Chris Welch (1) (1941–)

If you’re going to subtitle a biographical book “a life in pictures,” you better make a concerted effort to design the narrative carefully around the pictorial illustrations. Unfortunately, Chris Welch’s efforts to meet his titular mandate were mediocre at best, and at no point did I feel like I was on a visual journey through the life of David Bowie… Bowie is an artist who rose to stardom with a carefully curated (and extremely well documented) visual image that made him into an icon as much, if not more so, than his music did, so it should have been exceedingly simple to narrate his life alongside a selection of photographs showing his life’s personas. While the book does contain some lovely photographs throughout, Welch’s accompanying text is lack lustre and rarely pairs well with the visual story - and forget about any sort of concerted effort towards a graphic design sensibility to blend the two storytelling mediums. The photographs appear haphazardly throughout the chapters, contain little in terms of captioning or credits, and are far from revelatory, so reading the book (in any sense of the form) quickly became a fool’s errand. The only reason that I’m going to keep the book in my collection (for now, at least) is because a few of the images are worth saving, since the print quality is decent, but if I find a better composed pictorial biography this one may get relegated to the scrapbook/printwall.… (mehr)

Don’t be fooled by the cheesy cover, because this is a great book. Rock journalist Chris Welch chronicles Led Zeppelin’s career from his vantage point of multiple personal conversations with the band members over the years. Writing for Melody Maker, he was THERE when it was all happening. He was invited on tour with Led Zeppelin, and attended many shows on his own. The book includes a lot of anecdotes and facts not present in the glut of other Led Zeppelin books. This is one of the few Zep books out there that don’t rely on dubious sources, recycled myths, or hearsay. This book is for those who care about the music.… (mehr)