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branch_c's review against another edition
3.0
I haven't read many band biographies - not even any of the various available books about my favorite band, Rush, except those written by Neil Peart himself. But I'm also a fan of BNL, and had to pick this up when I came across it at a used book sale. It was written in 2002, so only covers the band's history up through the Maroon album, with most of the emphasis on the earlier years.
I definitely learned some things about the band - although much of this info is available online, I hadn't made the effort to seek it out, so this was an informative and fairly enjoyable read. I even learned something about Rush - although I knew that some of the BNL members were Rush fans (Ed Robertson says that when he bought "his very first rock album, Exit... Stage Left", they became at the time, "the only band that mattered to me" (p. 19)), I was not aware that Neil Peart made a guest appearance on the Rheostatics' Whale Music album, as did BNL. Anyway, there’s a lot of fun background info about many of BNL’s songs, the songwriting process, and the band's approach to live performance.
The writing, however, is a bit loose, with Myers sometimes seeming like he wanted to write himself into the story - rather than a straight reporting job, we get numerous asides, jokes, and opinions from the author - which is understandable, except some of these asides are not even related to the band. There are also a few awkward turns of phrase, in particular where Myers seems unsure how strongly to assert his first person narrative voice. But BNL is an idiosyncratic band, after all, so maybe some of this awkwardness is appropriate.
This book reveals quite a bit of interpersonal conflict, with members coming and going, tension with managers, and that sort of thing, which I suppose is typical for bands, and would seem more familiar to me if I'd read more of this genre. We hear about the "pushiness" of Tyler Stewart to join the band, and that the departure of Andy Creeggan was largely due to Stewart joining (p. 105 - 107). And in a possibly prophetic comment, we learn from Steven Page's wife Carolyn that "no one would have guessed that Steven and Ed would even get along" (p. 25) - they did until long after this book was written, but only so long (2015). And then there was the period leading up to the production of Stunt, the success of which was apparently accomplished by the business-like management style of Terry McBride - I'd have expected to hear about some rebellion from the bandmembers in the face of McBride's severe direction, but it seems they went along with it, and it's presumably just as well, since that album became - and remains - their most successful. It's interesting to see the references to other bands and music industry figures, including Ben Mink, Susan Rogers, Sarah McLachlan, Brian Wilson, and of course Rush.
So as band bios go, this one isn't bad, but not as good as one of the few others I've read, about Semisonic (who also get a mention here as an opening band for BNL): So You Wanna Be A Rock & Roll Star, written by the band's drummer Jacob Slichter.
For the record, I first saw BNL during a brief visit to Toronto in the fall of 1990 - once in a basement bar for an intimate performance that couldn't have had more than 20 people in attendance, and again the next night (since they were so obviously brilliant) in a somewhat larger venue (maybe the Horseshoe Tavern?). This book is a bit sketchy about the timelines, and of course I wasn't familiar with the band members at the time, but this was before they'd released any albums, and was presumably in the period when the band included Stewart and both Creeggans, as well as Page and Robertson. The next time they came to my attention was when I recognized "Be My Yoko Ono" playing in a store in a Colorodo ski resort town. I've since seen them twice more, once on the Stunt tour in Ft. Lauderdale in '98, and then in West Palm Beach in 2012.
Great band, decent book. Recommended for fans interested in the early history and trivia about the group.
I definitely learned some things about the band - although much of this info is available online, I hadn't made the effort to seek it out, so this was an informative and fairly enjoyable read. I even learned something about Rush - although I knew that some of the BNL members were Rush fans (Ed Robertson says that when he bought "his very first rock album, Exit... Stage Left", they became at the time, "the only band that mattered to me" (p. 19)), I was not aware that Neil Peart made a guest appearance on the Rheostatics' Whale Music album, as did BNL. Anyway, there’s a lot of fun background info about many of BNL’s songs, the songwriting process, and the band's approach to live performance.
The writing, however, is a bit loose, with Myers sometimes seeming like he wanted to write himself into the story - rather than a straight reporting job, we get numerous asides, jokes, and opinions from the author - which is understandable, except some of these asides are not even related to the band. There are also a few awkward turns of phrase, in particular where Myers seems unsure how strongly to assert his first person narrative voice. But BNL is an idiosyncratic band, after all, so maybe some of this awkwardness is appropriate.
This book reveals quite a bit of interpersonal conflict, with members coming and going, tension with managers, and that sort of thing, which I suppose is typical for bands, and would seem more familiar to me if I'd read more of this genre. We hear about the "pushiness" of Tyler Stewart to join the band, and that the departure of Andy Creeggan was largely due to Stewart joining (p. 105 - 107). And in a possibly prophetic comment, we learn from Steven Page's wife Carolyn that "no one would have guessed that Steven and Ed would even get along" (p. 25) - they did until long after this book was written, but only so long (2015). And then there was the period leading up to the production of Stunt, the success of which was apparently accomplished by the business-like management style of Terry McBride - I'd have expected to hear about some rebellion from the bandmembers in the face of McBride's severe direction, but it seems they went along with it, and it's presumably just as well, since that album became - and remains - their most successful. It's interesting to see the references to other bands and music industry figures, including Ben Mink, Susan Rogers, Sarah McLachlan, Brian Wilson, and of course Rush.
So as band bios go, this one isn't bad, but not as good as one of the few others I've read, about Semisonic (who also get a mention here as an opening band for BNL): So You Wanna Be A Rock & Roll Star, written by the band's drummer Jacob Slichter.
For the record, I first saw BNL during a brief visit to Toronto in the fall of 1990 - once in a basement bar for an intimate performance that couldn't have had more than 20 people in attendance, and again the next night (since they were so obviously brilliant) in a somewhat larger venue (maybe the Horseshoe Tavern?). This book is a bit sketchy about the timelines, and of course I wasn't familiar with the band members at the time, but this was before they'd released any albums, and was presumably in the period when the band included Stewart and both Creeggans, as well as Page and Robertson. The next time they came to my attention was when I recognized "Be My Yoko Ono" playing in a store in a Colorodo ski resort town. I've since seen them twice more, once on the Stunt tour in Ft. Lauderdale in '98, and then in West Palm Beach in 2012.
Great band, decent book. Recommended for fans interested in the early history and trivia about the group.
hylean's review against another edition
2.0
Huge fan of the band and finally got around to reading the book. The author is too concerned about making himself seem witty than just talking about the bank.
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