– Customer review on 25/09/2011

Bill Bruford - once called 'the godfather of progressive-rock drumming' - has been at the top of his profession for four decades, playing with Yes, King Crimson, Genesis, Earthworks, and many more. This is his memoir of life at the heart of prog rock, art rock, and modern jazz. It is an honest, entertaining, well-written account of life on the road and in the studio - rubbing shoulders with the famous, the less famous, and the infamous, and creating an impressive tally of great music.A rock musician with the temperament of a classical musician who became a jazz musician, Bruford defies all the cliches about drummers. He says: 'You write what you have to write, you play what you have to play, because you can't sleep at night. If you can sleep at night, you shouldn't be doing this anyway'. From time to time, at polite dinner parties, someone will ask Bill what he does. He replies that he is a musician. 'Yes, but what do you really do?' retorts the enquirer. This unusual, funny, and insightful music memoir answers the question

– Customer review on 24/06/2009

There are a huge number of rock musician biographies published and yet very few rock musician biographies worth reading. This is definitely worth reading because Bruford is a great teller of stories, and he has a great many stories to tell. His humour is the main attraction here: he doesn't take himself too seriously at all, which means he certainly doesn't take his fellow musicians too seriously either - there is some nice deflating of egos and reputations in this book. A great read.