A journey back through the music; madness; and unparalleled freedom of an era of change-the 70s-as told through the life of ultra-fabulous superstar Sylvester Imagine a pied piper singing in a dazzling falsetto; wearing glittering sequins; and leading the young people of the nation to San Francisco and on to liberation where nothing was straight-laced or old-fashioned. And everyone; finally; was welcome-to come as themselves. This is not a fairy tale. This was real; mighty real; and disco sensation Sylvester was the piper. Joshua Gamson-a Yale-trained pop culture expert-uses him; a boy who would be fabulous; to lead us through the story of the 70s when a new era of change liberated us from conformity and boredom. Gamson captures the exuberant life; feeling; energy; and fun of a generations wonderful; magical waking up-from the parties to the dancing and music.The story begins with a little black boy who started with nothing but a really big voice. We follow him from the Gospel chorus to the glory days in the Castro where a generation shook off its shame as Sylvester sang and began his rise as part of a now-notorious theatrical troup called the Cockettes. Celebrity; sociology; and music history mingle and merge around this endlessly entertaining story of a singer who embodied the freedom; spirit; and flamboyance of a golden moment in American culture.
2013-07-12 2013-07-12File Name: B00DWJ3TAY
Review
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Tourist InfoBy Jim Eggers; M.D.Helpful in preparation for 10 day trip to Greece. Highlights sites and historical background associated with sites.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Disorganized and no fun to readBy AESThis books contains a lot of useful information; but the author is clearly more interested in the minutiae of architecture and art history than in telling a coherent narrative. Each chapter is a disorganized mess; bouncing back and forth between architectural details and political history. There are also occasional sentences which require reading about 10 times to actually understand. Clearly this book was not edited very well.If you want a social and political history of Athens; I would look elsewhere for a more balanced and easy to read narrative. For that; Id even prefer wikipedia over this book. However; if you want a somewhat dry art history lecture to have on hand while touring Athens; then this could be of some help.I also take issue with some allusions that the author makes in the first chapter to the Indo-European hypothesis (though he never mentions it by name). He does this in the context of cultural and economic changes in Greece in the Neolithic and later. He appears to dismiss the theory of IE migration (violent or not violent) outright; insinuating that the switch from female earth deities to male sky gods (and a more militant culture to go along with it) was a homegrown phenomenon brought wholly about by economic change. He asserts that population growth and improved farming technology meant that males occupying valuable territory had come to supersede the reproductive power of females. In doing so he ignores decades of archaeological; genetic; and linguistic research supporting an IE migration; and fails to acknowledge the possibility that his ideas and the IE theory arent necessarily mutually exclusive. In other words; the economic conditions were a widespread phenomenon in Neolithic cultures making the transition from isolated farmers to cohesive; militant; territory-holding cities and states. This didnt just happen in Greece; but Greece (like much of Europe) was within the IE sphere of influence. This socioeconomic change could very well have simply provided the power vacuum for the IE/Kurgan cultures to migrate and establish their cultural influence; not necessarily by exclusively violent means.Obviously this is somewhat tangential to a history of Athens; but he shouldnt throw ideas out so recklessly.2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. A must read for travelers to GreeceBy Jeannine SmithIm visiting Athens soon on a Rick Steves tour; and this book is terrific. It isnt a travel book per se; but rather provides a lot of additional history that isnt in the travel guides. I am reading it alongside travel guides which show the places reference but its ATHENS; the book; that provides the cultural background and history that makes Athens; the city; come alive.