I shot a man in Reno
Subtitle: a history of death by murder, suicide, fire, flood, drugs, disease, and general misadventure, as related in popular song
By: by Graeme Thomson.
Publisher: Continuum
Published: 2008
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 253
ISBN-13: 9780826428578
Subjects: Popular music -- History and criticism; Death in music
Description: ""Death music" is not merely a byword for bookish solemnity, or the glorification of murder, drugs and guns. Over the course of the last hundred years it has also been about teenage girls weeping over their high school boyfriend's fatal car wreck; natural disasters sweeping whole communities away; the ever-evolving threat of disease; changing attitudes to old age; exhortations to suicide; the perfect playlist for a funeral; and the thorny question of what happens after the fat lady ceases to sing. Which means that for every "Black Angel's Death Song" there is a "Candle in the Wind," and for every "Cop Killer" there is "The Living Years." Death, like music, is a unifying force. There is something for every taste and inclination, from murderous vengeance to camp sentimentality and everything in between." "Drawing upon original and unique interviews with artists such as Mick Jagger, Richard Thompson, Ice-T, Will Oldham and Neil Finn among many others, I Shot a Man In Reno explores how popular music deals with death, and how it documents the changing reality of what death means as one grows older. It's as transfixing as a train wreck, and you won't be able to put it down. As an epilogue, I Shot A Man In Reno presents the reader with the 40 greatest death songs of all time, complete with a brief rationale for each, acting as a primer for the morbidly curious listener."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Prologue. The art of dying; title: Death ain't nothin' new : from John Barleycorn to John Walker's blues; title: Teenage wildlife : from sob to suicide; title: Blood on the floor : murder, music and morality; title: How does it feel? death and the sixties; title: Appetite for self destruction : oblivion songs; title: Sweetness follows : into the great beyond; title: Gangsta gangsta : rap reclaims the murder song; title: Sometimes it snows in April : songs of loss; title: Who wants to live forever? : the fat lady's songbook; title: The art of dying : slight return; title: Epilogue. To die for : the 40 greatest death songs.