Reviews for Cross and Tory Democracy A Political Biography of Richard Assheton Cross

The average rating for Cross and Tory Democracy A Political Biography of Richard Assheton Cross based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2007-09-26 00:00:00 Cleaves Bennett I like human voices, the more human the better, which is where these dramatic-melismatic upscale and downscale contemporary singers trip up all over their soft parts, I think - they're all so "good" they become interchangeable, like great engines. They sing their songs to death. Under their lashings and howlings and pitch-perfect ululations what sentiment can survive? Some fine singers of the past got to make one indelible record - Priscilla Paris cooing like the Angel of Complete Sex on "I Love how you Love Me" or Cathy Jean Giordano's stark and frankly caterwauling doowop psychodrama "Please Love Me Forever", and some great voices get to sing acres of junk and consequently get forgotten (Doris Troy, Maxine Brown, Bessie Banks, Irma Thomas, lots more). But some voices are unstoppable, no matter what unappealing face they emerge from – Roy Orbison, to take an obvious example. By 1960 Roy already looked dead – completely white face, never moved a muscle on stage, never even moved his lips, he was too old, he was too pudgy, in the age of Elvis and Beatles he really should have been sent right back to Wink, Texas, but he opened up his larynx of gold and climbed all the way up to the top of Runnin’ Scared or In Dreams and nothing physical mattered, he became pure spirit, pure pain, pure pleasure. Dusty Springfield was like that – she could ride in on the crest of an orchestral crescendo like the Silver Surfer and then in a heartbeat be whispering right behind your ear. In her ballads she was the poster girl for grace under pressure, in lots of other tunes she sounded like real fun. Which is the opposite of what this biography reveals. Dusty made herself up, literally. She invented her name and she created the famous bouffant-tranny-with-the mad-mascara image, as artificial as a Japanese Noh player, because she knew that without it she was the female Roy Orbison and you might be able to get away with being homely if you’re a man but uh-uh, not if you’re a girl in the swinging 60s. A fan once caught her without make-up on the street one day, and the fan's reaction was enough to make Dusty never ever go out of the house without the panda eyes again. Dusty never sang the Great American Songbook, I would have liked that, she never sang Jacques Brel* – I would have loved that, and she didn’t become a disco diva in the 70s, an obvious move I could have put up with. In fact after 1970 it all went horribly wrong, all the comebacks failed, the sporadic albums were crap, the mental breakdowns got scarier. Sometimes I have those daft fantasies that I go back in time and yell Hey – Buddy!! Get off the damn plane! Now! There’s a terrible storm coming right this way! or Hey! Jeff! Get out the damn river – there’s a bad current about ten feet from right where you are! But you couldn’t shout anything from the future into Dusty Springfield’s life to prevent it becoming the car crash it was. She lived through the time of gay liberation (as it was called back then) and it didn't do a thing for her, she was still petrified about coming out. Hundreds of promoters grovelled at her stilettoed feet casting rubies and pearls about her and she threw glassware at them all until no one dared come within half a mile of her. It wasn't pretty. She was a manic depressive. But records are records and they can’t be unrecorded, and we have those, and we can hope that the voice was, while it sang, sometimes at least, as it is to us fans always, its own justification. This is a decent enough showbiz bio, but I’d advise all Dusty fans to avoid it altogether. You really don’t need to know the details. I’m sorry I read this. * except If you Go Away

Review # 2 was written on 2009-01-18 00:00:00 Baulin Xavier Heartbreaking but at times very amusing. Lots of hardcore Dusty fans hate this book because they don't like the way it portrays the singer but I think it shows her fun loving side as well as the beautifully talented but extremely troubled part that pretty ,much ruled her life. I hope this is a true recollection of Dusty because, not only did I thoroughly enjoy her story but I also found many parts of the book that I could relate to.