OUR BOOK OF the month for April is Original Rockers by Richard King. The follow up to How Soon Is Now?, his hugely enjoyable history of independent record labels, finds Richard in lyrical mood, reminiscing about a period in the early 1990s when he worked in an independent record shop in Bristol. Back then most towns had a decent indie; their numbers were yet to plummet in the wake of downloading and streaming sites. Record shops, like bookshops, are more than retail spaces where goods are sold – they act as social hubs where like-minded people can meet and connect.

Richard blends memoir and elegiac music writing on the likes of Captain Beefheart, CAN, Julian Cope, roots reggae, British improv and Massive Attack. He is good at recalling the debauched glory days of the independent record shop – chaotic, amateurish and extravagantly dysfunctional, this is a book full of rare personalities and rum stories. It is a book about landscape, place and the personal; the first piece of writing to treat the environment of the record shop as a natural resource with its own peculiar rhythms and anecdotal histories.

Original Rockers is published by Faber Social and is getting great reviews:

‘A telling evocation of a lost past, so recent as to still be echoing in my ears, Richard King’s highly personal memoir in music stirs up scenes of provincial revolution, drawing together telling, disparate strands of influence – from the English idyll of Virginia Astley to Bristol shabeens, from the Colony Rooms to the stirrings of the Young British Artists. Original Rockers reverberates with a truly alternative past, lived out on turntables, in bedrooms, and urban dives.’ – Philip Hoare

‘What a great achievement, it’s not quite like anything else I’ve read – an honest, searching memoir of a maddeningly contrarian indie institution, and a reminder of the ecstasy and the agony of serious music fandom. Picking through Revolver’s backroom treasure trove, Richard King gets right back to that joyous moment when new horizons in sound open up in front of you, and worlds you never knew about stand revealed.’ – Rob Young

Faber have kindly given us a handful of signed copies for Idler patrons to buy. Follow the link to the right or visit us at the shop at 81 Westbourne Park Road, London, W2 5QH.