Michael Rubin
1115 posts
Mar 28, 2016
2:21 PM
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It's called Suck and Blow and there is a subtitle like And Other Stories I am Not Supposed to Tell. Has anyone read it?
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Goldbrick
1364 posts
Mar 28, 2016
2:47 PM
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Wow - best thing about that is probably the title.
Guess I will read this one after the Justin Bieber book but before the Bruce Willis tome
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sydeman
162 posts
Mar 28, 2016
2:53 PM
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For what its worth...
It’s the first of its kind: a jamband autobiography, written by Blues Traveler frontman John Popper with Relix co-editor in chief Dean Budnick.
“The exercise proved very fun for me and also the introspection proved valuable at this wonderful crossroads of my life,” Popper tells Billboard about Suck and Blow: And Other Stories I’m Not Supposed to Tell, available March 29 from Da Capo Press. “And besides they paid me.”
Two years shy of 50, Popper reflects on his years growing up in New Jersey, where he met the musicians who would ultimately comprise Blues Traveler, a ’90s jamband that had Top 10 success with their album Four and the single “Run-Around” in 1994 and 1995.
“As I creep ever more treacherously close to the half century mark, while at the same time beginning a new life with a young wife and new baby, I figured this would be the perfect time to look back at the life I’ve lived up until now as now my perspective of such younger adventures and an almost three-decade career with such an unlikely and legendary band may change,” Popper further explains. “I wanted to write as much of the experience down now before the memories begin to fade irreparably.”
Besides band exploits, Popper discusses the H.O.R.D.E. tour, which he created, his relationship with Bill Graham (Blues Traveler was the last band he managed), and his brushes with the law, gun collection and battle with being overweight.
“From the very first time I saw John perform back at Wetlands in 1989, I appreciated what a singular character he is as embodied in his music, his bearing and his worldview,” Budnick says about his co-author. “The tone of the book is self-critical, honest and laugh out loud funny.”
Zeroing in on the band that helped start the whole jamband movement in Manhattan in the early ’90s, Budnick says Popper focuses on how “Blues Traveler rebounded from the death of bassist Bobby Sheehan and how the group has continued to endure.”
Sheehan died of a drug overdose in 1999. Earlier this year, Traveler released their 12th studio album, Blow Up the Moon. In 1994, the band's album four peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard 200.
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waltertore
2924 posts
Mar 28, 2016
4:04 PM
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His father was my father's boss for many years in NYC. Small world and I wonder if he talks about his father in the book? Walter
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walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year in the Tunnel of Dreams Studio.
" life is a daring adventure or nothing at all" - helen keller
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WinslowYerxa
1109 posts
Mar 28, 2016
7:04 PM
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I remember Bill Graham and girlfriend Melissa Gold being backstage at a BT concert in 1992, just a few weeks before they died in a helicopter crash in a windstorm. Graham's son David was managing BT at the time; I remember him in the mosh pit. I was there to interview JP for the second issue of HIP:
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Winslow
Check out my blog and other goodies at winslowyerxa.com
Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition with tons of new stuff
Join us in 2016 for SPAH on the San Antonio River Walk!
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kudzurunner
5927 posts
Mar 28, 2016
8:06 PM
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I still remember that tab of "Runaround," Winslow. I spent some time with that. You were ahead of your time.
As for Popper's voice on the page: I'd probably take out "treacherously" and "irreparably," and a couple of commas. But I'm looking for my prose to last, not score chicks, and chicks dig excess.
I like Goldbrick's take.
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WinslowYerxa
1110 posts
Mar 29, 2016
10:49 AM
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That set of transcriptions was directly at Popper's request. Warner Bros., which was still in the music publishing business at that time (they later sold that division off to Alfred) had come up with a draft of a songbook for the album "four" that had melodies, lyrics, chords, and tabbed-out guitar parts, but no harmonica! The band wanted to see a full-band score with not only harmonica but also bass and drums and refused to allow the book as constituted to be published.
Right about then I got a call from Popper asking me to transcribe the harmonica parts. I had to wait it out while they fought with the publisher, then I had to do my own wrangling with them, and in the end they publised the harmonica transcriptions as a separate part of the book, as the rest of it had already been typeset and was already in blueline when they brought me in. Oy, what a headache getting that stuff down was - but I got it done and I still occasionally get people asking for those transcriptions 21 years later.
The next album, "Straight on 'til Morning," was also set for a songbook with harmonica parts, but the project stopped when once again Warners wouldn't agree to a full-band score. I was actually relieved because the heavy mix and distortion made it really hard to pick out the harmonica parts, and nobody seemed to have any idea how to get me a special mix to help me do the work.
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Winslow
Check out my blog and other goodies at winslowyerxa.com
Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition with tons of new stuff
Join us in 2016 for SPAH on the San Antonio River Walk!
Last Edited by WinslowYerxa on Mar 29, 2016 10:51 AM
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ted burke
444 posts
Mar 29, 2016
12:02 PM
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My impression is that Popper writes they way he plays and sings, which I'd described as "breathless", as in in-a-hurry, using the first word that comes to mind to convey the first idea that comes to mind,an approach that sometimes results in luminescent expression of experience and sensation, but also providing babble and confused fury just as often. "Kerouacian" , we could say, meaning that one tries to sustain beauty with velocity. Beauty is achieved , but so is its opposite.
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Ted Burke
tburke4@san.rr.com
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1847
3335 posts
Mar 29, 2016
12:54 PM
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i think i 'll just skip ahead to the last chapter
where he makes the switch from hohner to seydel harmonica's
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HarpNinja
4221 posts
Mar 31, 2016
5:55 AM
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I am about half way through. I just finished the chapters focused on HORDE and the release of four.
If you are a fan of the band or John, you'll like it. If you aren't interested in him or the band, you won't.
The first part did mention his dad a number of times. There isn't much about early childhood, in general, as it starts with him picking up the harmonica in high school. At this point in the book, Bobby is still alive and the band has just gotten into the mainstream with Runaround. There is some good music business talk and it seems like they had a lot of support to get going.
There is some mild harp talk, including kind words about Jason Ricci. Sugar Blue and Lee Oskar are mentioned as well.
Things that caught my attention were how much he downplayed his drug use (at least to the point I've read to) compared to the rest of the band - but there are several anecdotes about drugs with not always positive outcomes. He also uses a fair amount of self deprecating humor and is pretty upfront about being socially awkward and struggling to be the "fat guy".
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Mike
My Website
My Harmonica Effects Blog
Last Edited by HarpNinja on Mar 31, 2016 5:57 AM
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A440
538 posts
Mar 31, 2016
8:50 AM
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I can think of 100 autobiographies I'd rather read before Popper's.
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HarpNinja
4222 posts
Apr 01, 2016
5:38 AM
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I forgot that there was a lot of reference to James Cotton and Charlie Musselwhite early in the book.
He really holds Musselwhite in high regard. There were some cool anecdotes and in ring psychology shared.
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Mike
My Website
My Harmonica Effects Blog
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