White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s

Categories: Entertainment , Staff Picks

Joe Boyd has written an amazing book, White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s.  Joe Boyd is a music producer, who, in the years 1966-1974 produced records by the following luminaries: The Incredible String Band, Shirley Collins, Pink Floyd, Fairport Convention, Nick Drake, Vashti Bunyan, John & Beverly Martyn, Nico, and Maria Muldaur, among others.  For a bit more information on some of these folks, check out a couple of my other blogs, one about 1960s British folk rock, and another on Syd Barrett, Pink Floyd's original songwriter.  More than a roster of Boyd's accomplishments, White Bicycles is part memoir, part social history, and partly an intimate portrait of some very colorful, talented, and often tragic, individuals.  Due to feeling a strong connection to Sandy Denny and Nick Drake, I was particularly moved by the chapters written about them.  Poignant social commentary permeates the book as well, and he pulls no punches in describing his take on the myriad of differences between the world back then and what it has become. He even gets on the soap box for a superb chapter on the virtues of old school analog recording techniques versus today's omnipresent computer-based music making.  I cannot say enough wonderful things about this book or recommend it more strongly...I was sad to see it come to an end.  If you think you might be interested, put yourself on the holds list.  If you like folk, folk rock, or 1960s/early 1970s music in general, wrap your head, ears first, around the companion cd, White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s.  You won't regret either move.