EXCERPT FROM NO WAVE, UP TODAY AT PITCHFORK

An exclusive excerpt from NO WAVE is up today at pitchforkmedia.com. You can check it out here. It's a slightly condensed version of Chapter One, exploring the origins of the movement, its musical inspirations, and the conditions in New York at the time that allowed this loose collective of artists to live on practically nothing - freeing them to form bands, play shows, and influence each other. This is the most quote-heavy section of the book, so I hope it gives everyone a pretty good feel for all the voices and characters who played key roles in No Wave.

For anyone curious about what the rest of the book covers, here's a chapter rundown:

ONE: NO!: The Origins of No Wave
TWO: From Ten to One: Mars and DNA
THREE: Dissatisfied: Lydia Lunch and James Chance
FOUR: Theoretical Music: The Soho Contingent (Theoretical Girls, Gynecologists, UT, Rhys Chatham, Glenn Branca, and more)
FIVE: The Offenders: No Wave Cinema
SIX: Too Many Creeps: The Aftermath of No Wave (Lounge Lizards, Don King, Bush Tetras, ESG, Sonic Youth, Swans, Live Skull, and more)

Sprinkled in between chapters are sidebars delving in more detail into some fascinating crevices of No Wave. These include sections on Dark Day (Robin Crutchfield's post-DNA band), Lydia Lunch's surreal solo album Queen of Siam (which included compositions arrangements by the guy who wrote the Flintstones theme!), the psychotic trio Red Transistor (featuring Von Lmo and Rudolph Grey), the No Wave-ish cable access show TV Party, and the sub-No Wave scene based around NO Magazine and Tape #1 (including criminally underappreciated bands like Information, Blinding Headache, and Mofungo).

Also included are a foreword by No Wave archivist/expert Weasel Walter, and a ton of photos like the ones seen on Pitchfork today - we have illustrations on every page including live pictures, flyers, film stills, film scripts, and all other types of images, many never seen in a book before. Watch this space for samples of those in the coming months...