Storytellers with Loud Guitars
Music journalist Stephen Deusner’s Where the Devil Don’t Stay: Traveling the South with the Drive-By Truckers chronicles an enduring band’s unlikely rise and wild ride.
Lucille’s Better Half
Daniel de Visé’s King of the Blues: The Rise and Reign of B.B. King chronicles a life, traces a sound, and tells a story worthy of its iconic subject. Daniel de Visé will discuss the book at the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville on October 5.
Americanaland the Beautiful
John Milward’s Americanaland: Where Country & Western Met Rock ‘n’ Roll connects the musical notes, from Jimmie Rodgers to John Prine and far beyond.
Strange Things Happening
Larry D. Thacker’s short story collection Working It Off in Labor County creates a small world where wild-hair notions are the norm and the odd miracle is not out of the question. Thacker will appear with Shuly Xóchitl Cawood and Ciona Rouse at a virtual event hosted by East Tennessee State University on March 3.
Memphis Calling
Robert Gordon’s It Came From Memphis celebrates wild times and transformative music by shining a light on the likes of Furry Lewis, Mud Boy and the Neutrons, Big Star, disc jockey Dewey Phillips, and wrestler Sputnik Monroe.
Putting the Music First
No wonder so many writers have made Memphis their subject, this city that changed the world through sound. Now comes David A. Less with Memphis Mayhem, a slim volume touted by its publisher as the “definitive story of the birthplace of rock and roll.”
