Everything McBride writes deserves to be gold plated. It shines. ( )

This is no traditional, linear biography. McBride gives us a view of James Brown as complex as the man himself. There were times where I really liked that, and I certainly learned more about Brown than I knew previously, but there was enough repetition and circularity that I became impatient at times and wanted more story. Still, this served as a good reminder of how I actually do like to read about music more than I think I do, and I look forward to exploring in more depth some of the musical tangents discussed in this book.

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Read Harder: Biography ( )

I have the hardback.

I liked a lot about this book. McBride is one of my favorite authors. And I think the fact that he’s a musician helped add a dimension to this book that may not have been there otherwise.

The only problem I had with it is that I felt like it really glossed over the way Brown treated the women in his life.

It’s a well-told, pretty concise biography. If you’re interested in Brown’s life and music, it’s probably worth picking up a copy. ( )

"In the instant-information Internet age, every truth contradicts another truth: Brown was crazy. Brown was a genius. Brown was a woman basher. Brown was abused by gold-digging women. Brown was cheap. Brown would give away his last dime. Stick your finger in the dike to cover one lie and water bursts out of another hole. You have to choose what to believe. And therein lies the real story of James Brown, who was more southerner than he was black or white, more sensitive artist than he was superstar."

This is an interesting biography of the amazing James Brown, Godfather of Soul, well-researched and dispassionately approached. Locating Brown's controversial roller-coaster career in the racial and class politics of his time, McBride presents Brown's talent and creativity through the lens of a sophisticated musical theorist and historian. Each chapter centers around one key figure in James Brown's life: one of his wives, a member of the band, a manager, a friend, and so on. This brilliant approach allows us to see the musician's humanity, to learn about him through the eyes of those who knew him best. At first it seems that McBride only chose those who loved James Brown and that is to some degree true, but the story reads as true. The consistent theme is that James Brown was difficult to know, that his self-protective armor came down for no one. It is also that he was vulnerable and afraid much of the time.

My main quibble is that McBride repeats himself. It's as if he wrote each of the chapters after interviewing that particular person in James Brown's life but didn't bother to go back and identify some of the points already adequately articulated.

My second, less vehement quibble is that McBride too often lapses into soulless lists of people, usually musicians, who illustrate a quality or a historical trend or a theme in James Brown's life. What's great about this is that the artists he names matter ~ and too many of them are poorly recognized and/or were badly treated by an industry steeped in the racism and sexism of the broader society. What's not great is that the names remain lost without more context. McBride could have spent more time making whatever case the names support; these artists' place in the story of James Brown and, indeed, the story of American culture and music is interesting! It's worth telling. I wish McBride had spent more time telling the story of the context in which James Brown's life and work changed the world and less time telling me yet again that he spent three hours after each performance having his hair done before he would be seen again in public.

Still, it's a worthwhile read and an insightful examination of the Godfather of Soul and the society in which he made his mark. ( )

A Citizen Kane-style search for the man behind the legend. McBride is openly and unapologetically biased on some points, but it's a very interesting read. ( )