Oermann effectively bridges the gap between the country music giants of yore and today’s stars, such as the Dixie Chicks,...
Nashville-based critic Oermann, one of journalism’s best known authorities on country music, takes an ambitious look at the genre’s evolution from its hillbilly origins at the turn of the century to the mainstream success it is today.
His chronicle begins, appropriately enough, in 1900, when, according to Oermann, the New York Journal became the first publication to use the word “hillbilly” in print. Oermann takes his time explaining the origins of the hillbilly culture, and while this material creates a strong reference point for the development of country music, the opening chapter bogs down in minutiae. Oermann more than atones for the dryness, however, as the century and his chronology progress and the characters become more colorful, from Jimmie Rodgers (“ ‘We thinks about Elvis and the thousands of people that would mob Elvis. But back in 1933, it was like that with Jimmie Rodgers,’ said BoxCar Willie”) to the Grand Ole Opry, which began on December 26, 1925 on WSM radio. Obviously, there are certain giants of country—Hank Williams and Patsy Cline—who deserve more attention, but who have also been written about repeatedly. Oermann does a good job of them their due while coming up with something new. He starts the passage about Williams by writing, “Hank Williams was honky-tonk music’s tortured genius.” To put in perspective the unparalleled influence Williams had on country, Oermann cites Don Helms, Jimmy Dickens, and several other musicians. Of Cline, Oermann says, “She remains the voice against which all other female country singers must measure themselves.” To hear what many of today’s contemporary stars, including Kathy Mattea and Shelby Lynne, have to say of Cline is especially intriguing.
Oermann effectively bridges the gap between the country music giants of yore and today’s stars, such as the Dixie Chicks, Shania Twain, and Garth Brooks. (Over 200 b&w and color photos)Pub Date: Nov. 11, 1999
ISBN: 1-57500-083-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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