Reviews for Joe Cocker: The Authorised Biography

The average rating for Joe Cocker: The Authorised Biography based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-08-08 00:00:00 Ron Ramsden I may well be going slightly over the top with four stars here. Much in the genre of 'poptastic' biography I find to be somewhat wearisome at times. Julian Bean's authorised biog of Joe Cocker, published first in 1990 and then updated in 2003, as it's subject approached his sixtieth year, manages to avoid the usual tedium while at the same time documents Cocker's forty year career in 'rocks' helter skelter. J.P. Bean delivers with balance and 'warts and all' honesty, and there are some warts! Way back to the early sixties in Sheffield venues J.C. was swilling pints of beer and singing the blues. Once he hit with a little help from his Grease Band copious amounts of narcotics were added to the alcohol. Without the constitution of an ox, Cocker shouln't have lasted much beyond Woodstock. However, through the highs and lows of world tours, drug busts, band splits and management contract tangles, John Robert Cocker is alive and well in the twenty first century. Fully recovered from his drug and alcohol hang ups, happily married and living on his Colorado ranch, Cocker's career is still on the road, up where he belongs. I did see Joe Cocker and the Grease Band back in the sixties but haven't particularly followed his musical endeavours over the past forty years, this book is a good catch up with a long journey that doesn't end in the all too familiar depressing overdosed anti-climax.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-11-05 00:00:00 Gregory Sovetts A great book about a great guy with a ton of rock and roll cred.