No Sleep Till Canvey Island - Hardcover

Birch, Will

4.31

49 ratings by Goodreads

9780753507407: No Sleep Till Canvey Island

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0753507404 ISBN 13: 9780753507407

Publisher: Virgin Books, 2003

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Fully updated edition,first published 2003.

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Review:

Sandwiched between Glam Rock and Punk Rock came Pub Rock: a bunch of back-to-basics Brit bands, tired of the increasingly pretentious direction music was taking during the early 1970s, who unloaded their amps into the back-rooms of pubs. Will Birch's No Sleep Till Canvey Island is an engrossing and breezily illuminating study of a previously ignored period in British pop history, summed up by Brinsley Schwarz's Nick Lowe as "the regrouping of a bunch of middle-class ex-Mods who had been through the hippie underground scene and realised it wasn't their cup of tea". The Brinsleys persevered, as did Graham Parker & The Rumour, Ian Dury, Bees Make Honey, Eggs Over Easy and Ace. Then along came Dr Feelgood. The Southend-based R&B quartet electrified everyone who saw them--and among the audience at their 1974 Guildford show were Paul Weller and Graham Parker. Pub Rock was turned on its head again by the arrival of one Andrew Jakeman--"the manager from another planet"--who within two years had transformed himself into "Jake Riviera", and DP McManus into "Elvis Costello"--but that's another book. The only problem with Pub Rock was that it was essentially a live phenomenon. Crowds packed into sweaty pubs to watch the bands pumping out high-energy R&B or English rock & roll, but the experience could never transfer effectively to disc--which probably led to its hung-over end: "the blind" as Birch writes, "were in most cases, leading the blind drunk!"--Patrick Humphries

Review:

'An exhilarating anecdotal history' -- Q

'Illuminating ... what sustains the book is Will Birch's extraordinary attention to detail' -- Mojo

'Interesting ... knowledgeable ... 8/10' -- Loaded

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