Radio City (the book) is the improbable but true story of an ardent fan who gets close enough to Alex Chilton, the prime architect of the best power pop album ever made outside of Abbey Road Studios, to see what's on the other side of genius, fame, and expectations. This book examines the key ingredients of Radio City's lasting appeal, including the unique confluence of circumstances that channeled Alex Chilton's creative energies toward the possibility of commercial success for perhaps the last time.
Bruce Eaton is a writer and jazz concert producer who lives near Buffalo, NY. He is the author of two successful business books. He played bass and guitar with Alex Chilton on dates in Buffalo, Toronto and New York, and set up Chilton's notoriously distastrous 1981 tour.
The 33 1/3 series is always a fun read for record obsessives, and
Bruce Eaton's coverage of the greatest album of all time here is no
exception...Much has been made of the drama and tragedy surrounding
Big Star- but the focus here is music...Any fan of the album will
find this a quick, worthwhile read.
*Under the Radar Magazine*
What Eaton's book has going for it is a personal connection to
Chilton that provides him with rare access to the somewhat
reclusive icon and an insistence on focusing more on the music
itself and the circumstances of its recording rather than the more
familiar personality-based story of the band's brief initial
life.
*The Memphis Flyer*
...[Eaton's] been able to interview Chilton in depth, plus other
principal players in the LP's conception including Big Star members
Jody Stephens and Andy Hummel and Ardent Records founder John Fry.
The emphasis is on music so we learn about their influences...
*Mojo, November 2009*
Bruce Eaton's thorough investigation into the history of rock
music's most influentially unrecognised acts of the '70s, Memphis,
Tennessee's Big Star, and the recording of their second album Radio
City, does much to clear up decades of misinformation and
mythology, shedding light on session recordings, the artists
present and how the album was pieced together. It's that kind of
detailed musical reporting that the 33 1/3 series is known for.
Eaton's own personal history of playing in a backing band with Alex
Chilton (Big Star's vocalist/songwriter) adds a neat spin and the
interviews contained with the band members and album producer, all
casting their thoughts back a good 30 years to reflect on a busy
time for the band, are flawless...recreating the scene after the
fractious fall-out of the departure of original member Chris Bell
and how they picked up the pieces to create Radio City is retold
and relived, in studio and on-stage by the people who were there.
It's about as an authoritative and informative an exposition as you
could hope for...the 33 1/3 series are a fascinating and revealing
collection of books. Written by music fans for music fans, this
series will never grow old, never grow boring, and goes far into
explaining the mysticism and appeal behind these priceless bodies
of work, for your own personal pleasure or just in case you happen
to know someone who just doesn't understand.
*Webcuts Music, 2009*
Un must have pour tous les maniaques de la grande etoile, et pour
tous les autres aussi.
*Magic, September 2009*
Page-turning celebration of Big Star's power-pop
masterpiece...[Eaton] elicits fresh interviews with those who were
in the room at the album's conception. That includes the
recalcitrant Chilton and John Fry, the George Martin figure whose
engineering expertise was a crucial part of the album's sound.
Eaton has a gift for locating the album's slippery, unknowable
essence in a tale whose epic sweep spans 17th century Canterbury
and New York's Mudd Club in the early 1980's. Compacted with
enthusiasm, this is a concise, effective primer in Big Star
history.
*Classic Rock Magazine, January 2010*
Many writers manage to wrangle interviews with their subjects for
these books, but few make as much of the opportunity as Bruce
Eaton, who got unprecedented access to the ‘individuals who were
actually “in the room” and had a direct and tangible input into the
sound and development’ of Big Star’s sophomore album. This direct
insight from the band members and engineer John Fry steer the book
away from the cult mythology that still clings to the Memphis group
and creates something much more even-handed and humane. Eaton
conducted the interviews in 2007 and 2008, and his book was
published in 2009, just a year before frontman Alex Chilton and
bassist Andy Hummel both died unexpectedly. Those immense losses,
combined with Fry’s passing in 2014, adds poignancy to a powerful
story of thwarted dreams.
*Pitchfork*
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