Robert Hilburn was the chief pop music critic for the Los Angeles Times for more than three decades. Author of the bestselling biography Johnny Cash: The Life, which Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times selected as one of her top ten books of 2013, Hilburn has reported extensively on most of pop music's giants, including Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen and U2. He lives in Los Angeles.
"Epic . . . Definitive . . . Paul Simon offers unprecedented access
into the private life of the singer-songwriter."
--Rolling Stone "Hilburn evokes the singer-songwriter here in all
his melancholy and sweet-natured splendor. Stories of Simon's hits
and flops, insecurities, three marriages, perfectionist dad, and
frenemy Art Garfunkel make the book as engaging as a lively
American tune."
--People magazine "A straight-shooting tour de force . . . Like
Simon, Hilburn's passion is music, and he makes clear that Simon's
is very much a life in and of music--a drive for aesthetic
achievement, deeply serious in the studio and onstage. . . .
Hilburn does thorough justice to this American prophet and pop
star."
--USA Today (four stars out of four stars) "Every now and
then--rarely!--a book casts a little light on the creative
development of a gifted artist. Paul Simon: The Life is one of
those few. Read it if you like Simon; read it if you want to
discover how talent unfolds itself."
--Stephen King "Absorbing . . . . Hilburn's biography flows
smoothly along on the river of his liquid prose. He excels at
telling stories because he pays attention to details and facts,
never overwhelming readers with the mundane, but always making sure
that the stories rest on a solid foundation. . . . A sprawling,
sparkling narrative of a songwriter who has shaped the canon of
popular music with his inventive, sometimes playful, and discerning
poetry."
--No Depression "Up-to-date and scrupulously researched . . . The
timing is perfect . . . . I grew more sympathetic with Paul Simon
the deeper I got into this book."
--The Wall Street Journal "Eloquent and comprehensive . . . Not
only examines the personal life and professional career of the
great American singer-songwriter, but also the artistic process at
work."
--The Globe and Mail "Paul Simon is not an autobiography but it
might as well be. . . . The result, happy to say, is the biography
an artist like Paul Simon deserves; it takes its subject as
seriously as Simon takes himself. . . . It is filled with more than
enough anecdotes and factoids to please any fans."
--The New York Journal of Books "Thorough, balanced . . . Paul
Simon reminds us how titanic this musician is."
--The Washington Post "Fans will relish reading the stories behind
some of his most iconic tunes (he wrote "The Sound of Silence" with
the lights out in his bathroom, mourning the assassination of JFK)
and taking a deep dive into his remarkable career."
--AARP Magazine "Energetic and elegant . . . Hilburn's brilliant
and entertaining portrait of Simon will likely be the definitive
biography."
--Publishers Weekly (starred review) "With train-wreck moments and
tender interludes alike, a book that delivers a sharply detailed
Kodachrome of a brilliant musician."
--Kirkus Reviews "Engrossing . . . Simon is revealed as sensitive
yet tough, spontaneous yet controlled, as well as reflective,
perceptive, and empathetic, but also judgmental, insecure, and
extremely competitive. As a songwriter, he has earned a spot in the
canon alongside Gershwin, Lennon-McCartney, and Dylan."
--Booklist "In this detailed recounting of the life of Paul Simon,
veteran biographer Robert Hilburn delivers a lively, eye-opening
tale of the evolution of a doo-wop kid from Queens into an
international musical phenomenon. Best of all, Hilburn's telling
runs at just the right pace as it brings us inside Simon's personal
life, as well as inside his music--often song by song--while
illuminating Simon's ingenious adaptations of music from all over
the world."
--Billy Collins "Master storyteller and interviewer Robert Hilburn
knows how to draw the best from an artist. The intimacy of these
interviews gives Paul Simon: The Life the feel of Paul Simon's best
work, generous and witty and so rich in detail. It'll send you back
to the music with all these soul-stirring stories still in your
heart."
--Cameron Crowe "There are two great storytellers colliding here.
There's no tougher a mind, no more tender a voice than Paul Simon,
and there's no better man than Robert Hilburn to decipher the
hardwiring of this hyperintellect. From the prologue I was sucked
in, suckered into a sense that I too might discover the genetic
code of some of the greatest songs of any century. By the epilogue,
you realize the great songs can never be fully explained, but the
great man on his way to find those songs surely can."
--Bono "When it comes to writing songs, no one does it better than
Paul Simon. Robert Hilburn's is a wise and winning account of our
most nimble, nuanced, and numinous poet-musician."
--Paul Muldoon "A tantalizing look into the mind and writing
process of the man who is arguably the finest craftsman of the
American popular song since the Gershwin brothers, this book will
delight any Paul Simon fan or student of popular culture."
--Linda Ronstadt
PRAISE FOR JOHNNY CASH: THE LIFE New York Times' Michiko Kakutani's
10 Favorite Books of 2013
An NPR, Kirkus, and Publishers Weekly Best Books of the Year
Clive Davis's Favorite Book of the Year in The Wall Street
Journal's 50 Notable People "A thorough and thoughtful portrait of
the Man in Black and a deep appreciation of his artistry . . .
Hilburn writes most powerfully about Cash's trajectory as an
artist. . . . His writing is as authoritative as it's engaging when
he's discussing the singer-songwriter's music." --Michiko Kakutani,
New York Times "An excellent biography . . . A story that's both
larger and more fascinating than the legend . . . Hilburn has
created the definitive narrative of this 'symbol of American honor,
compassion and struggle.' It's a biography worthy of its subject."
--USA Today "The result of Hilburn's wrestling with his subject's
life and with his own moral compass is perhaps the richest
biography of a musician I have ever read, and one of the best
biographies I have read, period. . . . Hilburn knows how to
organize a life in print skillfully. . . . Hilburn is a first-rate
stylist. His sentences often sing." --Atlanta Journal Constitution
"A comprehensive and thoughtful biography, cognizant always of how
hard it is for heroes to make it in America . . . Hilburn does an
artful, enviable job of reconciling all the facets [of Cash] . . .
[and] writes with a remarkably steady hand. . . . Johnny Cash is
measured and mindful, allowing of all the paradoxical bits that
constitute a human life." --Los Angeles Times "Hilburn's Johnny
Cash: The Life is the big biography Cash's fans have been waiting
for since the singer's death in 2003 and Hilburn doesn't let them
down." --Jeff Baker, The Oregonian "The ultimate Johnny Cash bio .
. . Rock writer great Robert Hilburn goes deep." --Rolling Stone
"Do we really need another Johnny Cash book? Yes, we really do, as
it turns out, because Johnny Cash is so very good. . . . Hilburn's
work is far and away the most insightful, entertaining,
comprehensive, and well-told Cash biography to date." --Slate "It's
a rare gift to be given the opportunity to step far back from the
confusing miasma of one's own childhood to see the entire soaring
arc of a parent's life, and to be able to look clear-eyed at the
puzzle of his character and the kaleidoscope of pain and beauty.
This is the breathtaking gift Robert Hilburn has given me in a
definitive biography of my father that is excruciatingly honest,
rigorously researched, and has the depth and integrity that his
subject demands. I had to take many breaks while reading this book
to assimilate all the stories I knew, but had never put in a
narrative context, being claustrophobically close to not only the
events themselves but the resonance of those events. I felt dizzy
from the sense of time travel and from the odd notion that
Hilburn's masterful organization of the paradoxes and the fullness
of who Johnny Cash was--and is--satisfies not only my father's
family and fans, but himself as well. To those who fiercely cling
to a one-dimensional view of my father to satisfy their own
ideals--dark or light, saint or sinner, right or left--I challenge
them to read this book and begin to understand a far, far more
interesting and complex man: a truly great, visionary artist, a
deeply flawed human being capable of experiencing inconceivable
amounts of both love and pain, and a huge spirit who now belongs to
the ages." --Rosanne Cash
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