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| | Publisher: SP Turner Group
Salesrank: 1110405
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| Our Price: $39.58 |
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| Media: Hardcover |
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Editorial Review:
On the Brink of Fame: Pop Stars in the Swinging Sixties is photographer Ian Wright's archive from the 1960's of the intimate moments of rock stars on the rise. The fresh faces of The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Roy Orbison, Ella Fitzgerald, Ike and Tina Turner, Tom Jones, Jimi Hendrix and countless other images emerge from the once forgotten, mostly unpublished works taken in clubs in the Northeast of England. Memories abound in this book for all age groups. With a foreward by author Sir Harold Evans and an Epilogue by musican Spencer Davis, the book is a grand trip down memory lane from start to finish.
On the Brink of Fame: Pop Stars in the Swinging Sixties Reviews:
Riveting 
2008-05-01 - I stumbled across this book on a friend's coffee table and was just idly leafing through, as I have no real interest in the 1960's or rock music. But the incredible glimpse into the life of a young person in a Britain still recovering from World War 2 was absolutely riveting. The writing is very much "at the moment" and real time. Married with never-before-published photos of the royal family and film stars (including Richard Burton and Liz Taylor during the filming of "Becket"), the result was a book I could not put down. Required reading for any Anglophile.
To me, this isn't really about the world of rick and roll as much of the story as a talented, intelligent boy born into relative adversity. Through his pen and camera we travel back to an imperial power on it's slow but unstoppable way down.
Like Finding Treasure
2008-04-07 - As more and more rock and pop stars are putting down their guitars and picking up their pens to write best selling autobiographies, renowned international photojournalist Ian Wright has just published "On The Brink OF Fame, Pop Stars In The Swinging 60s," an expose' on the era from a different perspective. Wright's stunning photographs animate his fascinating and amusing anecdotes about the celebrities, social scandals and the political/economic landscape which many have already come to regard as a social history, chronicling the Swinging 60s.-
In 1962, Wright was a sixteen year old junior photographer for "Teenage Special" a new supplement to a newspaper in the North East of England. Too young to drive, Ian strapped the heavy plate camera equipment to his bicycle, pedaling to local ballrooms, theaters and nightclubs, photographing emerging pop stars and celebrities. "Photograph everyone on the bill; you never know who's going to become famous and keep all your negatives," was the brief given by his editor, the now illustrious editor/publisher, Sir Harold Evans, who wrote the foreward for this book.
Consequently, teenage photographer Ian Wright was unwittingly on hand to photograph the creation of the Swinging 60s. From his first picture, for the Teenage Special, of Ella Fitzgerald in 1962 to his last of Elton John in 1971, Wright photographed everyone on the scene. His intimate back-stage portraits show eager, young performers unsure of whether they would flop or ascend to fame and fortune. Some fell into obscurity while others ascended to indescribable success. Five became Knights of the Realm and many died too young.
Wright's collection of historic negatives, thought lost for 45 years, have recently been discovered in his old darkroom, bringing to light countless unpublished photographs representing a veritable who's who of the 1960's including, The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Roy Orbison, Ike & Tina Turner, Marianne Faithfull, Tom Jones, Moody Blues, Gerry & The Pacemakers, Dusty Springfield, Dave Clark Five, Manfred Mann, Engelbert Humperdink, The Animals, Jimi Hendrix, Peter & Gordon, Johnny Cash, Elizabeth Taylor, Peter O'Toole, Jayne Mansfield, Sophia Loren, Peter Ustinov, Rex Harrison, Michael Crawford, and members of the Royal family.
As you look through this amazing book, I'm sure you will think of the first time you heard the songs and films made famous by the faces in the photographs. You may think of your first date, your first dance, and your first kiss. These photographs and Mr. Wright's reminiscences allow us all to keep those memories forever.
Wright's pictures of the photographers and the crowd scenes in Beatlemania, show a nation rushing into a new era when nobody wanted to be left behind. His lens captured the youthful naiveté of Mick Jagger in 1965 and again the dynamic performer he had become, live on stage in 1971. Wright has managed to vividly capture on film and now in this book, the enormity of what was happening in the 60s.
Groovy, baby
2008-04-04 - As Sir Harold Evans says in the foreward, "This stunning collection of photographs by Ian Wright, many never published, affords us a rare pleasure. Here we are, face to face, with the artists who created what we now call the Swinging Sixties and we are intimately back-stage with them. They cannot know what awaits them when they go out to perform, still less could any of them guess whether they would flop or ascend to fame and fortune."
