and essays on artists Rachel Harrison for the Art Institute of Chicago and Bob Thompson for the Museum of Modern Art, NY. Corbett’s work as a music producer includes his label, the Unheard Music Series, which existed from 1999-2006, and Corbett vs. Dempsey, an ongoing label issuing CDs of new and historical jazz, experimental music and improvised music. In 2002, Corbett was invited to be guest artistic director of JazzFest Berlin, and he co-produced the Empty Bottle Festival of Jazz and Improvised Music as well as a weekly series of concerts at the club of the same name. He has organized many musical events and festivals, most recently a series at the Art Institute of Chicago and stand-alone events at the Guggenheim Museum of Art, NYC, and the Menil Collection, Houston. As a curator, Corbett has been involved in many exhibitions at museums including the Smart Museum of Art, Chicago (Monster Roster: Existentialist Art in Postwar Chicago, 2016), the Tang Teaching Museum, Saratoga Springs, NY (3-D Doings: The Imagist Object in Chicago Art, 1964-1980), Sullivan Galleries, the School of the Art Institute, Chicago (Touch and Go: Ray Yoshida and his Spheres of Influence, 2010), and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (Pathways to Unknown Worlds: Sun Ra, El Saturn, and Chicago’s Afro-Futurist Underground, 2009). Corbett taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1988 to 2014.

Reviews

[Chris Haught · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received an eARC of this book from the publisher through NetGalley.

Sometimes I like to just throw a music memoir into the mix as they give great perspective of the journey of life with great music as a backdrop.

I did get that here, though to be honest I had to skip some sections. I was reading it all for the first quarter but found myself mired when the author was covering artists I wasn't familiar with. Ideally, the writing would make me want to go out and find the material and give it a listen. But that didn't always work here. Sometimes I think the author just got too heavy handed with the descriptive words and cultural references that I didn't often get.

That said, there were some great moments here, especially in the areas where an artist I listen to was covered. These would take me back to a time when it was all new to me, much like it was for the author.

So yeah, great sections and some areas where my eyes glazed over. But all in all a fun experience...

[John Spiller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really 3.5 stars. If you are a Corbett fan (and I am), this is worth reading. If you are unfamiliar with Corbett, I would start with "Vinyl Freak" and go from there.

"Pick Up the Pieces" is not a systematic exploration of 1970's music. Rather, it is a series of essays on an idiosyncratic array of 1970's music and its interplay with Corbett's life. Some of the essays, such as the one on Sun Ra and The Fall, are incredible, and I expect that I will find myself returning to them in the future. Others are evocative of a time and place that resonated with me. Still others were annoying. I found it oddly reassuring that Corbett still grapples with conflicted feelings regarding The Clash, which he describes much better than I ever could. So, if you are looking for a tastemaker's guide to the best 1970's music, look elsewhere. But if you enjoy well-written vignettes on a variety of genres from jazz to AOR, then this might scratch that itch.

[Len or Len · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little too pretentious and judgmental, but it's still a nice look at the music of the 70s.

[J Earl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pick Up the Pieces from John Corbett is one of those books that sounded a lot better than it was. I remember the 70s very well, okay, maybe a little smoky, but hey, it was the 70s. My musical tastes are/were also as varied as Corbett's, though it sounds like our preferences don't line up perfectly.

One of the problems I had with the book was his writing style, I simply don't care for his tone and I don't need quite so many weak attempts at being creative with analogies and metaphors. Just admit you're not actually creative yourself and talk about the people who are. I do hope his arms are okay after so much patting himself on the back.

Another issue for me was the implication (perhaps it was my misunderstanding) that this was to parallel his trip through the 70s. First, at 7, I don't know that I would really care what your thoughts were, so maybe it is just as well there wasn't as much as I anticipated. I was born in 1958 and the first album I bought with allowance money was Revolver, so I understand that it isn't unusual for 7/8 year olds to appreciate good music. But my thoughts at the time would not have made interesting reading even though the seeds of future understanding was certainly there. Likewise for Corbett's 7 year old self. But some of the albums he didn't discover during the 70s, some he only even heard about much later. So this is less a personal trip than simply a critic writing about important albums and songs, from his adult perspective, with some juvenile and adolescent memories thrown in. But even most of his personal stories were well after the 70s, so the personal aspect was not part of the trip through the 70s but about how important he (thinks) he is after the fact.

Having said all that, when he sticks to talking about the music and the musicians the book is much better. His goofy attempts at some sort of literary device, whether analogy, simile, or metaphor (he fails equally at each) just distract from what flow the book has. There were a couple of works I don't recall ever hearing and one I don't even recall hearing about, so there is plenty here that is of value.

I do recommend this book to people who like to read about music, and especially anyone who has their own memories of the 70s. It might appeal more to someone who remembers the 70s as Corbett does, as a juvenile and adolescent. I grew up thinking I was going to Vietnam and by the end of the 70s I was well out of high school, while he was just graduating and beginning adulthood. Not a big difference in years but when a period is delimited then the difference, over that period, becomes significant. I remember the early 70s music as someone in junior high and high school, not someone in elementary school. But putting aside the "personal journey" he claims to take us on these essays on the songs and albums of the decade are still a fun nostalgic trip and the occasional insight he offers on the music and/or musicians makes the music that much richer.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

[Ranjit · Rating 5 out of 5]

We’ll,, this was a delight. I picked it up with the misimpression that I already had extensive, eclectic knowledge of 1970s music. This book, with 78 short chapters on everything from Beefheart to Parliament to Joni to Zeppelin to Fela to Gram to Eno to Suicide, plus a ton of stuff I didn’t know, opened my eyes. A thrilling mix of the familiar, the fetching, and the freaky. The writing is wildly entertaining, a fan’s notes and a musician’s insights intertwined with @johnccorbett ‘s coming-of-age stories. So much new music here that I made a companion Spotify playlist, “Excursions in Seventies Music.” Check it out.

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some hits, some misses. The author is not bad when writing about the nuts and bolts of the music itself, which is a rarer skill than you might think. There is a lot here about what you might call the sociological or autobiographical impact of '70s music. Again, some of it is pretty good, and the author doesn't try to pretend he was digging say, free improvisation when the decade began (when he was like age 7). I also appreciate that stereotypical '70s music biz outfits like Yes and Heart are discussed fairly, without the perpetual 1977 punk orthodoxy that's common among rock scribes. Tldr; worthwhile if you like reading this sort of music essay collection.

[patrick Lorelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t know what I was thinking about originally when I got this book but it was really not whatever was on my mind at the time. The author's vision of the 70s version of the music was or is different from mine and I was all over the place but I was also older than the author and had started going to rock concerts in the early seventies. That being said I will say it was good to remember for I did have good times in the 70s along with the good music. I received this book from Netgalley.com

[Curt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Corbett uses his personal stories of growing up in the 70s to illuminate the music of the time, and vice versa.

[Michael Norwitz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Corbett knows his material, and I certainly can't fault his excellent selection of pieces to highlight the music of the 70s, but too many of the chapters give short shrift to analysis in favor of rambling personal narratives which lead me nowhere.

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really nice trawl through a wide variety of seventies music, from the super popular to the super obscure. I like how Corbett makes it both a very personal journey and one that is still relatable, even to someone who's teen years came nearly two decades later.

[Annarella · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like rock, if you grew up in the 70s/80s, if you were into new wave or punk this is a must read.
I loved the memories, how it was written and how it helped me to remember may records I loved.
Highly recommended!
Many thanks to University of Chicago Press and Netgalley for this ARC