Showing results by publisher "Penguin Audio" in Music

Ignoring nearly all rock traditions, experimenting in near-total secrecy in their Düsseldorf studio, Kraftwerk fused sound and technology, graphic design and performance, modernist Bauhaus aesthetics and Rhineland industrialisation - even human and machine - to change the course of modern music. This is the story of Kraftwerk as a cultural phenomenon, who turned electronic music into avant-garde concept art and created the soundtrack to our digital age.

The Beatles landing in New York in February 1964 was the opening shot in a cultural revolution nobody predicted. Suddenly the youth of the richest, most powerful nation on earth was trying to emulate the music, manners and the modes of a rainy island that had recently fallen on hard times.

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of Unfaithful Music and Disappearing Ink, written and read by Elvis Costello. In a career spanning four decades, Elvis Costello (born Declan MacManus) has made himself a huge reputation through his tunes, lyrics and occasional bad behaviour. Now, for the first time, he is telling his story.

One winter’s night, Alex James received an unexpected call. Blur had been invited to play their biggest gig ever: Wembley Stadium. The only trouble was, he and his bandmates hadn’t spoken to – or even shouted at – each other for years. And he now had five children, an out-of-control menagerie of cats, and a sprawling farm to run. This is the story of what happened next.

Mutya Buena was only thirteen when she became one third of the original line up of the iconic girlband, Sugababes. Launching into fame, her life became unrecognisable overnight. Suddenly she was going straight from the studio to school in the early hours, rubbing shoulders with music royalty, and hearing fans scream her name. This is the story of the girl the tabloids never saw. In Real Girl Mutya takes us through the highs of her spectacular career and the lows that came with a life in the limelight and shares for the first time the struggles she’d kept hidden from the public eye.

Dividing the sum total of human musical achievement, from Beethoven to The Beatles, Busta Rhymes to Bach, into just six fundamental forms, Levitin illuminates, through songs of friendship, joy, comfort, knowledge, religion and love, how music has been instrumental in the evolution of language, thought and culture. And how, far from being a bit of a song and dance, music is at the core of what it means to be human.

On a sunny Saturday morning in May 1956, a fifteen-year-old, then called Harry Webb, was mooching down Waltham Cross High Street, with two mates. They heard some music blaring out of a parked car. It stopped them in their tracks. The song was 'Heartbreak Hotel' by Elvis Presley. It sounded like nothing they had ever heard before. In that instant, the schoolboy who was destined to take the hit parade by storm as Cliff Richard fell in love with rock and roll. It gave him the thrill, the purpose and the mission that has shaped his life ever since.

The perfect gift for music lovers and Neil Young fans, telling the story behind Neil Young's legendary career and his iconic, beloved songs. Legendary singer and songwriter Neil Young’s storied career has spanned over 40 years and yielded some of the modern era’s most enduring music. Now for the first time ever, Young reflects upon his life - from his Canadian childhood, to his part in the '60s rock explosion with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, through his later career with Crazy Horse and numerous private challenges.

In her current reign at Power 105.1 and for nearly two decades at New York's Hot 97, Angie Martinez has had one of the highest rated radio shows in the country. After working her way up as an intern, she burst on the scene as a young female jock whose on-air "Battle of the Beats" segment broke records and became a platform for emerging artists like a young Jay Z. Angie quickly became known for intimate, high-profile interviews, mediating feuds between artists, and taking on the most controversial issues in hip-hop.

The Spice Girls gave a generation their first glimpse of the power of friendship, of staying true to yourself, of sheer bloody-mindedness. And the girl power generation went on to kick-start a new conversation around gender equality. We may have grown up asking What Would the Spice Girls Do?, but their particular brand of feminism is as relevant today as it was 20 years ago - we still need that fun and fearlessness, we still need accessible and all-embracing equality...we still need a zig-a-zig-ah.

Pop music’s a simple pleasure. Is it catchy? Can you dance to it? Do you fancy the singer? What’s fascinating about pop is our relationship with it. This relationship gets more complicated the longer it goes on. It’s been going on now for 50 years. David Hepworth is interested in the human side of pop. He’s interested in how people make the stuff and, more importantly, what it means to us. In this wide-ranging collection of essays, he shows how it is possible to take music seriously and, at the same time, not drain the life out of it.

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Special Deluxe, written and read by Neil Young. Quirky and wonderfully candid, Neil Young's new book of reminiscences is as compelling as his first book. He returns with more unforgettable stories about his six decades in the music business - but this is not your average rock biography.

As a young schoolboy, David Essex dreamed of becoming a professional footballer and was signed up by his beloved West Ham United. But as a teenager, he developed a passion for music, which set him on a very different path, and ultimately led to superstardom. It wasn't, however, an easy start. Scraping a living on the edges of show business was a hard slog, and he endured many disappointments. Then, aged 23, he went along to an audition for a new musical called Godspell and won the role (Jesus) that shot him to fame.

From activist, Pussy Riot member and freedom fighter Maria Alyokhina, a raw, hallucinatory, passionate account of her arrest, trial and imprisonment in a penal colony in the Urals for standing up for what she believed in. 'People who believe in freedom and democracy think it will exist forever. That is a mistake. What happened in Russia - what happened to me - could happen anywhere.'

In this warm, intimate and humorous book, rich with nostalgia and unexpected intimate detail, Gary Barlow unpacks the people, music, places, things and cultural phenomena that have made him the man that he is. From the working men's club where it all began through to the sold out stadium tours, this is the story of Gary's life told through music.

Wretch 32 is one of the most influential musicians at work in Britain today. He is also a lyricist of unparalleled ability and an advocate of music as a tool to educate as well as to entertain. In an age of unprecedented social and political change, Wretch’s music stands as a medium of protest and of progress, helping to explain and shape a new era. Rapthology is an anthology of the songs that have shaped Wretch, and our society, over the last 30 years, from gospel music to dance hall anthems to the most innovative emerging young voices.

A compelling and growing body of research has shown music and arts therapies to be effective tools for addressing a widening array of conditions, from providing pain relief and alleviating anxiety and depression to regaining speech after stroke or traumatic brain injury, and improving mobility for people with disorders that include Parkinson’s disease and MS.

The title is Search Party, the idea being that we’re all out here looking for something, and my poems are my way of finding myself. A young black poet blending spoken word and rap; an inner city upbringing with a Cambridge education; a social consciousness with a satirical wit and infectious rhythm--George the Poet is the voice of a new generation. Search Party is a thought-provoking and deeply autobiographical collection.

Musicians know how to stay ahead of the beat. Forced to find new ways to adapt to accelerating change, musicians are masters of innovation. Demystifying their process for the first time, Two Beats Ahead reveals what we can learn from today's top musical minds. Drawing from interviews and case studies with masterminds like Quincy Jones, Jimmy Iovine, Dr Dre, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé and Pharrell Williams, as well as leaders at Google X and Amazon, this book identifies the key lessons and skills musicians can teach us about innovation.

Earl Slick was barely out of his teens when David Bowie hired him to play guitar on the ground-breaking 1974 Diamond Dogs tour. It marked the beginning of a relationship that would endure through thick and thin for the next forty years. Gracing classic albums like Young Americans, Station to Station and the 2013 comeback, The Next Day, Slick played on the tour that followed Bowie’s smash hit Let’s Dance album and was at his side for the epic Glastonbury show in 2000. But it wasn’t just Bowie