All book up

Poet, editor, publisher, journalist, critic, writer of fiction, promoter/entrepreneur – Andrew Darlington has been many things in his time, so it’s perhaps no surprise to learn that he is also Elvis Presley’s bastard love child.

Or, at least, that’s according to the title of Andy’s first published collection of rock journalism out now on Heasdpress/Critical Vision.

Design-wise, the book betrays the Yorkshire-based author’s abiding passion for comix and sci-fi while the luminous prose reflects a mind long since turned by rock’s enduring mavericks and pioneers. So here, often adapted from articles which first appeared in hotpress, are interviews with Peter Green, Country Joe, Cabaret Voltaire, Gene Clark, Robert Plant, The Fall, Holger Czukay, Mott The Hoople, The Stone Roses and many more.

As Andy himself says about the music, “it’s the greatest legal high on earth”. And here’s a book that really captures that maximum voltage rush.