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Product Description
Metallica, the seventh-biggest recording act in American history, are consummate musicians - but it wasn't always that way. A significant proportion of their playing expertise was acquired from a pivotal three-year period in their history - 1983 to 1986 - during which their music, a potent variant of thrash metal, evolved from garage level to sophisticated, progressive heights thanks to the teachings of their bass player, Cliff Burton. The San Francisco-raised Burton, born in 1962, pushed the band to new musical levels with his musical training, songwriting ability and phenomenal bass guitar skills. Across three albums - "Kill 'Em All" (1983), "Ride The Lightning" (1985) and Metallica's undisputed masterpiece, "Master Of Puppets" (1986) - Burton's awe-inspiring playing, derived from a unique blend of classical and punk approaches, received worldwide recognition from fans and bass players alike. He was the first heavy metal bassist since Black Sabbath's Geezer Butler to regard the bass as a lead instrument, delivering intricate live solos based on classical fugues and even laying down a solo track on Metallica's debut album. Cliff's life was short but influential; his death was sudden and shocking. At the age of just 24, he was killed when Metallica's tour bus overturned on a remote Swedish mountain road in the early hours of September 27, 1986 for reasons which have still not been ascertained: he was crushed to death after being thrown from his bunk through a window. The driver, who has never been identified, told the rest of the band that the bus had hit black ice, leading to the accident: singer James Hetfield refused to believe him and has often spoken publicly about his doubts. With Cliff's death, Metallica's most critically acclaimed period of activity ended. They went on to record huge-selling albums, but by their own admission never pushed the creative envelope as radically as they had done in the first four years of their career. In 2006, a group of dedicated Metallica fans unveiled a memorial to Cliff at the site of his death: the cult of Burton grows year on year, with bassists of many musical styles (even outside heavy metal) acknowledging his influence.
About the Author
Joel McIver writes for Total Guitar, Metal Hammer and many other music magazines and is the author of 12 books to date. The best-known of these is Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica (2004), which has sold over 30,000 copies in eight languages. He makes regular appearances on radio and TV.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Some great, some not so great,
By Asko "Mister X" (Finland) - See all my reviews
This review is from: To Live is to Die: The Life and Death of "Metallica"'s Cliff Burton (Paperback)
3 1/2 stars. Firstly, the good...
This book has quite a lot of interesting material, as the author has conducted new interviews with the likes of Harald Oimoen, Fred Cotton, Brian Slagel and John Marshall (=friends/'insiders'), producer Flemming Rasmussen, fellow bass player Dave Ellefson and most importantly, Burton's girlfriend at the time of his death, Corinne Lynn. McIver has also interviewed Metallica's Kirk Hammett who provided the foreword as well. So no question that there are many fascinating insights into Cliff Burton's character and musicianship. Not surprisingly, no one seems to have anything bad to say about him which makes the cynic in me quip, "c'mon, he must have had at least some weaknesses!" But hey, it isn't hard to believe that he was one of the good guys. One of the positive things about "To Live Is To Die" when compared with McIver's Metallica biography ("And Justice For All - The Truth About Metallica") is that here he keeps his opinions (i.e. his 'truths') more to himself which shows that he has grown as a writer/person(?). So luckily, this book doesn't have that 'a disappointed fan whining' thing that would not have suited it at all. It has a more philosophical approach, shall we say. Sadly, though, there are some negative aspects as well. A lot of the quotes - inevitably - are all too familiar at least to those who have read the author's Metallica book, and unfortunately the tautology, if you will, doesn't stop there; simply too much repetition in this book! Yes, there is no doubt that Burton taught Hetfield (and Ulrich) music theory, but does it have to be repeated like 10 times? (I'm glad, however, that this time McIver gives credit to James and Lars for being the primary songwriters - Cliff's big influence notwithstanding). Some people may also think that most of the stuff after the chapters concerning Burton's death and the aftermath is a bit of a waste of time & paper. They do have a lot of 'what if' ponderings that will always remain just that, but at least McIver offers some, er, educated guesses, and I kind of agree on many of his speculations. There are some factual errors. The one that really caught my eye is that concerning the events just prior to Burton's passing. The author claims that it is only now confirmed that Kirk and Cliff drew cards in order to settle out the sleeping arrangements on the bus. Nope. I saw a Metallica documentary (or 'rockumentary', whatever) already about 15 years ago where Kirk tells the story (according to him, Cliff drew the ace of spades!). So it is not really a revelation. I think I can safely recommend the book to every Cliff Burton fan for sure, and also to a more casual Metallica fan, who hasn't read McIver's Metallica biography - those who have might feel themselves just a WEE bit cheated, even if this one has plenty of new interesting stuff too. PS. In SOME other reviews that I've read (on the internet), McIver's writing abilities have been badly ridiculed! I don't remember having much difficulties reading the book, but maybe my enthusiasm on the subject sort of made me blind to it, I don't know. My other excuse would be that English is not my mother tongue, so I'm not probably the right person to make a judgement. But 'some say' and I can't tell either way.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent Book,
By
This review is from: To Live is to Die: The Life and Death of "Metallica"'s Cliff Burton (Paperback)
Great book - a must for all fans of metal and Metallica in particular - well researched. Good notes on how to achieve the level of virtuosity that Cliff achieved.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A solid biopic.,
By
This review is from: To Live is to Die: The Life and Death of "Metallica"'s Cliff Burton (Paperback)
This book is a very interesting book, doing a solid job on taking us through the his life, what his personality was, his attititude towards many things, all in all, very insightful. The interviews given from people close to Cliff such as family and band members was also very well presented, there is certainly no lack of effort put in. Especially helpful was the emphasis on his bass playing, perhaps tedious for anyone completely not interested in him as a bass player, (but then, this is the wrong book for you anyway). If however you are interested in the musician side of the man an well as him as a person, a very good book for what is otherwise, for fans anyway, an uncovered subject; Cliff Burton; RIP.
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