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List Price: $19.00 | | Publisher: Anchor
Salesrank: 106170
Released: May 13, 2003 |
| Our Price: $11.25 |
| Used Price: $6.85 |
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| Media: Paperback |
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Editorial Review:
Neil Young is one of rock and roll’s most important and enigmatic figures, a legend from the sixties who is still hugely influential today. He has never granted a writer access to his inner life – until now. Based on six years of interviews with more than three hundred of Young’s associates, and on more than fifty hours of interviews with Young himself, Shakey is a fascinating, prodigious account of the singer’s life and career. Jimmy McDonough follows Young from his childhood in Canada to his cofounding of Buffalo Springfield to the huge success of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young to his comeback in the nineties. Filled with never-before-published words directly from the artist himself, Shakey is an essential addition to the top shelf of rock biographies.
Description of Shakey: Neil Young's Biography:
Cantankerous and secretive, Neil Young has banished authors from his inner sanctum--until now. In Shakey, Jimmy McDonough distills more than 300 interviews (including guarded yet revealing interrogations of Young himself) into the definitive biography: the skyrocket success, willful disasters, health horrors and triumphs, stunning comebacks, and highly colorful scuffles with equally impossible characters like Stephen Stills, David Crosby, and the incompetent yet brilliant musicians of Crazy Horse. Young is not quite the noble soul some thought--he's an astounding control freak. But he is never less than fascinating. "As ruthless as I may seem to be," Young tells McDonough, "you gotta do what ya gotta do. Just like a f-----' vampire. Heh heh heh." --Tim Appelo
Shakey: Neil Young's Biography Reviews:
Learned so much about Neil but...... 
2009-10-01 - Awesome read! Learned so much about Neil that I did not know but, thank God that I had already bought most of Neil's CD collection before I read the book, or I probably wouldn't have bought half the CD's I did. I know that the author didn't want to come across like a fan and praise everything that Neil did, but he practically bashed every piece of music Neil put out. Some of the author's opinions about CD's that I love had me scratching my head.
Fantastic book about Neil Young
2009-08-07 - An excellent biography of Neil Young. Jimmy McDonough does an amazing job going through the ups and downs of a very complicated and unpredictable artist. A good book enthralls you with it's story, while a great book truly inspires you...SHAKEY is a great book, It delves so deep into Neil Young's persona that you truly believe you know him like you know yourself. My understanding and appreciation of Young's music is now not only enhanced, but ingrained in my system. Even the structure of McDonough's book is a knockout. In each chapter, the author goes into detail about various events in Neil Young's professional and personal life...from The Squires and The Mynah Birds, to Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young to Crazy Horse and to the many solo albums. Yet just when you think the story can't get any more compelling than it already is...we hear from Neil Young himself, in conversation with the author, commenting on his actions...and inactions. What's also great, is that Jimmy McDonough is a true fan of Young's music...yet also is Young's biggest critic, and often challenges Young directly if he feels Young's music, or performance is below par. I was sad finishing the book...and even now, I'm carefully going through SHAKEY's extended bibliography page by page...just not wanting the story to end. Who knew? I mean...I've never been a big Neil Young fan in the past. I had one or two of his records when I was a teenager, I think. Being a concert whore in my younger years...I first saw Young perform at Live Aid in 1985, then attended three Neil Young concerts in 1986, 1988 & 1991. Plus I saw him perform at the Bob Dylan 30th Anniversary show in 1992. Last time I saw him was 9 years ago at a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young concert in Los Angeles (which sadly was an extremely unpleasant experience for me, due to a disruptive audience). At the start of 2009, I owned a total of two Neil Young CDs...and only one of them I bought for Neil Young's sake: the 1970 classic AFTER THE GOLDRUSH. The other CD, MIRRORBALL, I only bought because it featured Pearl Jam as Neil's backing band on the entire album. What changed? Books...first the 33 1/3 book on HARVEST by Sam Inglis, which was just okay...hampered by the fact that Inglis didn't seem to like the album very much...making a point to let people know that TONIGHT'S THE NIGHT is Neil Young greatest album. Nonetheless, the book got me thinking about Neil Young...and soon enough, I bought a few more Neil Young albums. Which lead me to picking up SHAKEY (on a whim) at a Borders book store...which lead to even more albums. I now have close to 20 Neil Young albums, and counting. So in essence...the music inspired the books, which inspired the music. Who knew reading could be so much fun!
Shakey
2009-04-18 - This biography is excellent! I ordered this copy for a friend and it came in a timely manner and in great condition. Thanks!
A wheel in the ditch and a wheel on the track 
2009-02-26 - Part of me thinks 'Shakey' deserves more than a middling review. It's a highly entertaining, informative, and thorough biography, and I definitely gained all kinds of insight about Young and his music from it. However: too much of the story is not told, but rather filtered through the holier-than-thou lens of Jimmy McDonough.
Yes, it's wonderful that this isn't the standard hagiography that rock stars are usually adorned with - but McDonough seems all too conscious about presenting his biography in a contrary fashion, to the point of sheer pretense. McDonough goes out of his way to give Young hell both in his interviews (which are otherwise an essential asset to the book) and in his assessments of various records, career moves, and personal decisions - seemingly as if to convey (if not slam the point over one's head) what a refreshing pillar of integrity HE is - never mind Neil Young. The book thus becomes about whether Young, at various stages of his life, measures up to the biographer's standards of authenticity - really the height of rock-critic arrogance. One of the many shameful consequences of such an attitude is that several important songs in Young's discography are all but ignored simply because the author doesn't like them; in turn, the reader is made to feel like a know-nothing lightweight for not favoring "Tonight's the Night" over "Harvest". McDonough notes that those who have remained within Young's ever-changing circle of cohorts have tended to be the most difficult and irascible types of people, and it's almost as if he decided he had to be an a-hole himself in order to be taken seriously by and therefore close to Young.
I can even live with the author inserting himself into the story, at least on occasion. The format itself works pretty well. What I can't live with is a guy pretending to be objective based on his propensity to criticize rather than praise. This isn't objective biography, it's judgment. And incidentally, it's needlessly long. Omission of the detailed passages about what types of alcohol and drugs the musicians were using would alone have knocked off a hundred pages.
surprisingly interesting!
2009-02-05 - Bought this book for my husband, and we are both Young fans. He absolutely got into that book like nothing I ever saw. He says its written to keep you reading just to see what happens next. Young's life is totally different then what we had known about, and he has persevered some real tough issues with all kinds of stuff. But this is not your usual type of book, its well written, unusual, and surprising.
I recomend it to any good fan of Neil Young, doubly so.
Its a big book but you will not be able to leave it down. Learning from this book has given us a deeper understanding of YOUNG.
