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Product Description
Book Description
Metallica, the seventh-biggest recording act in American history, are consummate musicians - but it wasn't always that way. A significant proportion of their playing expertise was acquired from a pivotal three-year period in their history - 1983 to 1986 - during which their music, a potent variant of thrash metal, evolved from garage-level to sophisticated, progressive heights - thanks to the teachings of their bass player, Cliff Burton. The San Francisco-raised Burton pushed the band to new musical levels with his musical training, songwriting ability, and phenomenal bass guitar skills. Cliff's life was short but influential; his death was sudden and shocking. With his death, Metallica's most critically acclaimed period of activity ended. They went on to record huge-selling albums, but by their own admission, never pushed the creative envelope as radically as they had done in the first four years of their career.
About the Author
Joel McIver writes for Total Guitar, Metal Hammer and many other music magazines and is the author of 12 books to date. The best-known of these is Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica (2004), which has sold over 30,000 copies in eight languages. He makes regular appearances on radio and TV.
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Most helpful customer reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Five star book,
By
This review is from: To Live Is to Die: The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (Paperback)
the first and only book about one the most influential metal bass guitar player of the century.A very fine research done by McIver, insight from Burton's family, friends and bandmates. Could have take a little more pictures but the text is rich with anecdotes and really reflects Cliff nature and gives you (yet) another point of view of the brilliant debut of the greatest metal band of the last decades. A must have for any Metallica (and Cliff Burton) fan.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
To read is to die,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: To Live Is to Die: The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (Paperback)
This is a bit of a disappointment.I have enjoyed so much McIver's others books on Metallica and Slayer that I had expected the same from this one. A lot of redundancy from interviews saying almost the same thing, over and over again. This could have been a single chapter in "The truth about Metallica" instead of a full book. Cliff was a superb player. Cliff was a great and a bit unusual guy with eclectic musical taste. How many times can you write this? On top of it all , I almost could not finish the book. The last chapter simply restates what had been repeated many times before. Incursions into the Metallica story were inevitable but , having read "The truth..." was it really necessary? 20% of the books is almost verbatim from his previous books...at least it felt that way. Additional details about the accident? Cliff's influence on Metallica music? What Cliff would have thought or the Load-Reload duet? Sorry. It simply did not click with me. Sorry. I expected a lot more from McIver And the book's binding is so stiff that I almost could not hold it open with one hand. The few photos at the beginning of the book are nice but ...very few. Mind you, Cliff is still one of the best bass player in of the the greatest metal band in the world. Too bad he passed away. Too bad his only biography passes as a redundant bunch of interviews. Sorry Joel. I really think this is not up to par.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.4 out of 5 stars (28 customer reviews) 24 of 25 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Bellbottoms Rule!,
By Rico - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: To Live Is to Die: The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (Paperback)
Well, it has taken nearly 23years, but Clifford Lee Burton has finally gotten some of the respect he deserves, a book dedicated to his life, thanks to Joel McIver. All these years, we only had the Cliff 'Em All Video and brief commentary that you would see on Metallica documentaries. Sadly enough, Cliff was just a mere side note and almost always glossed over, which gave the newer Metallica fans a false sense of how the band developed their style and attitude, which in return, outraged the old fans. The book did a good job detailing Cliff's days before he joined Metallica, with his musical training that was inspired by the death of his older brother and the support he had from his parents Jan and Ray Burton. The book also touches on his bands prior to Metallica, which were Easy Street and most notably Trauma. McIver details all of the tracks that Cliff played on, with moderate bass detail from Kill 'Em All through Master of Puppets. The only omission would be the Creeping Death 12" single, in which Am I Evil? and Blitzkrieg were on the B-side. A lot of the quotes from Cliff and other people, I had heard many times and could practically finish the sentence, but there is very little to go on, being that Cliff didn't do many interviews. I only wished there were more recounts from people and bands he had toured with. I also found some date inconsistencies in the book. It was refreshing to hear some of the more recent recounts from people like Ron Quintana, Harold O, Brian Slagel, Fred Cotton and some of his earliest friends. To me, the memories and testimony from Corinne Lynn, Cliff's girlfriend, is what made the book special. The last part of the book unfortunately dealt with a lot of "what if" scenarios that I could of done without, but it ended on an extremely heart felt recollection from Corrinne, that shed more insight on Cliff Burton the human being, which left me very sad.I would also like to say, that Cliff Burton has always been an inspiration, from the love and respect he gave his family, to the complete and total honesty he lived his life by. Not only can Metallica fans benefit from this, but the Human Race in general. I hope this is not the last book we see on his life. 11 of 14 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
has me reconsidering Cliff,
By William Irwin - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: To Live Is to Die: The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (Paperback)
I'm a huge Metallica fan from way back in the day, and I saw Cliff on the Puppets tour. Cliff was definitely charismatic and stood for the "doing it on our terms" attitude that characterized Metallica in the early days. That said, I've always thought people attributed too much to Cliff in response to his untimely death. McIver's book has me seriously reconsidering that. I'm not a musician, and I find bass particularly hard to pick out and appreciate. McIver, though, is an accomplished bass player himself and brings that to bear in his analysis of Cliff's sonic contributions to the songs from Metallica's greatest albums. No doubt Cliff helped shape Metallica's classic sound, and maybe just maybe, they wouldn't have made some of their later bad moves if Cliff was still with them. In sum, this book is definitely worthwhile if you want a clearer view of what Cliff contributed personally and professionally to some of the greatest music of all time.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
A three-star book about a five-star guy,
By Privacy, Please - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: To Live Is to Die: The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (Paperback)
Cliff has always been my favorite member of Metallica and, given his untimely death early in the band's career, coupled with his not giving many interviews, he's always been a bit of a mystery man as well. Cliff needed a book written about him, and I'm glad this author took on the task. The book's heart is in the right place as it pays righteous dues to the influence Cliff had within Metallica and to his cool, focused personality, all the more awesome given his young age. The author clearly did his homework and spoke to a good many people, including not only Metallica members and associates, but also Cliff's friends and bandmates from pre-Metallica days and his girlfriend Corinne Lynn. Besides the personal details, the author also goes into some educated detail about Cliff's bass playing, while making an effort (as he explains) not to go overboard with the geek stuff.All in all, a great subject and not a bad book. So, why only three stars? Couple things. Although the personal stories about Cliff from those who knew him well are the best parts, the book often devolves from being the story of Cliff to being the story of Metallica generally. I realize some background is necessary, but there's a bit too much at times - it seems almost like padding in spots to make the book long enough. Example: There's an account of how, after Metallica's first big US stadium show, James Hetfield and a friend got really drunk, threw food at audience members, trashed the dressing room, and later wrote obscenities on the seat of another friend's white pants. This story goes on for pages, and the only thing it has to do with Cliff is that (as the author recounts in like, two lines) Cliff refused to participate in the food throwing and trashing. Multiply that by about two or three stories per chapter. Not what the book was advertised to be. Also, the writing style tends to be needlessly repetitive, a fact the author even notes in places with comments about how he knows he's mentioned such-and-such before but is going to say it again. The author in general injects too much of himself and his opinions into the book, when I really just wanted to hear people who knew Cliff talk about Cliff. Finally, there are very few photos of Cliff in the book, mostly in the front; the chapters are headed by a b&w picture of Cliff but it's the same picture for every chapter. This seems especially weird since several of the folks interviewed at length for the book were photographers and talk about photographing Cliff, or Metallica when Cliff was in it. So, how come we don't get to see more of these pictures? I'm glad somebody wrote a book about Cliff, may he rest in peace. I just hope this isn't going to be the only one written. |
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