Reviews for Nick Drake: The Complete Guide to His Music. Peter Hogan (Complete Guide to the Music of...)

The average rating for Nick Drake: The Complete Guide to His Music. Peter Hogan (Complete Guide to the Music of...) based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2018-11-29 00:00:00 Spiridione Mifsud Simplistic, short and rather skimpy, I'm afraid. While Nick Drake's life was short and shrouded with mystery and could therefore be covered satisfactorily in a short book, one expects rather more from a book that purports to be a "complete" guide to his music. What we get is a brief bio and then a track-by-track breakdown of his main albums with brief discussions of each song. So those discussions by definition need to be enlightening and/or comprehensive. Unfortunately precisely where the book needs to get down and prove its worth is where it badly loses its way. Aside from the odd nugget of useful information, these thumbnail sketches seem more like lists cribbed from one of the music monthlies, where space is more often an issue than it needs to be in a "complete guide". They are often lacking in any kind of insight at all. Just witness the desultory and critically skimpy lines given to Cello Song (which in just about anyone's judgment has to be seen as one of the pivotal and most indelible tracks on Five Leaves Left): "A song in praise of innocence, with the singer feeling unworthy of his love; she’s far above him. There’s a mournful quality here, though much of that is probably the simple result of using a cello." This is the entire review. I kid you not. A fifth grader could have trumped it. Then comes this pearl a little later: "Trevor Dann thinks ‘Hazey Jane’ might stand for heroin, in the same way that ‘Mary Jane’ stood for marijuana. Personally, I’m not convinced - and the other ‘Hazey Jane’ song on this album is definitely a love song to a girl, so the theory simply collapses. Here, Jane’ is someone the singer is definitely pining for, but that doesn’t mean she’s a drug." Then there is the enlightening way in which Hogan begins his "discussion" of the peerless and haunting At The Chime of a City Clock, one of those rare tracks that still gives of itself thousands of plays later: "A vaguely jazzy song about the big city and failing to fit in there." Or this doozy, about Road: "Some think this is about survival, some think it’s about contemplating suicide. You pays your money… but it seems to me that there’s some gritty determination on display here, so the former gets my vote." Evidently, in the presence of critical acumen or insightful prose we are not. This is a by-the numbers book which shockingly is not self-published and was actually released by Omnibus. It is, among other things, diametrically opposed to the way Nick Drake painstakingly constructed his fingerpicking parts and songs. Throughout Hogan keeps quoting Trevor Dann's slightly longer book, so I think that is where we shall go for our next Nick Drake stop…

Review # 2 was written on 2015-04-10 00:00:00 Kerry Carson Straightforward guide to everything Nick recorded until his death in 1974. Provides a few interesting theories on his life's events and a quick approach at possible meanings of the majority of his songs. The specific dates, places, people and events in his life given are good to see, but no so much as musical and lyrical analysis, of which there is practically none here. Still worth reading, it's a very short book.