Showing results by publisher "audible originals" in Biographies & Memoirs

“This isn't strictly speaking an instructional manual, but a work of comedic philosophy.” Elvis Costello - songwriter, singer, author, and Fender Jazzmaster known to his admirers as “The Little Hands of Concrete” - spins his tale with wit, grit, and spit to spare. How to Play the Guitar and Y, Costello’s new entry into Audible’s Words + Music series, combines recitation, impersonation, and musical illustration to show you how to turn a three-chord trick into a four-chord caper and let your curiosity take you where it will.

Soaring ambition. Unwavering integrity. Billie Joe Armstrong isn’t the first punk to negotiate mainstream success, but he might be its most undisguised example. In Welcome to my Panic, Green Day’s iconic front man holds nothing back as he tracks listeners though his deeply personal and artistic journey in raw detail. Matching his emotional storytelling with new, exclusive, recordings of Green Day’s biggest hits, Armstrong chronicles the seminal moments in his life: the trauma and triumphs that have come to define him.

In his W+M installment, A Dynamic Career in Communications, yasiin bey treats listeners to a rich and immersive experience that goes beyond the surface. It's a captivating journey that explores his roots, beliefs, and creative process. Through his words and music, yasiin bey offers a unique and powerful perspective on life, art, and the role of communication in shaping the world we live in.

Hip-hop pioneer Chuck D, the legendary lyricist and cofounder of Public Enemy, takes listeners on an extraordinary journey through politically and socially conscious music. Part history lesson and part memoir, Songs That Shook the Planet spans genres and decades to call out the brave artists who continue to inspire necessary change in the world.

Pete Townshend is one of the great figures in rock ‘n’ roll history. For almost 60 years, The Who have balanced the physical and the spiritual with introspective lyrics and inspirational music. But there is a part of Townshend’s story—and The Who’s—that has not been examined. These are his Words + Music. In the Audible Original Pete Townshend: Somebody Saved Me, the songwriter takes us through the period between the 1978 death of Who drummer Keith Moon and the 2002 loss of bassist John Entwistle.

How did a once faceless bureaucrat, a man whose own wife said he was born under the sign of the vampire, become the idealized face of Russian manhood and its authoritarian leader? Deputy Mayor Putin examines the man behind the myth. We will explore how Putin’s formative years shaped and drove him and how the supporting cast of characters he gathered along the way helped him get to the Kremlin’s inner sanctum.

In the basement of one of the world's most prestigious universities, there was a classroom lined with a collection of human skulls from around the globe. Join award-winning journalist Marc Fennell (It Burns, Nut Jobs, Stuff the British Stole) as he takes you on a captivating global journey through the mysterious Morton Cranial Collection.

This is the story of how a nerdy, homeschooled kid in the church choir named John Stephens became the Grammy-winning, platinum-selling, genre-pushing pop star we know as John Legend. For a long time, he led a double life—excelling as a star student while his home life was in shambles, working in corporate America as a financial consultant while moonlighting as a musician in nightclubs, always straddling a line between the person he was and the person he wanted to be. These are his Words + Music.

A true musical polymath, Beck shifts between and blends genres and generations with a preternatural ease—one foot in the secret history of American music and the other moving toward the future. Consistently brushed off by industry gatekeepers on both coasts, Beck perseveres—ultimately building a bespoke audience of millions who share his borderless musical vision. In Dear Life, Beck proves that the most powerful art is made by those who are brave enough to be fully themselves.

Brandy has influenced the last quarter century of pop music and helped define the R&B legacy of the ‘90s and ‘00s with seven rich, innovative albums. She’s an esteemed vocalist who along the way had to manage the pressures of teenage fame, young superstardom, and self-doubt. These are her Words + Music.

Legendary Grammy Award-winning producer and towering musical icon T Bone Burnett speaks plainly, which is all the more reason why his stunning new Words + Music, The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation, lands with such force. And his songs, delivered straight from the heart, carry with them the weight of unvarnished truth and the wisdom he’s gathered from a lifetime.

Rock and roll in the BC (Before Cooper) era was a tamer, milder world. In Who I Really Am, Cooper’s latest addition to Audible’s Words + Music series, we learn how the boa-wearing (not the feathered kind) maestro arrived at a show and sound - let’s call it AC for After Cooper - that has entertained millions of kids while terrifying parents in equal measure. Cooper drew inspiration from Saturday matinee horror movies, applied a "no such thing as too much" attitude, and hitched it to a kick-ass rock and roll band.

Carlos Santana’s Light, Spirit, and Soul is a rhythmic journey into the places, spaces, artists, and music that have inspired and informed one of popular music’s most successful artists by any measurable standard. He’s not an entertainer. He’s a communicator of a language that speaks directly to the molecules of listeners across space and time. These are his Words + Music.

A leading light on the alternative and indie music scene for nearly 40 years, Jeff Tweedy is a master of the art in the artifice of songwriting. In this volume, Tweedy introduces listeners to the people, occasions, and frames of mind that have inspired but don’t necessarily populate the iconic songbooks of bands Wilco, Uncle Tupelo, and Tweedy.

Roger Stringer grew up in rural Mississippi, hunting and eating everything from deer to rabbits. When he had two sons, Zac and Justin, he gave them guns and took them to the woods as well. Then one day when the boys were home alone, he got a call from Zac that Justin had been shot. What follows is an intimate and gripping memoir about the shooting’s aftermath. The story moves between the perspectives of Roger and Zac as they take us through their journey of betrayal, redemption, and ultimately confrontation with a company that had kept its corruption a secret for decades.

Through hard work and, well, tenacity, Jack Black and Kyle Gass catapulted themselves into rock superstardom. But before they were the only two members of the best rock band on earth, they were just Jack and Kyle, two theater students finding their footing in Los Angeles. The D’s trajectory was a slow and steady rise from clubs to a guest spot on the hit show Mr. Show on HBO to albums to film to headlining festivals across the globe. But it wasn’t without its pains. This is their story. These are their Words + Music.

Sidney Crosby is ready to tell his story in his own words. As one of the greatest NHL players of all time, he reflects on his 2005-06 rookie season with the Pittsburgh Penguins. From a Canadian phenom dubbed “the next Gretzky” to an 18-year-old carrying the burden of a struggling franchise, he talks candidly about the intense pressure he was under, the surreal experience of lacing up alongside his childhood idol Mario Lemieux and the truth about his rivalry with Alex Ovechkin.

In an explosive Audible Original investigative series, executive produced by James Patterson, veteran journalist and New York Times best-selling author Vicky Ward chronicles her 19-year quest to uncover what - or who - is behind Jeffrey Epstein’s wealth, influence, and criminality.

On rare occasion, a fascinating artist will endeavor to peel back the curtain and truly reveal themselves: Their craft, their thoughts, their pain, their humanity. But it is even more rare that the artist actually possesses the range of gifts to pull it off. St. Vincent is such an artist. And St. Vincent: Words plus Music is such an experience.

In his vivid and profound addition to Audible’s Words + Music series, Jonathan Biss, the world renowned pianist and critical Beethoven interpreter of our time, expounds on the spellbinding hold the classical figure and his work possesses over him. Biss doesn’t just love Beethoven more than other music, he loves it more than most things. It’s the lens through which he understands the world, and has been since he can remember. But in Unquiet, Biss reveals the full extent to which Beethoven is also a ruthless lens through which he views himself.