Soundtrack of the Revolution


Book Description

The politics of music -- The nightingale rebels -- The musical guide : Mohammad Reza Shajarian -- Revolution and ruptures -- Opening the floodgates to pop music : Alireza Assar -- Rebirth of independent music -- Purposefully "fālsh" : Mohsen Namjoo -- Going underground -- Rap-e Farsi : Hichkas -- The music of politics







Soundtrack to a Movement


Book Description

**FINALIST for the 2022 PROSE Award in Music & the Performing Arts** **Certificate of Merit, Best Historical Research on Recorded Jazz, given by the 2022 Association for Recorded Sounds Collection Awards for Excellence in Historical Sound Research** Explores how jazz helped propel the rise of African American Islam during the era of global Black liberation Amid the social change and liberation of the civil rights and Black Power movements, the tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp recorded a tribute to Malcolm X’s emancipatory political consciousness. Shepp saw similarities between his revolutionary hero and John Coltrane, one of the most influential jazz musicians of the era. Later, the esteemed trumpeter Miles Davis echoed Shepp’s sentiment, recognizing that Coltrane’s music represented the very passion, rage, rebellion, and love that Malcolm X preached. Soundtrack to a Movement examines the link between the revolutionary Black Islam of the post-WWII generation and jazz music. It argues that from the late 1940s and ’50s though the 1970s, Islam rose in prominence among African Americans in part because of the embrace of the religion among jazz musicians. The book demonstrates that the values that Islam and jazz shared—Black affirmation, freedom, and self-determination—were key to the growth of African American Islamic communities, and that it was jazz musicians who led the way in shaping encounters with Islam as they developed a Black Atlantic “cool” that shaped both Black religion and jazz styles. Soundtrack to a Movement demonstrates how by expressing their values through the rejection of systemic racism, the construction of Black notions of masculinity and femininity, and the development of an African American religious internationalism, both jazz musicians and Black Muslims engaged with a global Black consciousness and interconnected resistance movements in the African diaspora and Africa.




Noise Uprising


Book Description

A radically new reading of the origins of recorded music Noise Uprising brings to life the moment and sounds of a cultural revolution. Between the development of electrical recording in 1925 and the outset of the Great Depression in the early 1930s, the soundscape of modern times unfolded in a series of obscure recording sessions, as hundreds of unknown musicians entered makeshift studios to record the melodies and rhythms of urban streets and dancehalls. The musical styles and idioms etched onto shellac disks reverberated around the globe: among them Havana’s son, Rio’s samba, New Orleans’ jazz, Buenos Aires’ tango, Seville’s flamenco, Cairo’s tarab, Johannesburg’s marabi, Jakarta’s kroncong, and Honolulu’s hula. They triggered the first great battle over popular music and became the soundtrack to decolonization.




My Life in the Purple Kingdom


Book Description

From the young Black teenager who built a bass guitar in woodshop to the musician building a solo career with Motown Records—Prince’s bassist BrownMark on growing up in Minneapolis, joining Prince and The Revolution, and his life in the purple kingdom In the summer of 1981, Mark Brown was a teenager working at a 7-11 store when he wasn’t rehearsing with his high school band, Phantasy. Come fall, Brown, now called BrownMark, was onstage with Prince at the Los Angeles Coliseum, opening for the Rolling Stones in front of 90,000 people. My Life in the Purple Kingdom is BrownMark’s memoir of coming of age in the musical orbit of one of the most visionary artists of his generation. Raw, wry, real, this book takes us from his musical awakening as a boy in Minneapolis to the cold call from Prince at nineteen, from touring the world with The Revolution and performing in Purple Rain to inking his own contract with Motown. BrownMark’s story is that of a hometown kid, living for sunny days when his transistor would pick up KUXL, a solar-powered, shut-down-at-sundown station that was the only one that played R&B music in Minneapolis in 1968. But once he took up the bass guitar—and never looked back—he entered a whole new realm, and, literally at the right hand of Twin Cities musical royalty, he joined the funk revolution that integrated the Minneapolis music scene and catapulted him onto the international stage. BrownMark describes how his funky stylings earned him a reputation (leading to Prince’s call) and how he and Prince first played together at that night’s sudden audition—and never really stopped. He takes us behind the scenes as few can, into the confusing emotional and professional life among the denizens of Paisley Park, and offers a rare, intimate look into music at the heady heights that his childhood self could never have imagined. An inspiring memoir of making it against stacked odds, experiencing extreme highs and lows of success and pain, and breaking racial barriers, My Life in the Purple Kingdom is also the story of a young man learning his craft and honing his skill like any musician, but in a world like no other and in a way that only BrownMark could tell it.




33 Revolutions Per Minute


Book Description

33 Revolutions Per Minute tracks the turbulent relationship between popular music and politics, through 33 pivotal songs that span seven decades and four continents, from Billie Holiday singing 'Strange Fruit' to Green Day raging against the Iraq war. Dorian Lynskey explores the individuals, ideas and events behind each song, showing how protest music has soundtracked and informed social change since the 1930s. Through the work of such artists as Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Fela Kuti, The Clash, Public Enemy and Gil Scott Heron, Lynskey examines how music has engaged with racial unrest, nuclear paranoia, apartheid, war, poverty and oppression, offering hope, stirring anger, inciting action and producing songs which continue to resonate years down the line.




The New Hunger


Book Description

“In rich, evocative prose, Marion transports his readers back into the postapocalyptic parable he first brought to life—or death—in his brilliant debut Warm Bodies.” —Library Journal (starred review) “Refreshingly unique...I love this novella.” —LitStack The must-read prequel to the “highly original” (The Seattle Times) New York Times bestseller Warm Bodies—now a major motion picture—from the author whose genre-defying debut turned the classic horror story on its head. The end of the world didn’t happen overnight. After years of societal breakdowns, wars and quakes and rising tides, humanity was already near the edge. Then came a final blow no one could have expected: all the world’s corpses rising up to make more. Born into this bleak and bloody landscape, twelve-year-old Julie struggles to hold on to hope as she and her parents drive across the wastelands of America, a nightmarish road trip in search of a new home. Hungry, lost, and scared, sixteen-year-old Nora finds herself her brother’s sole guardian after her parents abandon them in the not-quite-empty ruins of Seattle. And in the darkness of a forest, a dead man opens his eyes. Who is he? What is he? With no clues beyond a red tie and the letter “R,” he must unravel the grim mystery of his existence—right after he learns how to think, how to walk, and how to satisfy the monster howling in his belly. The New Hunger is a crucial link between Warm Bodies and The Burning World, a glimpse into the past that sets the stage for an astonishing future.




Revolutionary Love


Book Description

The Revolution has cost Verity Sterrett nearly everything. Redcoats killed her father and burned her home. Verity is forced into living with her Loyalist uncle, who is determined to marry her off to a brutal British officer among those boarding with the family. And her beloved brother and his best friend Theo, the man Verity loves, are off fighting for independence. When one of the Redcoats brags of covert plans for an ambush, Verity sees her chance to aid her cause. It’s the first step in her role as a spy in Martha Washington’s spy ring. Major Theodore Kinnard volunteered to fight for his new nation with ideals of chivalry and honor. War has shattered those ideals. Gifted at sharpshooting, Theo has become General Washington’s best sniper. However, killing at a distance feels more like murder than honorable combat, and leaves Theo hesitant to admit his love for Verity lest he corrupt her innocence and goodness. As the war moves forward and Verity’s involvement grows, Theo does his best to shield her from its danger, and from himself. The battles rage on and Theo and Verity won’t stop fighting for independence. But when the danger mounts, if Verity can’t convince Theo to give their love a chance, their happiness and their freedom may become another casualty of the war.




The Soundtrack Album


Book Description

The Soundtrack Album: Listening to Media offers the first sustained exploration of the soundtrack album as a distinctive form of media. Soundtrack albums have been part of our media and musical landscape for decades, enduring across formats from vinyl and 8-tracks to streaming playlists. This book makes the case that soundtrack albums are more than promotional tools for films, television shows, or video games— they are complex media texts that reward a detailed analysis. The collection’s contributors explore a diverse range of soundtrack albums, from Super Fly to Stranger Things, revealing how these albums change our understanding of the music and film industries and the audio-visual relationships that drive them. An excellent resource for students of Music, Media Studies, and Film/Screen Media courses, The Soundtrack Album offers interdisciplinary perspectives and opens new areas for exploration in music and media studies.




Girl Power


Book Description

In the early nineties, riot grrrl exploded onto the underground music scene, inspiring girls to pick up an instrument, create fanzines, and become politically active. Rejecting both traditional gender roles and their parents' brand of feminism, riot grrrls celebrated and deconstructed femininity. The media went into a titillated frenzy covering followers who wrote "slut" on their bodies, wore frilly dresses with combat boots, and talked openly about sexual politics. The movement's message of "revolution girl-style now" soon filtered into the mainstream as "girl power," popularized by the Spice Girls and transformed into merchandising gold as shrunken T-shirts, lip glosses, and posable dolls. Though many criticized girl power as at best frivolous and at worst soulless and hypersexualized, Marisa Meltzer argues that it paved the way for today's generation of confident girls who are playing instruments and joining bands in record numbers. Girl Power examines the role of women in rock since the riot grrrl revolution, weaving Meltzer's personal anecdotes with interviews with key players such as Tobi Vail from Bikini Kill and Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls. Chronicling the legacy of artists such as Bratmobile, Sleater-Kinney, Alanis Morissette, Britney Spears, and, yes, the Spice Girls, Girl Power points the way for the future of women in rock.