It Gets Me Home, This Curving Track

When all else fails, when our compass is broken, there is one thing some of us have come to rely on: music really can give us a sense of something like home. With IT GETS ME HOME, THIS CURVING TRACK, legendary music critic Ian Penman reaches for a vanished moment in musical history when cultures collided and a certain kind of cross-generational and `cross-colour' awareness was born. His cast of characters includes the Mods, James Brown, Charlie Parker, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, John Fahey, Steely Dan and Prince - black artists who were innovators, and white musicians who copied them for the mainstream. In `prose that glides and shimmies and pivots on risky metaphors, low puns and highbrow reference points' (Brian Dillon, FRIEZE), Ian Penman's first book in twenty years is cause for celebration.