Bummed out
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Possibly the worst book I've ever read. It's an utterly hopeless and incompetent biography. Nothing is learnt about the subject here - not his date of birth, his upbringing, his relationship with his fellow Monday brother. The full line-up of neither Happy Mondays or Black Grape is established. Nothing is revealed about Ryder's private life. I came out of this book knowing even less about the subject than when I went in. Shaun Ryder is one of the most charismatic, colourful and talented pop stars of the last 20 years and he (and his fans) deserve a damned sight better biography than this lazy, scissors-and-paste, slung-together-in-a-weekend, unproof-read drivel.
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Madchester, Badchester, and Dangerous-to-know-Chester
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Like The Faces in the seventies, The Mondays summed up the 'band you could be part of' ethic for the Nineties. Shaun Ryder's habits of ingestion have been well-documented, but this guide from the inside (Middles has long been a journalistic part of the Manchester scene) is well researched and edited for fun! Middles gets under the skin of the band's motivations - whether toxic or aural - and follows Ryder through in to Black Grape and beyond. They talked so hip they twisted our melons, man!
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Call the cops!
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The Mondays brightened up rock long enough to slip into legend, and with their recent reforming this is the right time to read this definitive biography of Ryder. Funny, self destructive, passionate, pissed and always more interesting on the very next page, Ryder is the biographer's delight, and this superbly written (and well-edited) tome does this band of gypsies justice throughout.
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