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Where the River Bends : Recipes and stories from the table of Jane and Jimmy Barnes

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For a limited time only, order a copy of Where the River Bends: Recipes and Stories from the Table of Jane and Jimmy Barnes and you’ll receive a copy signed by Jane and Jimmy Barnes. *Available while stocks last from Booktopia

Jane and Jimmy Barnes invite you to enjoy family recipes and stories from their new cookbook, Where the River Bends.

Inspired by the food they love and the legendary feasts they share at home with family and friends, Where the River Bends features recipes and stories from the kitchen table of Jane and Jimmy Barnes.

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5 Music Biographies Every Rock Fan Should Read

Malcolm Young: The Man Who Made AC/DC
By: Jeff Apter
Available from Booktopia or eBay

Malcolm Young was a legend: the founder and the driving force of AC/DC, a man with what many have called ‘the greatest right hand in rock and roll’. That right hand provided the instantly recognisable riffs and muscle behind such timeless songs as ‘Highway to Hell’, ‘Back in Black’, ‘A Long Way to the Top’ and many others. Malcolm was instrumental in ensuring that AC/DC survived shifting musical trends and numerous in-house dramas to stand tall as the biggest rock band on the planet. Yet he was the most unpretentious man to ever strap on a Gretsch guitar. 

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Book | The Youngs – The Brothers Who Built AC/DC

the-youngsWith sales of over 200 million albums, AC/DC is not just the biggest rock band in the world. It’s a family business built by three brothers: George, Malcolm and Angus Young. And, as with any business, some people prospered while others got hurt along the way. The Youngs: The Brothers Who Built AC/DC is unlike any AC/DC book you’ve read before.

Less a biography, more a critical appreciation, it tells the story of the trio through 11 classic songs and reveals some of the personal and creative secrets that went into their making. Important figures from AC/DC’s long way to the top open up for the very first time, while unsung heroes behind the band’s success are given the credit they are due. Accepted accounts of events are challenged while sensational new details emerge to cast a whole new light on the band’s history – especially their early years with Atlantic Records in the United States.
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Autobiography | Ian ‘Molly’ Meldrum – The Never, Um, Ever Ending Story

the-never-um-ever-ending-storyThe Never, Um, Ever Ending Story
Life, Countdown and Everything in Between

Molly Meldrum‘s warm, vivid, often hilarious and always compelling account of life in and out of Countdown.

More than thirty-five years in the making, this is the story of Ian ‘Molly’ Meldrum and the television show that stopped the nation.

In 1974 Ian ‘Molly’ Meldrum was working as a record producer and music journalist when he was offered the chance to host a new music show called Countdown. It was a show that would run for the next thirteen years and become one of the most-loved and most-watched programs on Australian television. It also turned Molly into a national institution (or ‘mental institution’ as one of his friends put it).
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Bestselling Autobiography | Billy Idol – Dancing with Myself

dancing-with-myselfIn this original memoir following Billy Idol from his childhood in England to his fame at the height of the punk-pop revolution, the iconic superstar tells the real story behind the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll that he is famous for.

A member of the punk rock revolution whose music crossed over into the pop mainstream during the 1980s, Billy Idol is a rock ‘n’ roll legend. Dancing with Myself will cover the events and the people who shaped his life, his music and his career, including accounts of his childhood both in England and the U.S., his year at Sussex University, his membership in the Bromley Contingent, his period spent hanging out with the Sex Pistols, his time in Siouxsie and the Banshees, Chelsea and Generation X. Idol also tackles his successful solo career, which involved collaboration with Steve Stevens and, ultimately, some of the most influential, ground-breaking music videos ever seen on MTV. In Dancing with Myself , Idol renders detailed accounts of his life’s highs and lows with the unapologetically in-your-face attitude and exuberance that made him famous. In part a survivor’s story,Dancing with Myself is equally a very funny and always riveting account of one man’s creative drive.
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Book | My Bon Scott

my-bon-scottAn intimate account of life with AC/DC’s Bon Scott, featuring 15 never-before-published letters by Australia’s greatest frontman.

In 1971 Adelaide girl Irene Thornton meets Bon Scott, the singer for local band Fraternity. He is a larrikin showman with a smile that rules the world. Between Bon and Irene, there is a unique spark; they marry in 1972. For the next few years, with Irene by his side, Bon Scott continues a driven but difficult journey towards AC/DC and rock ‘n’ roll fame.

Irene gives us the scene without the airbrushing: the bitter winters in London with Fraternity, the drinking and drugs, the group living and frayed tempers, and the broken dreams and inner demons. But she also shares details of her incredible bond with this extraordinary man, watching Bon create and perform the music that put him and AC/DC on the world stage.
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Book | Bowie – The Biography

bowieDiscover the man behind the myth in this new biography of one of the most pioneering and influential performers of our time-David Bowie.

David Bowie-the iconic superstar of rock, fashion, art, design, and the quintessential sexual liberator-is a living legend. However, for the past five decades, he has managed to retain his Hollywood star mystique. Now, New York Times bestselling author Wendy Leigh reveals the real man behind the mythology. Through scores of interviews with Bowie’s lovers (both male and female), his girlfriends, business associates, groupies, and band members, Leigh, who grew up just a mile from where Bowie was born and went to school, has written an intimate biography of rock’s greatest enigma.

In an unexpurgated exploration of Bowie’s kaleidoscopic personal life, she reveals his star-crossed inheritance-his mother was once an acolyte of the British Fascist party; his father, the PR genius who masterminded his early career-in a dramatic contrast to those family members grappling with mental illness, fears that would haunt Bowie for most of his life.
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Biography | Gough Whitlam – “His Time” by Jenny Hocking

The much-anticipated second volume of former Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam’s biography.

gough-whitlamGough Whitlam, Australia’s twenty-first prime minister, swept to power in December 1972, ending twenty-three years of conservative rule. It was an ascendancy bitterly resented by some, never accepted by others, and ended with dismissal by the Governor-General barely three years later—an outcome that polarised debate and left many believing the full story had not been told.

In this much anticipated second volume of her biography of Gough Whitlam, Hocking has used previously unearthed archival material and extensive interviews with Gough Whitlam, his family, colleagues and foes, to bring the key players in these dramatic events to life.
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Biography | Something Quite Peculiar : The Church. The Music. The Mayhem – Steve Kilbey

something-quite-peculiarBook Description

With some 37 years in the music industry, Steve Kilbey has some stories to tell. Best known as the lead singer and enigmatic front man, songwriter, bassist of The Church, Steve has experienced both amazing international success and all the excesses that go with it, as well as a well known heroin addiction that delivered some very dark times. The Church has been a significant and constant influence on the Australian music industry and readers will be keen to hear from one of the industry’s most successful, creative and long-standing key protagonists.
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Autobiography | Ed Sheeran – A Visual Journey

ed-sheeranTake one acclaimed singer-songwriter and pair him with one of the most talented young artists of his generation and what do you get? A stunningly original visual documentary of one of the world’s best-loved and most successful musicians of his generation. With words by Ed Sheeran and illustrations by his childhood friend, artist Phillip Butah (who produces artwork for Sheeran’s albums and singles), and accompanying photos, Ed Sheeran: A Visual Journey is an exclusive, fully authorised, first-person account by Ed of how he became an internationally renowned singer-songwriter.
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Leonard Cohen

leonard_cohen
For four decades, Leonard Cohen has been one of the most important and influential songwriters of our time, a figure whose body of work achieves greater depths of mystery and meaning as time goes on. His songs have set a virtually unmatched standard in their seriousness and range. Sex, spirituality, religion, power – he has relentlessly examined the largest issues in human lives, always with a full appreciation of how elusive answers can be to the vexing questions he raises. But those questions, and the journey he has traveled in seeking to address them, are the ever-shifting substance of his work, as well as the reasons why his songs never lose their overwhelming emotional force.

His first album, Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967), announced him as an undeniable major talent. It includes such songs as “Suzanne,” “Sisters of Mercy,” “So Long, Marianne” and “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Good,” all now longstanding classics. If Cohen had never recorded another album, his daunting reputation would have been assured by this one alone.

However, the two extraordinary albums that followed, Songs From a Room (1969), which includes his classic song, “Bird on the Wire,” and Songs of Love and Hate (1971), provided whatever proof anyone may have required that that the greatness of his debut was not a fluke. (All three albums are reissued in April, 2007.)



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