everything simon price - have i missed something???

[Manicben]

It's certainly the best available. There are some poor biographies out there. It'd be nice to have an up to date biography. Most of them only cover up to Truth.

[andy]

I preferred nailed to history

[UEF]

I really liked it, I love the way it's written.

I've no opinions on Simon Price as I've never met him, but he can't be much worse than most Manics fans one can encounter.

[Nature's Discontent]

Originally Posted by andy

I preferred nailed to history

I probably would have preferred Nailed To History too, if Martin Power hadn't been so clumsily speculative about the band and Richey, and hadn't just completely glossed over everything from KYE to JFPL as if they stopped being of any interest at all after their success in the 90s.

[handbag]

Originally Posted by Porco

Nothing wrong with quoting interviews in a chronological context as far as I'm concerned

The problem is he doesn't quote them as interviews. He takes chunks from a stack of interviews with the band and doesn't even credit the source. He does it constantly because he really knows very little about anything unless he googles it.

He literally makes things up in the book. The story about the two "groupies" in Manchester is a load of shit. The girl he said had slept with one of Dogs D'Amour was actually the band member's girlfriend (eventually moved to LA and wed). That caused some serious shit.*

Fabrications galore.

It's like here's ten paragraphs from an interview which I won't credit, here's a bit about ME, here's a chapter full of interviews I won't credit, here's a bit about ME, oh and some pretty pictures...

I also find it odd that if this book is regarded as the definitive Manics biography he'd leave out Jennifer Watkins from the story. Not a mention.

I'm not surprised he's having problems finding work. His work is wank.

*Edit: because her friend and herself were definitely not groupies and definitely did not do a three way with a Manic Street Preacher, but a difficult one to explain away when it's printed that you are and you did.

[Oh Nick...!]

I don't know about that, in terms of what's accurate. But re: his writing style I think you either like it or you don't - it used to be quite common for music journos to inject their own style/themself into their writing (see Swells, Morley et al).

He has talked recently about updating it, as he's short of work ATM - I don't know how seriously.

[andy]

Michael Azerad imo is the best out there.

Come as you are is the best nirvana book (the Everett true book is too self focused on him)

he also aided bob mould in writing his autobiography

Our Band Could Be Your Life

so many good books - done a lot of notes and contributed to dvds, others books, and various other projects

[bleeding pepper]

Originally Posted by UEF

I really liked it, I love the way it's written.

I've no opinions on Simon Price as I've never met him, but he can't be much worse than most Manics fans one can encounter.

I didn't dislike him because of any Manics-fan reasons, it was what I perceived to be him acting a bit self-important.

What happened, was that we were at the Doves gig at Festival Hall where the Manics played the Heavenly set. I think it was during the interval, but I was walking from my seat to the toilets. An acquaintance of mine was chatting to Simon Price in the aisle. So this acquaintance stopped me and said "Simon, have you met my friend Steve [me]?" to which Simon [in what I took to be a rather pompous sounding voice] said "Oh, are you a fan of my work then?" To this I kind of sneered at him and said "What?" before I turned and walked away. I suppose in effect I didn't even really 'meet him' properly, but hey ho. I didn't want to at this point.

[hummingbird]

Originally Posted by bleeding pepper

I didn't dislike him because of any Manics-fan reasons, it was what I perceived to be him acting a bit self-important.

What happened, was that we were at the Doves gig at Festival Hall where the Manics played the Heavenly set. I think it was during the interval, but I was walking from my seat to the toilets. An acquaintance of mine was chatting to Simon Price in the aisle. So this acquaintance stopped me and said "Simon, have you met my friend Steve [me]?" to which Simon [in what I took to be a rather pompous sounding voice] said "Oh, are you a fan of my work then?" To this I kind of sneered at him and said "What?" before I turned and walked away. I suppose in effect I didn't even really 'meet him' properly, but hey ho. I didn't want to at this point.

brilliant

[Porco]

Well if he made stuff up that's bad. If he left stuff out that's a shame (though no biog can ever cover literally ... ahem... everything). I have no idea what he's like as a person. I just think the book, on its own merits, read fine. I wouldn't call it 'definitive', I think that's a bit of a silly term anyway, but the book is fairly obviously from the author's point of view, and criticising its structure of alternating chapters as if it was an accident just seems a bit redundant to me.

I'd love to see a new book (by anyone) that covered their entire career, but then Sony would probably want money first...!

[Son of Stopped]

Originally Posted by Porco

I'd love to see a new book (by anyone) that covered their entire career, but then Sony would probably want money first...!

Well Nicky was meant to be writing a huge book about them, but found the process "too painful". (High pitched voice) Dra-maaa!

[amnesic]

Originally Posted by bleeding pepper

I didn't dislike him because of any Manics-fan reasons, it was what I perceived to be him acting a bit self-important.

What happened, was that we were at the Doves gig at Festival Hall where the Manics played the Heavenly set. I think it was during the interval, but I was walking from my seat to the toilets. An acquaintance of mine was chatting to Simon Price in the aisle. So this acquaintance stopped me and said "Simon, have you met my friend Steve [me]?" to which Simon [in what I took to be a rather pompous sounding voice] said "Oh, are you a fan of my work then?" To this I kind of sneered at him and said "What?" before I turned and walked away. I suppose in effect I didn't even really 'meet him' properly, but hey ho. I didn't want to at this point.

Well, given that he seemed to like Richey's snubbing of Douglas Coupland, he can't really complain. My 82 year old neighbour has a word for that type of attitude, "supercilious"

[raven]

Simon Price's book is the only real biog around simply cos it's the only one not padded out with pictures or a straightforward a to b to c but it's badly written (in my humble), poorly researched, shows little insight and he brings Himself into everything. Vanity project. They're an intelligent band and deserve a better chronicler.......although when you think of the big selling biogs - Keith Richards, Slash......Nicky n Richey never went in for the full on rock n roll life style......maybe Richey took some things a little too far....but that had quite a serious ending, in the end, so. Hey, maybe he's still out there somewhere and possibly looking like Keith Richards now albeit still some years younger...
But. Still. Everything: a book about Simon Price.
No

[handbag]

Originally Posted by amnesic

Well, given that he seemed to like Richey's snubbing of Douglas Coupland, he can't really complain. My 82 year old neighbour has a word for that type of attitude, "supercilious"

I don't think Richey was even snubbing Coupland really. Price makes it sound like Richey had a problem with him because of the "Are you Generation X?" comment, when the full story was:

"At one stage, [Richey] asked [Douglas Coupland] who his favourite writer was. The answer was Joan Didion. Richey was horribly ashamed because he didn’t know who she was. Other people would have shrugged and got on with a pleasant night. But Richey was totally bummed out."

I think he was more pissed off that he hadn't heard of Joan Didion and didn't like feeling like he didn't know something.

I just think the quality of music critics is piss poor now. Paul Morley I really liked. Everett True comes across as a lovesick fanboy of Courtney Love in his Nirvana epic and even as a big Nirvana fan I found that book a bit of a slog to get through.

I'd rather have a straight up biog OR a my-personal-memoirs-with-the-band type book than a biog with too much emphasis on how the writer wants to be friends with the band.

MSP DO deserve a better biog than Price's. I'd rather that than some shitty updated edition. A band needs a biographer who is into all music, and can be impartial to the band s/he's writing about, but that's only my opinion.

[Bathtub]

Originally Posted by handbag

Everett True comes across as a lovesick fanboy of Courtney Love in his Nirvana epic and even as a big Nirvana fan I found that book a bit of a slog to get through.

I liked his Nirvana book in parts, but it was far too long. Live Through This: American Rock Music in the Nineties is one of my favourite music books though, I think he did a really good job profiling some of the less well known bands from that time. Pearl Jam also get a bit of a kicking which is always nice to see.

And to be honest, considering the amount of horrible and openly misogynistic crap that Courtney gets thrown at her from so many, I think it's good she's got someone in her corner, although he's far from uncritical of her in Live Through This.