DESERT DREAMS: The Music, Style, and Allure of Coachella

DESERT DREAMS: The Music, Style, and Allure of Coachella
KATIE BAIN
Epic Ink (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$24.99 all editions, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A celebration of one of the most successful music festivals in the world, Desert Dreams captures the groundbreaking performances, viral fashion moments, and impact of the Coachella phenomenon on music and culture. Immerse yourself in the music, the fashion, and the hype of one of the biggest music festivals in the world.

Coachella is considered one of the most profitable and widely attended music festivals, with an annual attendance of 250,000 people. Not only is it located in the middle of the desert, but to be there is to witness some of the best performances artists will ever put on. For them, playing at Coachella is a huge checkmark on the bucket list of their career. No matter how small their name appears on the billboards listing the year's lineups, the festival is known to be the starting point of artists on the way to superstardom. Chances are, if you saw them at Coachella, you'll be seeing them rise for the rest of the year and be able to say you knew them before they were big.

Discover the magic of one of the biggest festivals in the world, from the windy roads and mountain views on the way there, the hotspots on the polo field, and the art installations that create an epic landscape and dozens of photo ops that you see online. Desert Dreams will walk you through the biggest names that have performed on the mainstage, including those that started in a smaller tent. At Coachella, anything can and will happen. Relive the headlines that nobody could stop talking about for weeks after, such as who was there—from celebrities to special guest appearances onstage—what they were wearing—both the performers and audience members—and what to expect if you’re planning to experience it all yourself in an upcoming year. With 150+ iconic photographs and insights from music industry veterans, Coachella expert, Katie Bain brings you a comprehensive guide to this groundbreaking festival phenomenon.

This visually stunning book makes you feel as if you never missed a year in the desert, covering:

The origins of the festival from the Los Angeles music scene in the ’60s through the ’90s

The talent and most talked about performances including Guns N’ Roses, Beychella, and No Doubt

The epic fashion trends and viral looks that span from DIY to designer

The scintillating media stories such as the hard launch of Kristin Stewart and Robert Pattinson and when Shania Twain dazzled with Harry Styles

What happened when a Tupac Shakur hologram entered center stage

All the reunions, legacy acts, and makings of history each year

The cultural and musical impact of Coachella on US festivals and the American Music History

And so much more!

Learn about the extravagance (and not-so-extravagant moments) alongside a real account of what it takes to arrive on the site, all the key locations, and the most hyped about parties. By page one, you’ll feel like you’re on your way to the biggest event of your life—and for some, you’ll get the chance to relive it. A must-have volume for music lovers, pop culture enthusiasts, and fashionistas, Desert Dreams is the ultimate celebration of the iconic Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. Make sure you have your water ready because we’re taking you to the desert.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Privileged people being absurdly extravagant in luxurious ways is really nothing new is it? Marie Antoinette had her fantasy modest village where she pretended to be a milkmaid. Rich celebs spend outrageous money to DIY (I'll bet not) costumes, art installations, musical performances (those're real, kinda hafta be, but talk about publicity!) in the Cali desert.

Well, chacun à son goût. I myownself would spend that mountain of spondulix on books for kids, queer teens, and food pantries, but I'm notoriously no damn fun. Still, I'll bet you have at least one pop-culture vulture who would know every one of these pretty people, and find their doin's throughout the years right interesting.

It's a dream book for many. I'm fascinated by the astonishing excess.

All that...stuff...is single use. I don't know what other use it could be put to. Irrelevant...it's mostly too costly to ever reassemble the stuff even if there was a place to put it permanently; where ya gonna wear this...rig...after the show?

So maybe don't give it to me...but there are squads of fans of the music acts who'd enjoy this look at a venue they'll never see:

As a design-heavy book, though a very, very reasonably priced one, the first question I ask is, can I get the experience on my tablet? In this case, I'm not really sure...I wasn't troubled by seeming glitches when viewing it on my Galaxy S11 but well...I wouldn't be.

Up to you, but I'd give the tree book to my pop-culture obsessed nibling or the fashion lover or the fan of The Weeknd or...well, anyone not me.

Ye gawds.

PEARL JAM LIVE!: 35 Years of Legendary Music and Revolutionary Shows, 90s nostalgia on steroids

PEARL JAM LIVE!: 35 Years of Legendary Music and Revolutionary Shows
SELENA FRAGASSI
publisher (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$35.00 hardcover, available now

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: Pearl Jam Live! celebrates the iconic rock band, the fan culture, and the music they created through interviews, photos, and more.

A must-have for every Pearl Jam fan, this beautifully designed volume traces 35 years of the groundbreaking grunge group through photos, interviews, and all the fascinating facts.

Jeff Ament, Stone Gossard, Mike McCready, Eddie Vedder, and Matt Cameron are Seattle’s own alternative rock band that sprang to the top of the charts (and into the angsty hearts of millions of global fans) in the 1990s. Though each of the members and the band itself has faced their ups and downs in the four decades since they came together, they continue to release new music and maintain a loyal fan base.

On July 7, 2025, Matt Cameron made the surprise announcement that he was leaving Pearl Jam after a long 27-year run that began back in 1998. This book celebrates the many years, albums, and tours that Matt was a part of before stepping down.

In Pearl Jam Live! music journalist Selena Fragassi delves into the band’s origins—from their beginning as Green River to their earliest influences—to their biggest successes in the ’90s, to their continued achievements today and the lasting legacy they’ve left in the alt-rock canon. Along the way, readers will also explore:

The creation of Pearl Jam’s biggest hits, such as “Even Flow” and “Last Kiss”

The fan culture that built up around the band, from the small gigs and mall tours of their earliest years to performances at Lollapalooza and their Gigaton tour

Pearl Jam’s influences, from classic rock to pop, and their place in rock history

The lasting legacy of a band proudly celebrating their thirty-fifth anniversary

Step by step, through interviews, photos, and sidebars full of fun facts and trivia, you’ll learn something new about the band on every page. This book is the perfect companion to your lasting reverence for Pearl Jam.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: A defining act for much of its history, Pearl Jam's made millions very happy at its shows...more on its radio sides. (Wow, I'm really old.)

bet at least a few of these are familiar

What a zooming sound the past makes as it races past me. I'm glad I've lived long enough to see the culture of my middle age become nostalgia. My ambition is to live long enough to see 2001 Cadillacs on the auction floor at a Mecum antique-car auction.

Imagine if I'd kept that Pearl Jam concert program....

What we all need is a dose of "Alive" blasting on the car radio while cruising across the country in that 2001 Cadillac I mentioned above. Closest thing we're gonna get is a trip down memory lane with Author Fragassi telling us who the people are we've forgotten, where we know 'em from, and what was happening at that time:

Everything in its place. We're going through a lot of territory, there needs to be some razzmatazz to be visually over)stimulating, this is the alt-rock 90s after all!

Pearl Jam...thirty-five years as a touring band...no wonder Matt Cameron retired in July. He's bloody exhausted! Still, there are a lot of wonderful memory holes to fall into in this excitingly designed volume...but choose the tree-book, trust me. Your 90s-nostalgic giftee will love it.

LOLLAPALOOZA: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock's Wildest Festival, lives up to that promise

LOLLAPALOOZA: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock's Wildest Festival
RICHARD BIENSTOCK & TOM BEAUJOUR
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$16.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: The definitive, no-holds-barred oral history of 1990s alt-rock festival Lollapalooza―told by the musicians, roadies, and industry insiders who lived it. From the New York Times bestselling authors of Nothin’ But A Good Time.

Through hundreds of new interviews with artists, tour founders, festival organizers, promoters, publicists, sideshow freaks, stage crews, record label execs, reporters, roadies and more, Lollapalooza chronicles the tour’s pioneering 1991-1997 run, and, in the process, alternative rock’s rise – as well as the reverberations that led to a massive shift in the music industry and the culture at large.

Lollapalooza features original interviews with some of the biggest names in music, including Perry Farrell and Jane’s Addiction, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nine Inch Nails, Sonic Youth, Tool, Smashing Pumpkins, Ice-T, Rage Against the Machine, Green Day, Patti Smith, Alice in Chains, Metallica and many more.

Conceived by Farrell as a farewell tour for Jane's Addiction, Lollapalooza’s inaugural outing across the US in the summer of 1991 helped to coalesce an ideology and aesthetic that not only washed over popular music but seeped into fashion, film, television, literature, food, politics and more. Throughout the decade, Lollapalooza offered a vast and diverse ensemble of bands, breaking barriers of genre and creating the template for the modern American music festival and the scores of other contemporary destination events.
Unorthodox not just in music, Lollapalooza also spotlighted visual arts, nonprofit organizations, political outfits and even the occasional freak show, offering a tantalizing cocktail of culture, art, and activism that, taken together, defined the alternative mindset that dominated the 1990s. Today, Lollapalooza remains one of the world's largest music festivals, cemented by annual sellouts at destination events all over the globe and an estimated 400,000 attendees at the flagship Chicago fest each summer.

A nostalgic look back at 1990s music and culture, Lollapalooza traces the festival’s groundbreaking origins, following the tour as it progresses through the decade, and documenting the action onstage, backstage, and behind-the-scenes in detailed, uncensored, and sometimes shocking first-person accounts. This is the story of Lollapalooza and the 1990s alternative-rock revolution.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: People who get famous are,it seems, still just peopl...racist, homophobic jerks, divas who "think who they are," the run-of-the-mill addicts and freeloaders.

May be more information in here than is comfortable to know at thirty years' social and societal change. Many things were uttered aloud, recorded, and transcribed, that would get the speaker in a lot of trouble nowadays. You the reader have been warned.

Lots of names get bandied about, so stay on your toes! Bookmark the cast of characters in the fromt or it will get confusing. One anecdote you won't forget: Rage Against the Machine protesting Tipper Gore's foolish music-censorship stuff by doing their 1993 set naked! Socks over their cocks was all that stopped them from getting unwanted legal attention. Pity there were no cameraphones in 1993, isn't it....

Because it's so anecdotal, it's more a browser's book than a read-right-through binge machine. I don't know if there are photos in the finished books, but there were none in the DRC, so I have no comment to make about thm (assuming there had to be some).

A treat for your 90s-nostalgia giftee, your music fan giftee, and anyone who was there in any of the years...it's a long, long time now and it's still goin' on, so...everyone's bound to know SOMEone who's been to at least one.

I took a lovely, fun, often funny and always instructive wander through my last thirty-plus years with the performers, the reporters, and me. I'm not as fascinated as some are by bands and their personnel. I still found myself downing a festival or two a week. Pretty good going to keep an old guy that interested!

ALTERNATIVE FOR THE MASSES: The '90s Alt-Rock Revolution—An Oral History, seriously good fun with the information

ALTERNATIVE FOR THE MASSES: The '90s Alt-Rock Revolution—An Oral History
GREG PRATO
Motorbooks International (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$29.99 all editions, available now

Rating: 4.75* of five

The Publisher Says: Alternative for the Masses: The Oral History of the ’90s Alt-Rock Revolution offers insights, opinions, and memories from an incredible cast of musicians and producers who created the music. Get the definitive story of the ’90s alt-rock movement straight from the musicians and figures who lived it.

No period in the history of rock music offered such an abrupt shift in prevailing tastes as the 1990s. While just a short while before, radio and MTV were clamoring for hair metal bands, suddenly alt-rockers such as Jane’s Addiction, Nine Inch Nails, Faith No More, Primus, Smashing Pumpkins, and of course, Nirvana, brought a sea change not just in what the most popular bands sounded like, but also in fashion, politics, and seemingly all aspects of pop culture.

In Alternative for the Masses: The Oral History of the ’90s Alt-Rock Revolution, veteran music critic Greg Prato presents more than 60 new interviews conducted exclusively for the book—with an emphasis on the 1990–1995 peak period—including insights from renowned names like:
Ian MacKaye (Fugazi, Dischord Records) Frank Black (Pixies) Corey Glover (Living Colour) Moby (solo artist/DJ) Al Jourgensen (Ministry) Les Claypool (Primus) Kennedy (host of MTV’s Alternative Nation) Matt Pinfield (host of MTV’s 120 Minutes) Butch Vig (producer of Nirvana’s Nevermind) Tanya Donnelly (Belly, Breeders) Fred Armisen (Portlandia, Saturday Night Live) Prato also includes excerpts from one of the last interviews with Steve Albini, arguably the period’s most influential recording engineer and producer, responsible for influential albums by the likes of Nirvana and PJ Harvey producer, among many others.

Prato sets out his book in thematic chapters covering topics such as:
The Lollapalooza music festival The impact of Nirvana Alt-rock’s many subgenres Notable producers of the period The impact of women rockers MTV’s influence Drugs and addiction and much more! Do you long for the days when it seemed rock artists were all about daring to be different, speaking their minds, and shaking up the music industry? The last decade before the internet, downloads, and streaming took over music? Alternative for the Masses will take you back to that time when alt-rock truly promised something different.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: I'm unhappily aware that it's been more than thirty years since Kurt Cobain died.

It's saddening to think "what might have been" about anyone's life; his was no more important than any other, yet some people take on larger-than-life importance to the culture at large. He was one of them. His early overdose death was A Moment, not merely a tragedy for his wife and his family, including the daughter he never really knew.

This book is filled with the stories of the survivors, and the fallen, from their own mouths. The author's been a music journalist and author forever. Many books to his credit, including the lushly titled The Yacht Rock Book: The Oral History of the Soft, Smooth Sounds of the 70s and 80s, which ZOMG might's well have been titled "I'm Aiming For Mudge's Wallet." In this case I'm bycarch, but still very much into reading the stories. The book's design is really of a piece with its era and subject.

half-title;contents; text spread

Of course, the real appeal is the interesting people who were there:

And there are lots of fun sidebars of trivia, too:

I don't see this as a very expensive book for what it is and has inside it. Music defines generations. We're all walking to the beats the speakers are pumpin' out. You'll already have someone in mind for this delight of nostalgia, either who was there or who wished they were. At this price, even a casual friend can look forward to one of these. I will say, though, the tree-book will flow better than the ebook; though it's by no means *bad* it just lacks the overall view that a tree-book has.

Lucky us who lived through it!