During the '50s and '60s, hundreds of recording artists--from the well-known to the obscure--jumped on the country music bandwagon. Drawing on his years of research, personal interviews, and rare recordings and documents, Escott brings to life a score of musical innovators, telling their stories and reinstating their place in American musical history. 45 photos.

Tattooed on Their Tongues: A Journey Through the Backrooms of American Music

Arts & Photography

ESCOTT, Colin

Music

Schirmer Trade Books

Looks at fifty years of change in country music, highlighting the careers of record label owners, producers, stars, and sidemen who have played a role

Macmillan Library Reference

Hank Williams: Snapshots From The Lost Highway

He was twenty-nine years old and had recorded just eighty sessions when he died on New Year's Day 1953. Yet those songs—“Hey Good Lookin'," "Your Cheatin' Heart," "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry"-made Hank Williams the most influential country musician ever. He is the essential pre-Elvis performer, molding American music into a new art form, and creating descendants that range from Garth Brooks to Beck. But for all that his music reveals, we know remarkably little of the man himself. His formal interviews barely filled a page, and even those who claimed him as a friend admit they barely knew him. Hank Williams fans, devoted and avid, have been cherishing the same few Hank pictures and reminiscences for decades. Now this book will reveal a previously unseen wealth of photographs, letters, interviews, and the handwritten lyrics to twenty-nine newly discovered songs in a beautifully designed tribute. Arranged chronologically and enhanced by testimonials from Hank's family, friends, and the musicians he inspired, Hank Williams is a revelation.

Florita, Kira

Bragg, Rick.

History

Da Capo Press

A history of Sam Phillips' Sun Records label examines its role in the birth of rock 'n' roll and the rise of Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Carl Perkins

Good Rockin' Tonight: Sun Records and the Birth of Rock 'N Roll

Hawkins, Martin

St Martins Pr

Memphis, Tennessee. The early 1950s. The Mississippi rolls by, and there's a train in the night. Down on Beale Street there's hard-edged blues, on the outskirts of town they're pickin' hillbilly boogie.
At Sam Phillips' Sun Records studio on Union Avenue, there's something different going on. "Shake it, baby, shake it!" "Go, cat, go!" "We're gonna rock..."
This is where rock 'n' roll was born-the record company that launched Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and Carl Perkins. The label that brought the world, "Blue Suede Shoes," "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On," "Breathless," "I Walk the Line," "Mystery Train," "Baby, Let's Play House,' "Good Rockin' Tonight." Good Rockin Tonight is the history, in words and over 240 photographs, of Sam Phillips' legendary storefront studio, from the early days with primal blues artists like Howlin' Wolf and B.B. King to the long nights in the studio with Elvis and Jerry Lee. As colorful and energetic as the music itself, it's a one-of-a-kind book for anyone who wants to know where it all started.

Good Rockin' Tonight: Sun Records and the Birth of Rock 'N' Roll

St. Martin's: Griffin

This compelling account reveals much that was previously unknown or hidden about Hank Williams's life and takes its place as the authoritative biography of this country music legend.

Hank Williams: The Biography

Merritt, George

MacEwen, William

Humor & Entertainment

Little. Brown and Company

Telling the simple, unbiased truths of his musical career, from overwhelming stardom to drugs, alcohol, and death, this biography portrays country artist Hank Williams as the product of an American generation.

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

Little,Brown & Co

The book that inspired the major motion picture I Saw the Light. In his brief life, Hank Williams created one of the defining bodies of American music. Songs such as "Your Cheatin' Heart," "Hey, Good Lookin'," and "Jambalaya" sold millions of records and became the model for virtually all country music that followed. But by the time of his death at age twenty-nine, Williams had drunk and drugged and philandered his way through two messy marriages and out of his headline spot on the Grand Ole Opry. Even though he was country music's top seller, toward the end he was so famously unreliable that he was lucky to get a booking in a beer hall. Colin Escott's enthralling, definitive biograph -- now the basis of the major motion picture I Saw the Light -- vividly details the singer's stunning rise and his spectacular decline, revealing much that was previously unknown or hidden about the life of this country music legend. Originally published as Hank William: The Biography.

I Saw the Light: The Story of Hank Williams

Back Bay Books

- Long considered the last word on Hank Williams, this biography has remained continuously in print since its first publication in 1994.- This new edition has been completely updated and includes many previously unpublished photographs, as well as a complete catalog detailing all the songs Hank Williams ever wrote, even those he never recorded.- Colin Escott is codirector and cowriter of the forth-coming two-hour PBS/BBC television documentary on Hank Williams, set to broadcast in spring 2004, and coauthor of "Hank Williams: Snapshots from the Lost Highway.- HANK WILLIAMS was the third-prize winner of the prestigious Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Award.

Roadkill on the Three-Chord Highway: Art and Trash in American Popular Music

It's the real stories, not the publicists' confections, that concern Colin Escott. We hear Perry Como's story in his own words: it wasn't all smooth. We learn about the astonishing twists and turns in Roy Orbison's life, and the stories behind the songs we know so well. And we go down with Vernon Oxford, the last great honky tonk singer, who came to Nashville just a little too late. These are stories for anyone who loves what Escott calls "little songs from great sorrows." They will fascinate even the most casual fan of popular music, and they're told here in sympathetic, engaging, and illuminating prose.

Routledge

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by ESCOTT, Colin. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by ESCOTT, Colin

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by ESCOTT, Colin. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Tattooed on Their Tongues: A Journey Through the Backrooms of American Music

Tattooed on Their Tongues: A Journey Through the Backrooms of American Music

Hank Williams: Snapshots From The Lost Highway

Good Rockin' Tonight: Sun Records and the Birth of Rock 'N Roll

Good Rockin' Tonight: Sun Records and the Birth of Rock 'N' Roll

Hank Williams: The Biography

Hank Williams: The Biography

I Saw the Light: The Story of Hank Williams

Hank Williams: The Biography

Roadkill on the Three-Chord Highway: Art and Trash in American Popular Music