At the end of last year I read an autobiography called Scar Tissue, written by Anthony Kiedis from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and I instantly thought of this after reading the question because of the overbearing amount of story-telling in the book. Kiedis has a very intriguing and very different style when it comes to telling his life story, one that I have never quite seen before, but one that I very much enjoyed reading. He has a certain way of writing that seems very natural, and as if it were written down straight from his spoken words, and the combination of this element with the eccentric and very personal nature of the stories themselves makes for quality story-telling.
One passage where this ability is phenomenally displayed is when Kiedis is talking about the band's drummer, Chad Smith. He reveals a very interesting dynamic about Smith that would only be recognized by those actually in the band, and he does so in a way that can be very easily related to by the reader, making the passage both very grasping to the interest and easy to understand.
"He stayed very much a man unto himself within this band. He has a whole different way of dealing with being the new guy, and that was 'I don't need them, I don't want them, I've got my own life.' He never showed any signs of needing to be in our inner circle. [...] When it came to clothes, his sensibilities were way different from ours, and I used to tease him about it all the time. He'd show up in 80's-looking purple double-breasted suits, and i'd say, 'Did you raid Arsenio's closet for that? He thankfully stopped teasing his hair when he joined the band, but instead of hanging out at a punk-rock dive like Small's with Flea and me, he'd go to the Mötley Crüe bar and wear funny jeans with belts and cowboy boots and play pool and go after rock chicks. [...] We found common ground in the music. Even there, his musical sensibility was different, but his energy and passion and the power he had for creating rhythm were unsurpassed. [...] We'd never had a drummer who had a supercharged angst battery that never seemed to run low. I shudder to think that we ever would have made him feel unwelcome or unwanted by giving him the same tough-love, boot-camp-style introduction into the band we gave John, but we did it because we cared about him, we wanted him to be close to us."
Reid--I agree with you that the combination of down-to-earth style and the eccentric world of the music industry makes this piece appealing. I take it you like learning about the theme of the music business? Me too, sometimes. My last one was Eric Clapton's autobiography a few months ago. Anyway, thanks for a good first entry.
ReplyDeleteThis is a good first draft, but there is far too much quote to go from here easily. Maybe prune the quote a bit and expand upon it. Also, adding a conclusion to tie it all together would make a strong essay as I feel you have a strong writing style already.
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