It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track

Ian Penman

ISBN 10: 1910695874 / ISBN 13: 9781910695876

Published by Fitzcarraldo Editions, GB, 2019

When all else fails, when our compass is broken, there is one thing some of us have come to rely on: music really can give us a sense of something like home. With It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track, legendary music critic Ian Penman reaches for a vanished moment in musical history when cultures collided and a certain kind of cross-generational and 'cross-colour' awareness was born. His cast of characters includes the Mods, James Brown, Charlie Parker, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, John Fahey, Steely Dan and Prince - black artists who were innovators, and white musicians who copied them for the mainstream. In 'prose that glides and shimmies and pivots on risky metaphors, low puns and highbrow reference points' (Brian Dillon, frieze), Ian Penman's first book in twenty years is cause for celebration. Seller Inventory # LU-9781910695876

Synopsis:

When all else fails, when our compass is broken, there is one thing some of us have come to rely on: music really can give us a sense of something like home. With It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track, legendary music critic Ian Penman reaches for a vanished moment in musical history when cultures collided and a certain kind of cross-generational and ‘cross-colour’ awareness was born. His cast of characters includes the Mods, James Brown, Charlie Parker, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, John Fahey, Steely Dan and Prince – black artists who were innovators, and white musicians who copied them for the mainstream. In ‘prose that glides and shimmies and pivots on risky metaphors, low puns and highbrow reference points’ (Brian Dillon, frieze), Ian Penman’s first book in twenty years is cause for celebration.

About the Author:

Ian Penman is a British writer, music journalist and critic. He began his career at the NME in 1977, later contributing to various publications including The Face, Arena, Tatler, Sight & Sound, The Wire, the Guardian, the London Review of Books, Harper’s and City Journal. He is the author of the collections Vital Signs: Music, Movies, and Other Manias (Serpent’s Tail, 1998) and It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track (Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2019). His first original book, Fassbinder Thousands of Mirrors (Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2023), won the RSL Ondaatje Prize for Literature and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography in 2024.

Bibliographic Details

Title: It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track
Publisher: Fitzcarraldo Editions, GB
Publication Date: 2019
Binding: Paperback
Condition: New