Saturday, August 07, 2021

The soundtrack of our lives

I have a monthly direct debit set up to support the Quietus, but I really might as well do likewise for White Rabbit.

Copies of Mark Lanegan's warts-'n'-all memoir Sing Backwards And Weep and Harry Sword's exploration of drone Monolithic Undertow are already sitting on my shelves, and Jennifer Lucy Allan's The Foghorn's Lament, Steve Davis and Kavus Torabi's Medical Grade Music and Robin Turner's history of Heavenly Records Believe In Magic are all high on the shopping list. And now it's been announced that they'll be publishing Jude Rogers' debut in May next year. Go on - just take my money, all of it.

The Sound Of Being Human is set to differ from all of the other books above in that it doesn't focus on a particular genre, artist or artists or label but instead looks at music more generally and attempts to answer some big questions about its consumption and emotional impact/resonance, albeit filtered through Rogers' own personal experience. In the words of publisher Lee Brackstone, it's "a book that will prompt you to reassess your relationship to music and how it comes to define us at the key moments in our life. How and why do we connect so profoundly and overwhelmingly with certain songs? Why is music the mirror that often shines a light on the most raw and vital parts of our humanity?"

While I haven't listened to A Life In Music, the Radio 4 show from which the book has sprung, her Quietus article about an epiphanic experience at Glastonbury and the joy of live music in general ("a glowing, thrilling realm of communal feeling") is more than enough to convince that The Sound Of Being Human will be a must-read.

No comments: