Heavy Rotation: Twenty Writers on the Albums That Changed Their Lives

By Peter Terzian and Annabeth Albert

Book Overview

Colm Tóibín on Joni Mitchell * James Wood on The Who * Stacey D'Erasmo on Kate Bush * Daniel Handler on Eurythmics * Lisa Dierbeck on the Pretenders * Clifford Chase on the B-52s . . . and other writers on the soundtracks of their lives In Heavy Rotation, twenty of our most acclaimed contemporary writers pay homage to the record albums that inspired them. Benjamin Kunkel remembers how the Smiths' Queen Is Dead transformed him into an adolescent Anglophile. Pankaj Mishra describes how a bootleg cassette of ABBA's Super Trouper evoked a world far from his small Indian village. Kate Christensen relives her years as an aspiring novelist in Brooklyn listening to Rickie Lee Jones's Flying Cowboys. And Joshua Ferris recalls his head-banging passion for Pearl Jam's Ten. Exploring music from the Talking Heads to the Hedwig and the Angry Inch soundtrack, this extraordinary anthology is a moving, funny, uplifting, and unforgettable celebration of the unique and essential relationship between life and music.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061579742
• ISBN13: 9780061579745
• Release Date: June 2009
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.68 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.7" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Brilliant. Flecked with flakes of fabulous. Necessary.

This is a terrific collection, full of gorgeous writing and well-observed reporting. Sheila Heti's account of being hyper-obsessed with the soundtrack of "Annie" as a child is worth the price of admission (Heti became so convinced that she herself was an orphan that she asked her parents to show her her own birth certificate), and there are solid, artful contributions from Benjamin Kunkel, Stacey D'Erasmo, and Claire Dederer, among others. This is a surefire read or gift for anyone who is interested in music or grew up misunderstood.