Martin Bandyke Under Covers | Ann Arbor District Library - Martin Bandyke Under Covers for March 2022: Martin interviews Jennifer Otter Bickerdike, author of You Are Beautiful and You Are Alone: The Biography of Nico.

Martin Bandyke Under Covers for March 2022: Martin interviews Jennifer Otter Bickerdike, author of You Are Beautiful and You Are Alone: The Biography of Nico.

03/03/22 • 34 min

Martin Bandyke Under Covers | Ann Arbor District Library

You Are Beautiful and You Are Alone is a new biography of Nico, the mysterious singer best known for her work with the Velvet Underground and her solo album Chelsea Girl. Her life is tangled in myth--much of it of her own invention. Rock and roll cultural historian Jennifer Bickerdike delivers a definitive book that unravels the story while making a convincing case for Nico's enduring importance. Over the course of her career, Nico was an ever-evolving myth: art film house actress, highly coveted fashion model, Dietrich of Punk, Femme Fatale, Chelsea Girl, Garbo of Goth, The Last Bohemian, Heroin Junkie. Lester Bangs described her as 'a true enigma.' At age 27, Nico became Andy Warhol's newest Superstar, featured in his one commercial break out hit film Chelsea Girls and garnering the position of chanteuse for the Velvet Underground. It wasn't Nico's musical chops which got her the gig; it was her striking beauty. Her seeming otherworldly and unattainable presence was further amplified by her reputation for dating rock stars (Brian Jones, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison, among others). She became famous for being Nico. Yet Nico's talent and her contribution to rock culture are often overlooked. She spent most of her career as a solo artist on the road, determined to make music, seemingly against all the odds, enduring empty concert halls, abusive fans, and the often perilous reality of being an aging artist and drug addict. She created mesmerizing and unique projects that inspired a generation of artists, including Henry Rollins, Morrissey, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Iggy Pop. Drawing on the archives at the Andy Warhol Museum and at Nico's record labels, various private collections, and rarely seen footage, and featuring exclusive new interviews from those who knew her best, including Iggy Pop and Danny Fields, and those inspired by her legacy, You Are Beautiful and You Are Alone reveals the complicated, often compromised, self-destructive and always headstrong woman behind the one-dimensional myths. Martin’s interview with Jennifer Otter Bickerdike was recorded on October 5th, 2021.

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undefined - Martin Bandyke Under Covers for February 2022: Martin interviews Marc Ribot, author of Unstrung: Rants and Stories of a Noise Guitarist

Martin Bandyke Under Covers for February 2022: Martin interviews Marc Ribot, author of Unstrung: Rants and Stories of a Noise Guitarist

Throughout his genre-defying career as one of the most innovative musicians of our time, iconoclastic guitar player Marc Ribot has consistently defied expectation at every turn. Here, in his first collection of writing, we see that same uncompromising sensibility at work as he playfully interrogates our assumptions about music, life, and death. Through essays, short stories, and the occasional unfilmable film "mistreatment" that showcase the sheer range of his voice, Unstrung captures an artist whose versatility on the page rivals his dexterity onstage. In the first section of the book, "Lies and Distortion," Ribot turns his attention to his instrument--"my relation to the guitar is one of struggle; I'm constantly forcing it to be something else"--and reflects on his influences (and friends) like Robert Quine (the Voidoids) and producer Hal Willner (Saturday Night Live), while delivering an impassioned plea on behalf of artists' rights. Elsewhere, we glimpse fragments of Ribot's life as a traveling musician--he captures both the monotony of touring as well as small moments of beauty and despair on the road. In the heart of the collection, "Sorry, We're Experiencing Technical Difficulties," Ribot offers wickedly humorous short stories that synthesize the best elements of the Russian absurdist tradition with the imaginative heft of George Saunders. Taken together, these stories and essays cement Ribot's position as one of the most dynamic and creative voices of our time. Martin’s interview with Marc Ribot was recorded on September 9th, 2021.

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undefined - Martin Bandyke Under Covers for April 2022: Martin interviews Lenny Kaye, author of Lightning Striking: Transformative Moments in Rock and Roll.

Martin Bandyke Under Covers for April 2022: Martin interviews Lenny Kaye, author of Lightning Striking: Transformative Moments in Rock and Roll.

“We have performed side-by-side on the global stage through half a century.... In Lightning Striking, Lenny Kaye has illuminated ten facets of the jewel called rock and roll from a uniquely personal and knowledgeable perspective.” –-- Patti Smith An insider’s take on the evolution and enduring legacy of the music that rocked the twentieth century Memphis 1954. New Orleans 1957. Philadelphia 1959. Liverpool 1962. San Francisco 1967. Detroit 1969. New York, 1975. London 1977. Los Angeles 1984 / Norway 1993. Seattle 1991. Rock and roll was birthed in basements and garages, radio stations and dance halls, in cities where unexpected gatherings of artists and audience changed and charged the way music is heard and celebrated, capturing lightning in a bottle. Musician and writer Lenny Kaye explores ten crossroads of time and place that define rock and roll, its unforgettable flashpoints, characters, and visionaries; how each generation came to be; how it was discovered by the world. Whether describing Elvis Presley’s Memphis, the Beatles’ Liverpool, Patti Smith’s New York, or Kurt Cobain’s Seattle, Lightning Striking reveals the communal energy that creates a scene, a guided tour inside style and performance, to see who’s on stage, along with the movers and shakers, the hustlers and hangers-on--and why everybody is listening. Grandly sweeping and minutely detailed, informed by Kaye’s acclaimed knowledge and experience as a working musician, Lightning Striking is an ear-opening insight into our shared musical and cultural history, a magic carpet ride of rock and roll’s most influential movements and moments. Martin’s interview with Lenny Kaye was recorded on January 19th, 2022.