The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #152466   Message #3565991
Posted By: Ron Davies
11-Oct-13 - 08:31 AM
Thread Name: Review: Linda Ronstadt's New Memoir
Subject: Review: Linda Ronstadt's New Memoir
Well, this sure ain't BS to me.    Review is the closest I can come.

Her new book is a pure delight.    I haven't even finished it yet--but you could probably read it in one sitting;   it's only about 200 pages.   Flagrantly violated my own rule about only buying meaty books--usually 500 pp. or above.

But I knew I couldn't resist it.      Sure enough, it's a fascinating--if short--version of her life up to now.    All sorts of worthwhile items to remember (I call it stories, rather than trivia).

Just off the top of my head, and not to steal her fire too much:   when she left home and school at about 18, over her parents' objections, her father gave her a Martin his father had bought new in 1898, with these words:    Ahora que tienes guitarra, nunca tendras hambre. Need a diacritical mark, but translation is approximately:    Now that you have a guitar, you will never go hungry.    I think that's just great. Proved, in her case, to be true.

Then there's the item that Keith Richards and Gram Parsons bonded over Keith's desire to learn about country music.    So much so that when Gram begged him to let him record "Wild Horses" , Keith agreed--Gram recorded it a year before the Stones did.

Then the story about how Jerry Brown garbled Linda's invitation to sing in "Pirates of Penzance"--I won't spill the beans on that.

Just a great window into the music business in the 70's--and so many stars that lit up the firmament then. And of course some of her own story, especially musical development.