Winwood tells a lot of stories about those who have suffered, those lost along the way, and asks why it keeps happening.

Bodies is documentation of massive, gaping issues found within the music industry, from the grassroots level all the way to the cream of the multi-million-pound crop. This is an excellent music book from an author who is very well placed to comment on the music world given his years of journalistic experience.The book has opened up a much-needed debate about the nature of the music industry as an insatiable meat grinder for creative souls with an instinct for self-destruction. Ian Winwood is a music journalist whose work has appeared in the Daily Telegraph , the Guardian , Kerrang! First and foremost, though, Bodies is a memoir that shows the intoxicating allure of music journalism, written by one of its most incisive practitioners, shining a light on the perverseness of a job in which you’re celebrated for chronicling the suffering of others while, often, being subjected to the same pressures and temptations they’ve fallen foul of.

Sure, it touches on the topic of suicides and overdoses but then it will drift to Twitter and streaming and money, all the while Ian tramps all of the places he's been and all the wonderful things he's experienced by you. Bodies relates a number of incidents where an artist is pushed or feels impelled to work despite being clearly unwell, sometimes with terrible consequences. This book is full of cautionary accounts ( he's not afraid to mention names) and stories about the pitfalls /downside of the lives of many musicians and those working in music business , and of course Ian's own personal experiences of addiction and mental health issues. The book also deviates to talk about the difficulties for women working in the industry, the sexism and the abuse.Publication dates are subject to change (although this is an extremely uncommon occurrence overall). Gutting details, triumphant moments that anyone in the field will have latched to after their first byline, but without the impressive addition of actually meeting the bandmates as Winwood often does. I urge absolutely everyone in bands, the music industry and otherwise to read 'Bodies' by IanWinwood immediately.

Dave Grohl (solo) and Nine Inch Nails are set to join James Gang, The Black Keys and The Breeders for ‘the concert for our veterans’, VetsAid. Before becoming the year's most talked about music book, Bodies: Life And Death In Music starts out as the story of a father and a son. I really wanted to love this book, the subject matter is something I work in and have experienced personally. At a time when bands are thankfully pulling back to focus on themselves rather than their careers, Bodies provides an articulate look at the other side.I didn't realise that this book would also be about Ian's descent into addiction (and recovery); if at least one person reads it and it resonates with them and they seek help (be they a musican or not), great (not doing it justice but I hope you get what I mean. And commendably, this isn't offered up as vicarious entertainment disengenously reframed as a cautionary tale in the last chapter or epilogue. In Bodies, Ian Winwood explores the industry's reluctance to confront its many failures in a far-reaching story which features first-hand access to artists such as Foo Fighters, Green Day, Trent Reznor, Biffy Clyro, Kings of Leon, Chris Cornell, Mark Lanegan, Pearl Jam. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Behind this preposterously romantic, transgressive image lurks personal horror and tragedy, which Winwood recounts unsparingly, but with authentic empathy: the story of his own drink-and-drug fuelled collapse, which results in several stays in psychiatric hospitals, is woven through the book.

A real peek behind the curtain at the music industry, I had to keep stopping and starting this book as it took me to some dark places and was a little triggering.

After decades of writing for Metal Hammer, NME and, most of all, Kerrang, Winwood looks at the ways the music business kills its young, with stories of drugs, alcohol, stress, pressure, mental illness, abuse, social media pile-ons, all told to him by a cast of now-dead men and some of the bandmates they left behind. The _ga cookie, installed by Google Analytics, calculates visitor, session and campaign data and also keeps track of site usage for the site's analytics report. Winwood’s point with much of these brushes with history is to show the depths of depravity that goes beyond the drink and drugs that have allegedly stemmed creatives bursts with a unique intimacy only gained through the trust and interest of rockstars that still tour and take their chances with substances today. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. Conversations about mental health and support for those with issues should be an essential part of looking after artists.