Omnibus Press

Written and Illustrated by Students of the Special Music School at the Kaufman Music Center, NY

Florence loved her mother’s piano playing and wanted to be just like her. When she was just four years old she played her first piano concert and as she grew up she studied and wrote music hoping one day to hear her own music performed by an orchestra.

The story of a brilliant musician who prevailed against race and gender prejudices to become the first Black woman to be recognised as a symphonic composer and be performed by a major American orchestra in 1933.

Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, a couple of cynical New York jazz fans wormed their way into a record contract and astonished critics with their first album ‘Can’t Buy a Thrill’ in 1973. Nine albums later, they were among the biggest selling acts in the world. Steely Dan were different from the rest of rock’s super-sellers. They rarely gave interviews and, after some early bad experiences on the road, they refused to tour. They didn’t have their photographs taken and few people knew what they looked like. Steely Dan weren’t even a proper group; it was two musicians and a producer, yet every top notch player in the world lined up to appear on their albums. Brian Sweet, former editor and publisher of Metal Leg, the Steely Dan fanzine, draws back the veil of secrecy that has surrounded Becker and Fagen, presenting the true story of how they made their music and lived their lives

Book by book, year by year, the ultimate literary trip through Bowie’s greatest decade.

Simon Goddard’s electric ride through Bowie’s greatest decade reaches the halfway mark with this fifth instalment. Wickedly funny and shockingly tragic, Bowie Odyssey 74 is the story of one man trying to find his soul in a world that’s gone to the devil.

Darkness looms in 1974. It could be the winter energy crisis. It could be The Exorcist. Or it could be the shock that Britain’s biggest pop star, David Bowie, is about to leave its shores for good.

Bidding the corpse of glam, Ziggy’s haircut, and loyal ‘Bowietania’ farewell, the plan is to storm North America with his highly theatrical Diamond Dogs tour. But by opening night he’s already wishing he was Barry White instead. Then there’s that nasty sniff he can’t get rid of. And that fly in his milk. And the suspicion that, much like every other teen idol named David, fame is driving him completely out of his mind …

This is a day-by-day account of Bowie's life from the start of 1970 to the end of 1980, his golden era that defined his work as a major artist a dozen inspired studio albums, five major tours, two feature films and critically acclaimed theatrical performances in Chicago and New York. He reinvented stage presentation in rock and revived the careers of Mott The Hoople, Lou Reed and Iggy Pop.

David Bowie: The Golden Years chronicles in fascinating detail how it all unfolded, tracking Bowie s creative life from post- Space Oddity London in 1970, through the genesis of Ziggy Stardust, The Thin White Duke, his withdrawal to West Berlin and New York in 1980.

Informed by recollections from Bowie himself and his many collaborators, friends and associates of the time, the book illustrates how Bowie's influences and experiences shaped his extraordinary body of work, which in turn has inspired generations of musicians. David Bowie: The Golden Years features rare, unpublished and iconic photographs from a unique era in the private and professional life of one of rock s greatest and most enduring heroes.

A new and expanded edition of Behind the Rainbow, Johan Bakker’s definitive biography of musician Eva Cassidy.

Cassidy's story is one of the most compelling and poignant in recent music history. In this thoughtful and probing study Bakker re-evaluates her career and the fame that came only after her death at the tender age of 33.

Cassidy performed largely in and around Washington D.C.. Iceland was the only place she ever played in Europe, yet her jazzy folk pop would, after her death, make her a star both there and in her homeland. Since her passing she has sold more than ten million records.

Bakker has interviewed Cassidy's friends, colleagues, and family, and by tracing her formative experiences, outlook, and eventual disillusionment with the music business, has crafted a detailed and considered account of her life.

Picking up where the critically acclaimed Salad Daze left off, Heady Daze sees Wayne Hussey revisit the years from 1985 to 1990 leading The Mission through their formation to global success.

From headlining some of Europe’s major festivals, playing with U2, Robert Plant and The Cure and sweeping the UK music papers’ readers’ polls, to the excesses of touring the world and the lurid headlines that followed them wherever they ventured, it’s all here in this memoir packed full of candid moments and hilarious anecdotes.

While she once made headlines with her hedonistic lifestyle, part of Nicks' irresistible appeal is her youthful vulnerability and mystical aura, making her an artist with whom fans have an unbreakable emotional connection.

Crowned 'The Reigning Queen Of Rock And Roll' by Rolling Stone, and with gold and quadruple platinum solo albums under her beaded belt, Stevie Nicks has enjoyed the ultimate in rock 'n' roll success in her life as a recording artist - but this charmed life has come as a result of hard graft, self-belief and a devotion to creativity above all; hers has been a journey of intense highs and lows.

This biography, a celebration of the Stevie Nicks phenomenon, takes us on her journey from peripatetic mid-West childhood to her explosion onto the music scene as chiffon-swathed rock goddess, right up to present day. Including exclusive interviews with some of Stevie's associates and collaborators from over the years, author Zoe Howe explores the mystique while retaining the magic of this modern-day musical sorceress and wise woman of rock.

This revised edition includes information about the full line-up Fleetwood Mac tour dates ('On With The Show'), the 24 Karat Gold self-portrait collection exhibition Stevie curated in Hollywood to coincide with her 24 Karat Gold album, her work with the LA band Haim, coping with the loss of her close friends Glenn Frey and Prince, being a Rolling Stone cover girl again and more.

Meticulously researched, this is the definitive account of the momentous year that sent John, Paul, George, and Ringo to stratospheric heights.

At the start of 1963, The Beatles were a successful local Liverpool band with one hit single; twelve months, two albums, and the arrival of Beatlemania later, they were on the cusp of world domination.

Featuring daily entries covering every pivotal event, The Beatles 1963 draws on hundreds of new eyewitness accounts and provides numerous unseen photographs.

The classic authorized biography that told it all.

Foreword by Sir Paul McCartney

When Little Richard burst onto the scene in the early 1950s, he was utterly unique. Drenched in sweat, screaming, hollering, and pumping his piano, he made all who followed sound tame. His stage act was so explosive that for years people assumed the real man could never match the flamboyant public image.

Little Richard made himself a star through sheer talent and personality, breaking racial and sexual taboos on his way to becoming the primal force of Fifties rock & roll.

Using Richard’s own words, Charles White chronicles a staggering career that spanned the very inception of rock’n’roll, the rise of The Beatles, tussles with God and the Devil, and an erratic series of comebacks.

This edition includes a new cover as well as pictures from Little Richard’s own archive and a comprehensive discography.

With an introduction by Martyn Ware (of Heaven 17 and The Human League)

Tina Turner: singer, trailblazer, icon. One of the best-known and most-beloved performers of all time, Simply Tina documents her life, career, and relationship with celebrated music photographer Paul Cox.

When Paul Cox captured Tina’s legendary 1983 comeback performance with Heaven 17, it was the beginning of a friendship that would last for over two decades. During that time, Paul was commissioned to photograph Tina for numerous video shoots and live performances.

This unique and intimate collection contains a variety of never-before-seen images, telling the story of Tina’s career through a mixture of live photos, video shoots, promo shots, candid images and sessions in the recording studio, as well as photographs with such high-profile friends as David Bowie, Rod Stewart, Bryan Adams and many more.

At the start of 1963, The Beatles were a successful local Liverpool band with one hit single; twelve months, two albums and the arrival of Beatlemania later, they were on the cusp of world domination.

Featuring daily entries covering every pivotal event, The Beatles 1963 draws on hundreds of new eyewitness accounts and provides numerous unseen photographs.

Meticulously researched, this is the definitive account of the momentous year that sent John, Paul, George and Ringo to stratospheric heights.

When the anarchic vocalist of Can left the celebrated German band in late 1973, the ensuing decade-long absence was taken by many to be the end of his personal story. But it was just the beginning.

In I Am Damo Suzuki, Kenji Damo Suzuki and co-author Paul Woods illuminate a life in music driven by the principle of randomness. The book spans the influence of western music on Suzuki growing up in post-WWII Japan, his rejection of national traditions and a lifelong journey of exploration.

After his hippie-influenced beginnings as a provocative street musician, Suzuki s story took an unlikely turn after a chance recruitment into Can, one of the most innovative bands of the seventies.

A stint of family life and the role of Japanese salaryman preceded his return to the music world with The Damo Suzuki Band and later with Damo Suzuki's Network, an international vehicle for musical communication using sound instead of words. With contributions from family members, lifelong friends, musical collaborators and Damo's long-term partner, I Am Damo Suzuki is an absorbing portrait of a musical catalyst and enigmatic icon.

An entertaining, definitive and in-depth study of prog rock, with a new cover and a foreword by Steve Hackett (Genesis).

Progressive rock, a genre formed out of a creative surge in the late Sixties and throughout the Seventies. Made by young musicians for a young audience, prog music looked towards new horizons by synthesising rock, jazz, folk, classical and other styles.

While prog has always divided critical opinion, in its heyday it had a large and devoted fanbase, and the era's biggest acts from Pink Floyd to Genesis went on to enjoy long-lasting international and commercial success. Although the scene fragmented in the late Seventies, new generations of young listeners continue to discover the unique sounds of prog today.

Examining the myths and misconceptions surrounding the genre, music journalist Mike Barnes paints a vivid, colourful picture of the Seventies based on his own interviews with the musicians, music business insiders, journalists and DJs, and the personal testimonies of fans of that extraordinary decade.

Offering something new for even the keenest of prog enthusiasts, A New Day Yesterday is an entertaining and in-depth study of both the music itself and the cultural conditions and attitudes that fed into, and were affected by, this remarkable musical phenomenon.