{"id":30605,"date":"2026-02-13T05:30:34","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T10:30:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=30605"},"modified":"2026-02-13T10:12:40","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T15:12:40","slug":"book-review-graham-parkers-howlin-wind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/13\/book-review-graham-parkers-howlin-wind\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Graham Parker’s Howlin’ Wind"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"On the face of it, an entire book dealing with the first album by Graham Parker<\/a> and the Rumour might seem a bit excessive. While Howlin\u2019 Wind<\/i> is an important work and a superb debut, it represents a small slice of Parker\u2019s body of work. Better, perhaps, to author a career overview with Howlin\u2019 Wind<\/i> as a major highlight?<\/p>\n

Author Jay Nachman doesn\u2019t see things that way, and after reading Graham Parker\u2019s Howlin\u2019 Wind<\/i>, I am wholly convinced of the wisdom of his decision. While in some ways Nachman\u2019s book is a biography of Parker<\/a>\u2019s life (up to 1976, anyway) in truth it\u2019s much more than that. Nachman\u2019s keen and deep appreciation and understanding of Parker\u2019s music and artistry equips him to present a story that\u2019s balanced in its emphases. With the help of quotes from Graham Parker and his associates (Parker and the Rumour are actually co-credited as authors!), Nachman dispels some long-held ideas about what was and was not \u201cpub rock,\u201d and how that critics\u2019 retroactive invention (see also: freakbeat, proto-punk) glossed over some important qualities of the music being made in the \u201870s.<\/p>\n

Nachman recognizes that Graham Parker<\/a>\u2019s work deserves discussion and consideration alongside that of higher profile artists such as Bruce Springsteen and Van Morrison. He\u2019s also unafraid to credit those artists as formative influences upon Parker\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

The book gets into some music criticism and analysis, but does so in a way that won\u2019t fly over the heads of non-musos. Nachman writes with economy and wit (though free from snark) and his well-cultivated love for the music shines through on every page. He never oversells Parker, but readers who come to the book thinking, \u201cHey, Graham Parker<\/a>\u2019s a pretty fine artist\u201d are likely to come away with an understanding that he\u2019s much more than that. And rightly so. And like all of the best works of its type, Nachman\u2019s Graham Parker\u2019s Howlin\u2019 Wind<\/i> will not only lead readers back to its musical subject, but to the subsequent releases from this powerful and still wonderfully vital<\/a> singer-songwriter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the face of it, an entire book dealing with the first album by Graham Parker and the Rumour might seem a bit excessive. While Howlin\u2019 Wind is an important […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30607,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,49,60,62,65],"tags":[931,5834],"class_list":["post-30605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book","category-new-release","category-rb","category-rawk","category-review","tag-graham-parker","tag-jay-nachman","cat-10-id","cat-49-id","cat-60-id","cat-62-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30605"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30605\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30788,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30605\/revisions\/30788"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30607"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}