Reading.

A quick posting on what I would recommend on reading at the moment.

Being a fan of biographies and autobiographies I enjoyed reading the Muddy Waters biography ‘Can’t be Satisfied’ by Robert Gordon. An exceedingly well written and researched book. I feel I understand much more now about what made Muddy tick. How he held on to some level of integrity after leaving the delta and how he was able to inject such feeling into his performance and composition despite changing times and circumstances. Muddy comes over as a good man but certainly no angel.

The other book I want to recommend is not Blues but Jazz related. Even if you don’t dig Jazz, even if you’ve never heard of one of the greatest saxophonists of the mid 20^th century American Jazz scene Art Pepper read this book! It’s called ‘Straight Life’ by Art and Laurie Pepper. I have trouble with autobiographies as you know there’s a good chance they’ll be a gloss job; this is the reverse. I found myself wondering why Art Pepper would confess so readily to so many weak and despicable acts. Brutally honest, a shocking account of extreme substance abuse and how this great talent was almost destroyed by his own demons.

Not for the faint hearted.