Nick Mason: Inside Out - A Personal History Of Pink Floyd - more details and info! |
Written by Matt | |
Wednesday, 23 June 2004 | |
We are pleased to share with you excerpts from the extensive press release for Nick Mason's forthcoming, and long anticipated, book about Pink Floyd - "Inside Out". The press release itself is a superbly produced item - housed in a LP style cover (the front of which shown to the right), is a four page glossy card fold out full of information about Nick's book. If the following details from the release don't whet your appetite for what's in the book, then we are not sure what will! To accompany the release will be a large number of promotional activities, from interviews with Nick to book signings and serialisations in the press. We have details of most of this, but we are waiting for final confirmations of times, dates and locations... Finally, we should point out that, having seen the cover of the book, it is quite different to the image to the right.
About this book Nick has appeared at every gig, from a handful of late-night dates at a long-extinct London club in late 1965, through to playing the largest stadia in the world, by way of the Palais de Versailles and the Canale di San Marco in Venice. This is very much Nick's personal view, but in addition to his own research and memories, he has drawn on the thoughts and reminiscences of key players in the Floyd story. The history is rounded off with Nick's own version of the band's discography and chronology, incorporating his comments and observations. As the band's unofficial curator, Nick's personal archives represent an extensive and significant resource for photographs, including many that are both rare and unpublished, graphics and props. Nick, Roger Waters and Rick Wright met when all three were architectural students at the Regent Street Poly. In keeping with that architectural background (which perhaps became most overt in The Wall, but is also reflected in the band's high level of involvement in the construction of their stage shows), the contents fall into four blocks of three chapters. The mid point of the book, the end of chapter 6, marks the release of The Dark Side Of The Moon. The text has been read by Paul Du Noyer (Mojo and Q Magazine), who writes: "When I was asked to read Nick Mason's book for my comments I had no hesitation in accepting. While I was never a particularly avid fan of Pink Floyd, I was always aware of their huge influence on music; I was naturally conscious too, of their phenomenal popularity. "But more than either of those things, I was drawn to the promise of a great story to be told. Here was a band, after all, who had been at the very centre of the psychedelic upheaval, a band that featured the bewildered but charismatic Syd Barrett (a man whose spectacular rise and fall is one of rock music's enduring legends). "This is the group who once epitomised 'way-out' experimentalism, yet became the stadium band of choice for mainstream music fans everywhere. And these are the men whose internal divisions would serve as a paradigm of superstar feuding. "All in all, it promised to be a richly entertaining tale. The question was, would Nick be willing or able to tell it? "To my delight he was not only willing, he was a superb story-teller. The draft I read was rich with anecdote, clarity and shrewdness. Nick was not only Pink Floyd's drummer, he was their curator. He has been at the heart of their story all along, but has preserved a humorous detachment as well. Perhaps alone of all its members, he appears to have no axe to grind, no score to settle. "There cannot be many stories left in rock that are as big as Pink Floyd's. And I doubt whether anyone could tell this story so well as the patient, witty man who watched it all unfold from his perch behind the drum kit." And Alan Parker, the director of the film Pink Floyd The Wall, wrote: "I laughed out loud so many times my wife thought I had Tourette's. It's so well written, full of detail, self-deprecating and funny. A seminal book - an intelligent, literate rock and roll memoir full of candour and wit."
The Images
The Design
Chapter points We will have more information for you shortly...watch this space! |