Rollicking, rowdy, and introspective, five big rockers record their memoirs and reminiscences in big books this season.
Mick Fleetwood’s Play On: Now, Then, and Fleetwood Mac (Little, Brown), shares his life as a drummer and bandleader and sheds new light on Fleetwood Mac’s raucous history and his lifelong friend John McVie. In the New York Post, Larry Getlen said, “”In his new memoir, Fleetwood documents his wild life, including how the creation of 1977’s Rumours, one of the best-selling albums of all time, almost drove the band insane.”
Jimmy Page by Jimmy Page (Genesis) is a photographic autobiography. Jimmy Page has chosen hundreds of photographs from his career as a celebrated guitarist: from a schoolboy with a “Rockabilly” forelock through his extensive work as a session musician; including The Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin, ARMS, The Firm, Outrider, Coverdale & Page and Page & Plant; playing with Roy Harper and The Black Crowes; collaborating with P. Diddy, and performing with Leona Lewis at the closing ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
In his autobiography Dancing with Myself (Touchstone), Billy Idol is candid, brash, and lively. He says, “I am hopelessly divided between the dark and the good, the rebel and the saint, the sex maniac and the monk, the poet and the priest, the demagogue and the populist. Pen to paper, I’ve put it all down, every bit from the heart. I’m going out on a limb here, so watch my back.”
Anthrax guitarist Scott Ian brings us the fast-paced, funny, and revealing I’m the Man (Da Capo). He includes tales from first hearing Kiss on the radio, backstage with Metallica, and the complete history of Anthrax, to interviewing Ozzy Osbourne for “The Rock Show” while dressed as Gene Simmons (and going undetected), marrying Meatloaf’s daughter, singer-songwriter Pearl Aday, becoming a fully functioning adult, and more. And, as Newsday’s David Criblez points out, his memoir comes with a comic book in the center.
In Rocks (Simon & Schuster), Aerosmith lead guitarist Joe Perry paints an insider’s portrait of the rock-and-roll family, featuring everyone from Steven Tyler and Jimmy Page to Alice Cooper, Bette Midler to Chuck Berry, John Belushi to Al Hirschfeld. He takes us behind the scenes at unbelievable moments such as his appearance with Tyler in the movie “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” (they act out the murders of Peter Frampton and the Bee Gees). Jimmy Page said of Rocks: “Rocking Joe Perry ‘rocks’ again!”