What's Exactly the Matter with Me? Memoirs of a Life in Music Book Softcover
What's Exactly the Matter with Me? Memoirs of a Life in Music Book Softcover
- Book
- Jawbone Press
- Softcover
- P.F. Sloan, S.E. Feinberg
- 19.95 (US)
What's Exactly the Matter With Me? is a first-person account of an extraordinary life and pilgrimage through the most fascinating years of American and English musical culture. This is a story of dreams, success, destruction, and miraculous resurrection; the incredible, heartbreaking and inspiring story of one of the greatest songwriters in American music, as well as one of the most elusive and mysterious. P. F. Sloan was a prolific and influential genius from the golden age of the 1960s and a pioneer of folk-rock. Between 1965 and 1967, 150 of his songs were recorded by major acts; 45 of those made the charts. No other songwriter has ever come close to achieving so great a number of hits in such a short period of time. From his little studio at Dunhill Records, P. F. Sloan was a veritable hit-machine, writing for the Mamas & Papas (thats Sloan's infectious guitar lick on “California Dreamin'”), Jan & Dean (the falsetto you hear on most of their hits is Sloan's), Barry McGuire (the brilliant and controversial “Eve of Destruction”), Johnny Rivers (“Secret Agent Man”), the Turtles, the Fifth Dimension, and many, many more. He wrote so many songs in fact that Dunhill sold him as seven different acts. Unsurprisingly, he wound up exhausted and broken, thus beginning a long journey into the wilderness – a journey of UFOs and psychiatric hospitals, survival, healing and, ultimately, redemption.
Product Details
- #HL 123073
- 9781908279576
- 888680029067
- 6.0"
- 8.5"
- 320 Pages
Endorsements
- “Sloan's journey has been at times tortuous others celebratory, mystical and mysterious but most of all its a tale of success through adversity, of huge indomitable human spirit and of a tortured genius who finally is getting the accolades and recognition he truly deserves, its possibly the most revelatory music autobiog to date.” – James Crowther, Radio JJ
Reviews
- “...a poignant remembrance of a vanished era when summer meant fun, and a gifted young songwriter could take a little ray of sunshine, a little bit of soul, add just a touch of magic and get the greatest thing since rock 'n' roll.” – L.A. Observed
- “Highly readable and entertaining...” – Mojo
- “...if you're fascinated by the '60s, and in songwriting in general, then buy this book.” – The Record Collector
- “Part of what makes What's Exactly the Matter with Me? so readable is Sloan's economical treatment of his personal life, at least in terms of his formative years and romances. He knows what potential readers will be most interested in, which is essentially the trail of hits from surf days through the contrived 'idealism' of rock music in the late '60s.” – Blogcritics
- “The folk world had sanctioned a select few to be their spokesmen. Sloan was not sanctioned. He was a renegade. An outsider. And it's with those words in mind that you open the first chapter of this fascinating and brutally honest book.” – Jocks & Nerds
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