A Dream Goes on Forever: The Continuing Story of Todd Rundgren (Paperback)

~ (Author) "Upper Darby, Pennsylvania is a middle class suburb located outside of Philadelphia..." (more)
Key Phrases: gonna cry today, todd rundgren, hamburger hell, New York, Moogy Klingman, John Siegler (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

"The people that buy my records are of that age group that missed the Beatles; well, I'm their Beatles." - Todd Rundgren

To understand Todd Rundgren is to understand change; a continual artistic metamorphosis that goes through various radical stages, yet somehow remains not far from its original roots. (Roots derived from the music of the mod British rockers of the '60s, such as the Yardbirds, the Beatles and the Who; the incomparable writing style of Laura Nyro; as well as the sounds from his own back yard - Philadelphia soul music.)

A true dichotomy in music; Todd Rundgren has continued to amuse and bemuse fans and critics alike for more than three decades, with his enchanting songs and music, innovative productions and incessant persistence in dealing with the music business strictly on his own terms. A Dream Goes On Forever - The Continuing Story Of Todd Rundgren (volume one) examines the history of one of America's true rock icons; from his early days of pop stardom with the Nazz; to the 'whiz kid' productions, which included the likes of Badfinger and Grand Funk; from the million seller hits; to his psychedelic explorations; from his idiosyncratic ideologies and philosophies; to the highly acclaimed conceptual ensemble Utopia.

The unbelievable story of rock's lost genius is now ready to be told. Utopia is here!

Product Details

• Paperback: 470 pages
• Publisher: Golden Treasures Pub (December 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0971049335
• ISBN-13: 978-0971049338
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #158,452 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars For the want of an editor, August 27, 2003

By	Cookbook Addict (Philly, PA) - See all my reviews

Thank goodness an effort has been made to compile a book on someone who time will identify as one of the most important composers and producers of the 20th century. If you've even looked this book up on Amazon, you recognize the brilliance of Todd Rundgren.

I'd really like to say this was a great book, but I can't. The story it tells is fascinating, but the execution, I'm sorry Billy James, is quite weak. There is no way this book was edited by someone other than James. There are sentences that are not sentences, wrong words all over the place ("there" instead of "their" kind of stuff), misspelled words, mistyped quotes, words that are used in a completely wrong way, redundant information, and very obvious questions that the text raises that are never asked and never answered. The writing style is also uncomfortable. There seem to be many instances where James wanted to use a bigger word, hit the thesaurus button on his computer, and replaced the earlier term with something that is either used inappropriately, or that comes off as being completely goofy.

The most disturbing part is when you read things that are just plain wrong. They're generally miniscule things, but just knowing that information in what's supposed to be a biography is inaccurate makes you lose some faith in the other things you read. For example, James talks about Todd's break up with his high school girlfriend, Marlene, as being the inspiration for several songs on "Something/Anything". What we have here is a misinterpretation of something James probably read somewhere. Marlene was Todd's girlfriend while he was recording "Something/Anything", not while he was in high school. At the time they were together she was only 17-years-old. See what I mean? It's a tiny little point that doesn't amount to anything, and you can see how he made the mistake, but it causes you to lose faith in the accuracy of the other things you're reading.

This is volume one of what presumably will be at least two volumes. It takes you up through "Faithful" and John Siegler's departure, so it would seem the arrival of Kasim Sultan and the release of "Ra" will kick off the next book.

Hopefully this book will spark enough interest to encourage others to write on the topic of Todd. (That's what happened with Syd Barrett. Mike Watkinson wrote a so-so book called "Syd Barrett & the Dawn of Pink Floyd: Crazy Diamond." That book was followed by a brilliant biography of Barrett by Julian Palacios called "Lost in the Woods - Syd Barrett & the Pink Floyd." Highly recommended.)

Sorry, but it's not a very good read. At the same time, though, I can't wait to buy and read Volume Two.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, Even Fascinating, But Requires Patience, July 6, 2006

By	J. Wilson "Professional Musician" (Somewhere between Venus and Mars) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I concur with a lot of the prior reviews which state: a) This book has an enormous amount of interesting detail, and b) This book was not copy-edited. It appears as though the author did the best he could in arranging the order of the book, and used all his notes, and the publisher printed the book without an editor cleaning up spelling, puncuation, and redundancies. However, if you're a Todd fan, you will have the patience to wade through the unfortunate lack of editing to find an amazing amount of detail on Todd, from his childhood up to the departure of John Seigler from Utopia, and the final line-up of Todd, Kasim Sulton, Willie Wilcox, and Roger Powell. I spoke to the good folks at Golden Treasures Publishing, and they said they are hopeful for a December '06 release for Volume Two (also by Billy James). I can't wait to get my hands on a copy, no matter how badly edited it may be.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's a 5 plus for anyone who loves TR , December 8, 2006

By	Amazon.com-lover (California) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

Yes there are typos, yes there are many areas of boggy writing, but it is a damn fun book! So many tidbits and interesting stories. Excellent pictures. I can't wait for the second volume which will feature the *sigh* Utopia years...( not that what TR is doing now isnt sigh-worthy... the New Cars tour is a gift! Todd and Kasim are better than ever...)
If you are hooked on Todd's creative output in any way, this book is worth buying, even if you just skim thru certain parts.