Overview

Anyone can start a band. Anyone can be famous. Not everyone can wait a lifetime.From hammering it with the 'gods of rock' to heroin diaries, white line fevers and the inevitable ghost written My Story, it would seem that every gnarled old pop star has had a crack at the rock and roll memoir. Wrong-side-of-the-tracks childhood? Check. Abusive stepdad? Check. Salvation with the band followed by booze, sex, acrimonious rows, near death experiences, sobriety and, eventually, religion. Yeah, I think we get the picture. But what about rock's also rans? The no hopers. The ones who never even got as far as a record deal. Shouldn't these less-feted performers with their doomed musical adventures and dashed hopes of super stardom be allowed to tell their tale too? So here's a real rock memoir. An honest, warts and all portrayal of what it's like to fall in love with music and start your own teenage band (or indeed several bands) spanning the eras of glam, punk, new wave and 80s pop, right up to the so-called 'second summer of love' in 1988. Whatever happened to the teenage dream? Find out by joining guitarist and songwriter Dan with his band Stranger Than Paradise as they chart their rise to the top alongside a cast of outrageous characters and oh, so many disapproving grown-ups. Get ready for a no holds barred, tragi-comic ride through the euphoric triumphs and near misses of raw creativity and joyous music making.

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9781068530814

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Reviews

""A fun and poignant read...hang on tight for a ride on the rock 'n' roll roller coaster!"" Suzi Quatro ""For lovers of music and style."" Don Letts aka The Rebel Dread ""A breathless romp through the best - and the worst - of the 1980s."" Sheryl Garratt, The Creative Life ""Conjures up a lost era of tape recorders and Top of the Pops."" Genevieve Fox, author ""Captures the spirit of the 1980s in forensic detail...some good laughs in the 'heroic failure' tradition."" David Sinclair, music writer and musician ""Takes you on a fender-fanging journey through the teenage indiedream."" Jane Cornwell, music writer and author ""A quest to be 1987's next big thing, but with worse survival odds than Betamax."" Garry Bushell, music critic and columnist ""Vividly evocative of a time and a place, and highly entertaining too."" Antonio Padilla Esteban, author and translator ""All the fun of the '80s, the decade when pop ruled the world."" Living In A Box ""Possibly the best book about being in a guitar pop group."" Uwe Weigmann, Firestation Records

Author Information

After a four-year stint as lead guitarist with pop wannabes Daniel Takes A Train, Dan Synge taught English in Barcelona and London before becoming a journalist, going on to freelance for The Guardian, the Financial Times, the Independent and Time Out. He has worked for a number of consumer magazines and websites including Esquire, where he wrote about discovering the 'West Pole' in a remote part of the Galapagos Islands. As an independent publisher and editor, he has launched both local luxury lifestyle magazines and illustrated travel guides.Dan has combined a career in journalism and publishing with being a senior university lecturer teaching Journalism and Media Studies. He returned to music making following his band's surprise rediscovery by a German record label in 2018.

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