BOOKS
Since kindergarten comics, everyone looks at the pictures — in magazines, encyclopedias, movies.
The CREEM Archive presents the magazine as originally created. Digital text has been scanned from its original print format and may contain formatting quirks and inconsistencies.
THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF ROCK
Abby Hirsch, Editor
(Bobbs-Merrill)
Since kindergarten comics, everyone looks at the pictures — in magazines, encyclopedias, movies. There have been books of photographs but always accompanied by an excuse, like song lyrics or poetry and always thematically arranged. Well, this book�s reason is selfexplanatory so the small print serves only as additional insight, like bringing a subject into sharper focus.
A plethora of books expounding on rock have been published, mostly critical anthologies. Now the graphics from some of these stories, plus posters and portfolios, are unveiled under one cover (a Pete Townshend pose). The glamorization of rock criticism is extended. Long ignored, pushed around by guards at concerts and generally taking second bill to writers, these rock reporters are in the limelight here. The reader(?) not only has 238 stars to gaze upon, but a shot and quick biography of the nine famous, professional rock photographers who collected their fave pictures with personal comments on them.
Blow Up is singly responsible for the resurgence in rock photography. The movie made the camera a cock, an extension, a tool and the Yardbirds soundtrack was the logical connection. The Kodak instamatic was left behind for a more dimensional instrument. Some of my best friends are rock photogs and nine out of ten agree Blow Up changed their lives. So did rock�n�roll.
Whether backstage, staged or candid, the photos of Dylan, Beatles, Stones, Fillmore, Alice, Rod Stewart, Leon Russell, Joplin, Hendrix, the Band, Woodstock, etc. are action-packed — performers caught in an emotional mood. You�ll stare, glare, laugh, cry, curse and what�s worse is the fun you�ll have doing it again and again with different pictures. Just try to guess who�s who without looking it up.
Yes indeed, this book is a trip through the past — and through the present. Memories of people in moments of time at particular places are created by the moment-freezing camera. I�m very grateful to them for these pictures and thankful to Abby for collecting them in one volume for our delectation. How�s that for sincere sap?
Robbie Cruger
THE ROLLING STONE
BOOK OF DAYS - 1973
designed by Robert Kingsbury
(Straight Arrow)
Way back when I played the gulchergoop dupe, I subscribed to the bible of the tie-dye generation just so as I could get me a copy of The Book of Days. I have no use for calendars, cause I never make appointments, cause I never can keep �em. But anyway, that�s the reason I got caught by those money flints just to get a glimpse of how you could manage a hip, commercial calendar. I was that curious.
Well, now that I�m nineteen and wiser I feel a little obligated to warn all you jerks that about the stupidest thing you could ever do would be to fork over $3.00 for the new Book of Days. Where�s it gonna get ya, huh? I mean, if you want it cause it�ll look good on the coffee table next to your copies of Tolkien and your peace sign ashtray, well, then by all means go right ahead and splurge. Jeez, you might even hang it on the wall over your water mattress.
But if you�re considering purchasing it just to satisfy your curiosity, then lemme help you out here. The first thing you gotta notice is that ugly chick dolled up as a clown with her nipples peeking over the suds in the bathtub. She looks like she just took a break from the Mardi Gras, which is total Rolling Stone for ya. I mean, there�s nothing more hip than hitchhiking down South to josh around with the local yokels when spring sneaks around. And what a dynamite drug scene, too!!
Then note the layout. Over each month is a photo of somebody famous with a little note telling ya what the particular month is noted for. Like, April is Organic Food Month. May is the time ya should be hitting the communes. In September you should be searching the cow pie for hallucinogenic mushrooms. Boy, now if that ain�t groovy, I don�t know what is.
The pictured celebritites are even more absurd. You got well-known figures like Roberta Flack, Ian Anderson, Grace Slick and a terrific pose of that contagious Beach Boys disease. All of �em are either grinning or stifling a yawn. Everyone of �em looks like they do when they admire themselves in the mirror at night. Big deal hotshots! Even Mick Jagger, being ever so gentle as he noddingly tosses his glamorous show-biz wife a flower... yeah, sweet lady jane my ass. All big time rock stars should be shot anyway or forced to appear on the Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour.
Look, honestly, there�s no excuse for a racket like this. I got sucked into it once, and I know how it feels. I mean, Rolling Stone has actually drenched the �73 year in syrup and sugar magnolias by selling this obnoxiously beautiful exercise in peace and love. It�s like Love Story or Jonathan Livingston Seagull or anything else that tries to disguise its own sentimentality and gush with a tightknit commercial spirit. You just can�t hide from the fact that Rolling Stone is a hip monopoly out to put the squeeze* on the kounter-kultur kash. I wouldn�t be surprised if it were run by the Mafia.
Anyway, one thing�s for sure ... calendars are positively useless. And Rolling Stone has a goddamn good racket going on. And despite all the sugarcoating, �73 is gonna be just another year.
Robot A. Hull
