TMN's top 10 music biographies

28 February 2012

by Poppy Reid

The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell - Marilyn Manson (with Neil Strauss)

At thirteen years old, a young Brian Warner was attending a strict Catholic school and had already contracted crabs. His biographical tome delves into some of his most intricately described memories and experiences, some relevant to his over two decade-long career, some not.

Manson paints himself as everything the public and his most devoted zealots ever wanted him to be. Even if your opinion of him sits on the side of the blame-game government, by chapter five your complete understanding of his character will overslaugh any predispositions.

Slash – Slash (with Anthony Bozza)

This is one recalling which doesn’t require any knowledge of the band the author is a member of. Released just over a month after his addiction-comrade Nikki Sixx released The Heroin Diaries, the legendary axeman offers his recount of the road too often travelled by rock stars hell-bent on escapism. Wild hallucinations, a tag-team affair with rehab and the kind of sexual experiences not even a wet dream could conjure.

The Dirt - Mötley Crüe (with Neil Strauss)

If you ever doubted the band’s tumultuous friendships then here’s The Dirt. The four-piece each write candidly when offering the often-conflicting accounts of the same incidents, hilarious back-stories on the birth of hit singles and honest delineations of both their struggles to begin and to reach each of their hiatuses. Anyone dubious of how frank an autobiography could be when written by all four members should only turn to the penultimate chapter where Vince Neil takes the reader through the death of his four-year-old daughter.

Scar Tissue - Anthony Kiedis (with Larry Soloman)

Scar Tissue was always going to make this list. The fact the book is currently in the works to become a television series speaks volumes of its international appeal.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers frontman makes all sexual persuasions fall in love with him and recurrently question why as he relays his most grotesquely intimate battles with drug abuse, his Romeo-esque approach to love and a few slightly disappointing muses for some of his most celebrated lyrics.

Scar Tissue also reached #1 on the New York Times best-seller list after its release in 2004.

Journals - Kurt Cobain

Clearly not an autobiography (Journals was published nine years after his death) but nevertheless this release deserves a mention for its burying of multivalent interpretations. Complete with illustrations that were the makings of Nirvana album artworks, letters to the likes of Dale Crover from The Melvins and Mark Lanegan from Screaming Trees, his lovers (one who he obsessed over with the fervour of Perfume: The Story of a Murderer’s protagonist) as well as odes to the misunderstood media - this is one collection that offers more insight into his personal confessions than Charles Cross’ award-winning Heavier Than Heaven biography. With no explanatory preface, Journals is taken on face value, as we endeavour to piece together the complexity that was Cobain.

Interesting fact: Journalists were stopped from printing page 204 in any reviews. The page in question features a torn page from a comic book collaged with a self-portrait sketch. The lyrics "With the lights out, it's less dangerous. Here we are now, entertain us!" are included underneath the word ‘Swingers’ which titles cut-and-pasted text from the Alicia Ostriker poem A Young Woman, A Tree. http://www.jstor.org/pss/20601264

The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star – Nikki Sixx (with Ian Gittins)

Similar to Slash, the Mötley Crüe guitarist has created one of the best deterrents for any naïve fans wishing to emulate their rock star idols. Sixx divulges details of his drug abuse in a way that makes him appear pathetic and spoilt; the piteous portrayal complete with many lyric sheets, photographs and drug-fuelled ramblings is more than what any music lover could hope to expect from their favourite musician.

Killing Bono: I Was Bono's Doppelganger - Neil McCormick

Already made into a film, the 2003 memoir is as hilarious as it is insightful. Weaved throughout endearing moments of a friendship which reached a fork in the road (while mates McCormick and Bono were both in high school bands, U2 went on to reach insurmountable success leaving McCormick bitter and inadequate) is the sweet reminder the two have remained friends. Plus, his failing attempts to compete with the super-group in multiple projects is possibly the best ‘how-not-to’ guidebook for musicians.

Cash - Johnny Cash (with Patrick Carr)

Written in a conversational manner and read with his Southern drawl in mind throughout, Cash may be a follow up to his 1986 novel The Man In Black but unlike most remakes, this second attempt to tell his life story leaves its predecessor looking like a blueprint. Enlisting the help of Country Music Magazine editor Patrick Carr, Cash recounts each hard-earned win and karmic low with immense gratitude.

Freaky Dancin’: Me and the Mondays - Bez (of The Happy Mondays)

Any man who can make both money and a name for himself by dancing like a fiend on drugs (on drugs) and have the word 'maraca' next to his band contribution, deserves a published autobiography. Known as Shaun Ryder’s sidekick, the pair have been tagged as the cause of Factory Records’ demise after indulge in an LSD and heroin spree in the Caribbean instead of recording an album.

The Real Frank Zappa Book - Frank Zappa (with Peter Occhiogrosso)

Putting to bed the ‘I shit onstage in 1973’ rumour within the first chapter, the late Frank Zappa offers laugh-out-loud opinions of his music, the music of those other who shaped the ‘70s and life as he saw it. Instead of convincing you as to why you should pick up this tome, here’s an excerpt: “A drug is not bad. A drug is a chemical compound. The problem comes in when people who take drugs treat them like a license to behave like an asshole.”