1. they tell stories about the life of rock musicians irrespective whether these stories are *true* or not; they provide insight into the business of culture or the culture of a business which has an enormous impact on our societies and particularly youth;

2. some of the books provide good-quality information on musicians, producers, etc. who have contributed to the formation of the rock-scene; these books have an educational value in so far as they demonstrate the powerful energy of so-called minorities; I consider these books as books of hope - irrespective of my liking the music which they propagate.

I am buying books with amazon.com for quite some time and I have never experienced any problems with them. That's why I offer this option here.

I should tell you that amazon.com will provide me with a discount on my own book orders, in case you order one of these books through this connection. If you don't like the idea, please don't make use of the option presented here.

Martha Bayles (1994)
Hole in our soul. The loss of beauty and meaning in American popular music.
New York (Free Press)

Hal Blaine with David Goggin (1990)
Hal Blaine and the Wrecking Crew. The story of the world's most recorded musician.
Emeryville, CA (Mix Books)

Victor Bockris (1992)
Keith Richards. The biography.
New York (Poseidon Press)

Victor Bockris (1994)
Lou Reed. The biography.
London (Hutchinson)

Sony Bono (1992)
And the beat goes on.
New York (Pocket Books)

Robert Burnett (1996)
The global jukebox. The international music industry.
London/New York (Routledge)

Donald Clarke (ed.) (1990)
The Penguin Encyclopedia of Popular Music.
London (Penguin)

Alan Clayson (1992)
Ringo Starr. Straight man or joker?
New York (Paragon House)

Leonard Cohen (1994
Stranger music. Selected poems and songs.
New York (Vintage)

Ray Coleman (1994)
Clapton. The authorised biography.
London (Sidgwick & Jackson)

Ray Coleman (1995)
Lennon. The definite biography. Revised and updated.
London (Pan Books)

Ray Coleman (1995)
McCartney. Yesterday and today.
London (Boxtree)

John Covach & Graeme M. Boone (eds.) (1997)
Understanding Rock. Essays in musical analysis.
New York/Oxford (Oxford University Press)

Ray Davies (1995)
X-ray. The unauthorized autobiography.
London (Penguin)

Anthony DeCurtis, James Henke & Holly George-Warren (eds.) (1992)
The Rolling Stone Album Guide.
New York (Random House)

John Densmore (1991)
Riders on the storm. My life with Jim Morrison and The Doors.
London (Arrow Books)

Loranne S. Dorman & Clive L. Rawlins (1990)
Leonard Cohen. Prophet of the heart.
London (Omnibus Press)

Robert Draper (1990)
Rolling Stone Magazine. The uncensored history.
New York (Doubleday)

Brian Eno (1996)
A year with swollen appendices.
London (Faber & Faber)

Marianne Faithfull with David Dalton (1994)
Faithfull.
London (Penguin)

Simon Frith (ed.) (1990)
Facing the music. Essays on pop, rock and culture.
London (Mandarin)

Steven Gaines (1987)
Heroes and villains. The true story of The Beach Boys.
London (Grafton Books)

Bob Geldof with Paul Vallely (1986)
Is that it?
Harmondsworth (Penguin)

Nelson George (1988)
The death of rhythm & blues.
New York (Plume)

Holly George-Warren (ed.) (1994)
Neil Young: The Rolling Stone files.
New York (Hyperion)

Charlie Gillett (1995)
The sound of the city. The rise of rock and roll. Second edition, newly illustrated and expanded.
New York (Da Capo Press)

Geoffrey Giuliano (1994)
Paint it black. The murder of Brian Jones.
London (Virgin Books)

John Glatt (1993)
Rage & roll. Bill Graham and the selling of rock.
New York (Carol Publishing)

Bruce Golden (1991)
The Beach Boys. Southern California pastoral.
San Bernadino (Borgo Press)

James F. Harris (1993)
Philosophy at 33.3 rpm. Themes of classical rock music.
Chicago (Open Court)

Bill Harry (1992)
The ultimate Beatles Encyclopedia.
New York (Hyperion)

Michael Heatley (1994)
Neil Young. His life and music.
London (Reed Consumer Books)

John Hopkins and Danny Sugarman (1981)
No one here gets out alive.
New York (Warner Books)

John A. Jackson (1997)
American Bandstand: Dick Clark and the Making of a Rock 'N' Roll Empire.
New York (Oxford University Press)

Ian Johnston (1995)
Bad seeds. The biography of Nick Cave
New York (Little, Brown & Co.)

Nick Kent (1994)
The dark stuff. Selected writings on rock music 1972-1993. With a foreword by Iggy Pop.
London (Penguin)

Hanif Kureishi & Jon Savage (eds.) (1995)
The Faber book of pop.
London (Faber & Faber)

Colin Larkin (ed.) (1993)
The Guiness Who's Who of Country Music.
Enfield, Middlesex (Guiness Publishers)

Jerry Lee Lewis & Charles White (1995)
Killer!
London (Century)

Ian MacDonald (1995)
Revolution in the head. The Beatles' records and the sixties.
London (Pimlico)

Greil Marcus (1990)
Mystery train. Images of America in rock 'n' roll music. Third revised edition.
New York (Dutton)

Greil Marcus (1994)
In the fascist bathroom. Writings on punk 1977-1992.
London (Penguin)

Greil Marcus (1998)
Invisible republic. Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes.
New York (Henry Holt and Company)

Dave Marsh (1983)
Before I get old. The story of the Who.
New York (St. Martin's Press)

Dave Marsh (1988)
Glory days. Bruce Springsteen in the 1980s.
London (Arrow Books)

Neville Marten & Jeffrey Hudson (1996)
The Kinks. Well respected men.
Chessington (Castle Communications)

George Martin with William Pearson (1995)
Summer of love. The making of Sgt. Pepper.
London (Pan Books)

John McDermott with Eddie Kramer (1994)
Hendrix. Setting the record straight.
New York (Warner Books)

Richard Meltzer (1987)
The aesthetics of rock. New foreword by Richard Meltzer. New introduction by Greil Marcus.
New York (Da Capo Press)

Jim Morrison (1971)
The Lord and the New Creatures.
New York (Touchstone Books)

Jim Morrison (1988)
Wilderness.
New York (Vintage Books)

Jim Morrison (1990)
The American night.
New York (Vintage Books)

Bert Muirhead (1984)
The record producers file. A directory of rock album producers 1962-1984.
Poole, Dorset (Blandford Press)

Ira Nadel (1995)
Leonard Cohen. A life in art.
London (Robson Books)

Richard Neville (1996)
hippie hippie shake. the dreams, the trips, the trials, the love-ins, the screw-ups ... the sixties.
Port Melbourne (Minerva)

Philip Norman (1996)
Buddy. The biography.
London (Macmillan)

Lucy O'Brien (1995)
She bop. The definite history of women in rock, pop and soul.
London (Penguin)

Pfeil, F. (1994) Rock incorporated: Plugging in to Axl and Bruce. In: Goldstein, L. (ed.), The male body. Features, destinies, exposures. The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor 67-101

Pat Primeaux (1996)
The moral passion of Bruce Springsteen.
San Francisco (International Scholars Publications)

Noel Redding & Carol Appleby (1990)
Are you experienced? The inside story of the Jimi Hendrix Experience.
London (Picador)

Tim Riley (1989)
Tell me why.
New York (Vintage Books)

John Robertson (1994)
Neil Young. The visual documentary.
London (Omnibus)

Rolling Stone (1995)
Encyclopedia of rock & roll. Completely revised and updated.
New York (Fireside)

Rolling Stone (1996)
Bruce Springsteen. The Rolling Stone files.
New York (Hyperion)

Rolling Stone (ed.) (1989)
The Rolling Stone Interviews: the 1980s. Introduction by Kurt Loder.
New York (St. Martin's Press/Rolling Stone Press)

Joel Rosenman, John Roberts & Robert Pilpel (1989)
Young men with unlimited capital.
New York (Bantam Books)

Nishi F. Saimaru (1990)
The John Lennon Family Album.
San Francisco (Chronicle Books)

Nicholas Schaffner (1991)
Saucerful of secrets. The Pink Floyd odyssey.
London (Sidgwick & Jackson)

Joel Selvin (1994)
Summer of love. The inside story of LSD, rock & roll, free love and high times in the Wild West.
New York (Dutton)

Charles Shaar Murray (1989)
Crosstown traffic. Jimi Hendrix and post-war pop.
London (Faber & Faber)

Robert Shelton (1987)
No direction home. The life and music of Bob Dylan.
New York (Ballantine Books)

Brian Southall, Peter Vince, Allan Rouse (1997)
Abbey Road: The Story of the World's Most Famous Recording Studios.
London (Omnibus Press)

John Street (1986)
Rebel rock. The politics of popular music.
Oxford (Basil Blackwell)

Danny Sugarman (1991)
Wonderland Avenue. Tales of glamour and excess.
London (Abacus)

David Szatmary (1996)
A time to rock. A social history of rock 'n' roll.
Upper Saddle River, N.J. (Prentice-Hall)

Hunter S. Thompson (1991)
Songs of the doomed. More notes on the death of the American Dream. Gonzo Papers Vol. 3.
New York (Pocket Books)

Sandy Troy (1995)
Captain Trips. The life and fast times of Jerry Garcia.
London (Virgin Books)

Jerry Wexler with David Ritz (1994)
Rhythm and the blues. A life in American music.
London (Jonathan Cape)

Timothy White (1994)
The nearest faraway place. Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys, and the Southern California experience.
New York (Henry Holt & Co.)

Jon Wiener (1991)
Come together. John Lennon in his time.
Urbana/Chicago (University of Illinois Press)

Paul Williams (1997)
Neil Young. Love to burn - Thirty years of speaking out, 1966-1996.
London (Omnibus Press)

James Young (1993)
Nico. Songs they never played on the radio.
London (Arrow)