"Melody Maker" History of 20th Century Popular Music Book

Ever since 1926, 52 weeks a year, during war and peace, and throughout the ages of Be-bop, folk-rock, punk, new romanticism, dance . . . Melody Maker has served as the forum for popular music. Nowadays, everyone knows how life-changing Charlie Parker, The Beatles and Bob Dylan were; but back then it was the job of Melody Maker's hacks to tell you--as it happened. And these contemporary reports from the front-line are what give Nick Johnstone's book its edge. The writing was on the wall as far back as 1955, when Stanley Dance became the first journalist to mention rock'n'roll in Melody Maker. Initially the paper was dismissive of the new music, its jazz snobbery refusing to yield house-room to rock'n'roll. But by March 1963 The Beatles had achieved their first cover, and the paper was asking "Is Liverpool Britain's Nashville?" Half the fun, of course, comes from seeing just how wrong they often got it at the time. Thriller, the best-selling album of all-time, was simply dismissed: "not a good LP"; while Fleetwood Mac's multi-million selling Rumours was written off as "full of stereotypes, easily assimilated formulae and bland techniques". So they got that right then! Then in 1993, having struggled through the awful 80s (23 Skidoo, Dali's Car, Rip Rig & Panic), Melody Maker wrote enthusiastically about Oasis: "a proper group with guitars and choruses and mountains of moments that leave you wide-eyed and yelping". You can almost feel the relief. --Patrick HumphriesRead More