Overlong for nonfans but certainly definitive.
An ambitiously comprehensive biography of a musical supernova.
Though the Oklahoma musician and composer’s time in the spotlight was comparatively brief, he commanded it in the early 1970s like no one else, exerting a transformative influence on rock in the process. As one of the primary creative forces behind Delaney & Bonnie, Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs & Englishmen, and George Harrison’s Concert for Bangladesh, Leon Russell (1942-2016) had a magnetic pull on artists, fellow musicians, and audiences introduced to his talents on the big screen. As a recording artist, he wrote standards often covered by others. Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, and numerous other luminaries fell under his spell, wanting to channel some of the Southern gospel dynamism he injected into the rock mainstream, and unknown Tom Petty signed to his label and became a star. Then Russell seemed to disappear, or something dissipated. What happened? Janovitz, author of Rocks Off: 50 Tracks That Tell the Story of the Rolling Stones, works his way through a complicated story. A sickly kid from Tulsa, Russell established himself as a studio superstar among studio musicians, playing on Phil Spector tracks and making hits with artists from Glen Campbell to Gary Lewis & the Playboys. Then he grew his hair and beard, experimented with LSD, and gathered a commune of kindred musical spirits around him. Russell had deep-seated insecurities and stage fright, and he was likely bipolar and perhaps autistic (both undiagnosed). He indulged heavily in shopping, eating, and sex, and he was stubborn and prone to trusting the wrong people. Though he ran out of steam, he persevered through decades, playing smaller venues. Despite his many personal and professional struggles, the story has a happy ending of sorts, with Elton John rescuing him from semi-oblivion and championing a career revival. In this exhaustively researched book, Janovitz mostly succeeds in creating a full portrait of a “Stranger in a Strange Land.”
Overlong for nonfans but certainly definitive.Pub Date: March 14, 2023
ISBN: 9780306924774
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Hachette
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2023
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
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