Five books about the lives of musicians that are stonking good reads

This year is the national year of reading, and if you’re a music lover, I urge you to pick one up about your favourite musician. The lives of musicians are often full of highs and lows, which makes for compelling reading. Here are five of my favourites.

1. Fight The Power by Chuck D

I suppose I shouldn’t really include Fight The Power in my list, given that Chuck D himself says in its prologue that it “damn sure ain’t an autobiography”. He positions himself as a tour guide rather than a protagonist, chaperoning us through the fascinating landscape of 80s and 90s hip-hop. Such guiding means it’s different from your average autobiography. But, intertwined with observations on racial oppression, media bias, politics, violence and religion, we find Chuck D’s life story. And it’s quite the story indeed.

The book moves from a childhood lived against a backdrop of assassinations, chaos and race riots, through his days as the leader of Public Enemy (one of the most revolutionary groups in music history), up to his latest challenge as a father encouraging his daughters to think as independently as possible. An engrossing, page-turning peek behind the curtain of a fascinating character living in a fascinating (albeit often troubling) world.

2. Under the Ivy: The Life and Music of Kate Bush (2024 Omnibus Remastered Edition) by Graeme Thomson

At 432 pages, this is a slim volume compared with the likes of Ray Davies: A Complicated Life (800 pages), Madonna: A Rebel Life (880 pages), or The Life and Times of Malcolm McLaren (892 pages). But what it lacks in physical heft, Under the Ivy more than makes up with the weight of research that has gone into it.

Thomson is forensic in his detail, both in terms of researching Bush’s life (he conducted more than 70 interviews with school friends, band mates, studio collaborators, former managers, producers, musicians, video directors, dance instructors and record company executives), and in analysing her songs, which he does with the keen eye of a music critic. Trying to form a single picture of an artist as enigmatic and complex as Bush is, in Thomson’s words, “like trying to complete a jigsaw when some of the pieces are missing”. And making a coherent, entertaining and informative read from that is an even bigger challenge. Luckily for us, Thomson is up to it.

3. Things The Grandchildren Should Know by Mark Oliver Everett

By page four of his autobiography, Eels singer and songwriter Mark Everett (known professionally as “E”) has been attacked with a butcher’s knife, found his 51-year-old father dead in the family home, and told us about how, at 19, he fantasised about driving his car off a bridge. As if this weren’t enough tragedy for one lifetime, E then tells us about his sister’s suicide, the months of nursing his bedridden mother before she eventually succumbed to breast cancer, his flight attendant cousin dying during the Pentagon plane crash on 9/11, the deaths of several close friends, and the numerous rejections of his music.

In other hands, Things The Grandchildren Should Know might have been one of the saddest, most harrowing autobiographies ever written. And it certainly had every right to be. That it somehow succeeds in being one of the most uplifting, positive, and inspirational autobiographies is a testament to both E’s skilful writing, bone-dry sense of humour, and infectious optimism in the face of adversity. I’ve read it at least once a year since its release in 2008, usually in one sitting. It’s one of those books that never fails to raise my spirits. Even if you haven’t heard a single note of Eels’ music, or you don’t normally bother with books about rock or pop stars, this story is so good; it’s a must-read.

4. The Beatles by Hunter Davies

That it is the only authorised biography of The Beatles ever to be produced is reason enough to read this 1968 classic. But knowing that, for 18 months, Hunter Davies partied with the band, went to work with them and was introduced to all their friends makes it an essential. And the 18 months were those between 1967 and 1968, when the band were changing not only music, but pop culture at large.

Strangely, for all the magic of the now well-known story of the band’s rise to global domination, the real highlight comes toward the end of the book, where Davies details the time he spent at each Beatle’s house. Here we get to see the world’s most celebrated icons behind closed doors, unguarded and relaxed. And the mundanity of it is delicious. There’s Lennon playing with a loose filling before swigging milk straight from the bottle; Ringo pottering around his garden; Paul eating fried eggs, bacon and buttered bread; and George answering the phone pretending to be “Esher Wine Store”.

5. The Story of The Streets by Mike Skinner

Mike Skinner burst onto the British garage scene with his project the Streets in the early 2000s, with songs about sitting around on the sofa, working at JB Sports and getting pissed on the plane back from holiday. After five hit albums, Skinner took a hiatus from The Streets in 2011, releasing this book the following year.

Skinner makes it clear from the outset that he’s “going to be as honest as the publisher’s lawyers will allow”, but the book is so much more than a warts-and-all account. Much of it focuses on musical inspirations, the craft of songwriting, and his production techniques.

It may come as a surprise to some that The Story of The Streets is written with such intelligence and insight, especially given that Skinner’s lyrics brim with colloquialisms, profanity and ineloquence. But as those of us who’ve followed his career closely will know, this is a man who is able to build character as well as he builds story, and the “everyman” we see portrayed in the Streets’ songs is only the tiniest part of a much more complex person.

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Glenn Fosbraey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.