Book 48 - Bedsit Disco Queen by Tracey Thorn

Reading date - December 2020

I've realised what I like so much about biographies by musicians.  It's not the behind the scenes of the actual music business, it's how they were before they became big and what their life was like.  Everyone is fascinated by the mundane, whether they like to admit it or not..or they just want to know what went on behind closed doors.  I have a copy of Brett Anderson's Coal Black Mornings and I loved it because 1)I love the man 2)I have a massive crush on him and have had since the first time Suede came to my attention and 3)because his life was so normal..he doesn't come from a fancy showbizzy family, he was just a boy who lived in Crawley with an eccentric dad.

I found this on Depop and it was the first thing I'd ever bought on there.  I started out really liking this book, Tracey Thorn has a very disarming way of writing about herself, it's not arrogant, it's honest without being self deprecating and I really like that.  It begins with her as a child, going through schools, liking certain bands, forming groups with mates and just getting on with childhood and teenage life.  She gets into uni and that is where she meets a boy called Ben.

Her and Ben bumble around, forming groups and making music.  They are quite well known around the uni town where they go and they develop a relationship.  The book follows their various musical releases leading up to their biggest hit "Missing".

This is one of those books that you read, then when you go back and listen to their music, it all makes sense.  You can actually see in the music all the things outlined in the book about their musical style.  

The book is also about her actual life, i.e away from the music and we follow both Tracey and Ben through his illness and through child-birth and parenthood.

The book ends at the start (I love when books  do that) and I would recommend this to anyone who likes reading music autobiographies and who was a kid growing up in the 90's, like I was.