Customer Reviews

John Denver: Mother Nature's Son

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I was saddened to discover that the so-called biographer of one of this century's most beloved artists, entertainers, conservationists, and humanists couldn't marshall a more formidable effort on behalf of John Denver. Why undertake a project like this with such misgivings and such a lack of appreciation for who Denver was, how much he personally contributed, or how deeply he affected millions of fans and admirers. While the author may personally find aspects of John's musical style superficial or slick, no one delving deeper into John Denver's story can fail to appreciate his sheer talent, energy, sincerity, and humanity, nor to be impressed by the energy, talent, or persistence in the plethora of important projects John threw himself into.

Any number of his songs are quite widely covered, even today, yet no one has ever been more successful presenting what was basically an extremely popular and easy-to-listen to (the word beautiful seems descriptively inadequate) country music cross over into the popular realm than was John Denver. He was indeed a phenomenon.

At a time when singer/songwriters like James Taylor, Van Morrison, and Elton John were tearing up the charts, Denver effectively outsold, outwrote, and outperformed them in terms of his public appeal. This is not intended as a put-down of any of these incredible artists, all of whom have continued to create and contribute today . It is rather to emphasize how amazing his continuing success and effective domination of the popular music charts in the 1970s was. John Denver was THE singular popular musical superstar of thee 1970s, and the fact that he was deserves to be recognized for the phenomenal success it was.

His deeply personal musical voice spoke simply yet eloquently through the vehicle of a unique perspective on the world, and combined an intensely personal way of describing himself and his relationships with a seductively romantic view of the world. Of course, he quickly became identified with his soaring paens in praise of the beauty of the natural world, and almost as quickly became a driving force popularizing the environmental movement, often testifying to Congress with great style and verve, often very influential in the drafting of certain aspects of the clean water and clean air acts.

As the years went by became Denver became less and less concerned about his own career and more and more involved in various environmental and humanist causes. He was friend and confidant to luminaries, world leaders and philosophers like Jacques Cousteau and Buckminister "Bucky" Fuller, and spent time working, covorting and relaxing with a list of notables that sounds like a who's who list of 20th century luminaries.

His personal life was as complex and as full of sadness as often true of most exceptional people, and no one denies that he had bouts of depression and tough times over the years. Haven't we all? And isn't that the price one pays for being a human being in this, the last half of the 20th century? Why dwell on his frailties and vulnerabilities when they pale in comparison with his accomplishments and contributions? As his brother commented on suggestions that John's tragic death in a plane crash was a suicide, anyone knowing how much John loved living and life itself who could say that he committed sucide must have his head up his ass.

Still, with all of this taken into account, nothing can still bring such a fond smile to millions of babyboomer faces or such a twinkle to many of our eyes as can the mere mention of John Denver's name. Those of us who have witnessed the incredible panorama of music in the last thirty years or so still hold a special place in the valhalla of artistic fame for the bespectacled kid with a shock of bushy blond hair who walked the frozen streams and mountain passes of the American Rockies, and sang so simply, so beautifully, and so eloquently to all of us from his heart. These kids running around the Rockies in their high-tech clothing and glacier boots haven't got a clue, viewing the wilderness as another Disneyland, just another setting for their self-absorbed personal adventures, something to demonstrate their prowess and flatter their egos. Yet Denver helped a whole generation discover how much of a world onto itself the wilderness is, and how much of a gift from Providence such natural wonder is.

For Denver the wilderness presented us with a chance to be fuller, kinder, and better people, people who cared about all of God's creation and would act as caretakers for everything in this garden. What we need is a better biography to help these kids understand. In essence, Denver wasn't just an incredibly talented and popular and successful singer/songwriter/entertainer; he was a very special human being who reached higher, stronger, and farther than most normal human beings, someone who opened his heart, head, and spirit to share and guide us with. He deserves a better biography that appreciates the full story of his gifts, contributions, and legacy.

If I could have given this book a negative number, I would have. The 190-page book could have been cut in half; only that much is actually about John Denver. Collis leads the reader to believe the book is a biography about Denver, when in fact he jumps between issues and events surrounding Denver's life. He accuses him of being a "wife-beater", and does give an example, albeit one brief example towards the back of his book. Collis is more interested in telling us about his favorite music stars of the time than giving any information about the artist the book proclaims to be about.
As someone said before, if you want to know about Denver, read his autobiography "Take Me Home", rather than wasting your precious time and money on Collis' biography. There's also a movie that made a better impression on me than this attempt to describe Denver's life, "Take Me Home: The John Denver Story". Don't make the same mistake I did by reading this.

Readers, if you want to learn something about John Denver's life or his place in music history, don't waste your time with this book. I have serious doubts about the "facts" Collis presents, considering that within the first 62 pages Collis informs us that:
* the distance from Ft. Worth to El Paso is "the best part of 1,500 miles" (p. 42)--which will come as quite a surprise to most Texans, who think the true distance is less than half that
*Texas Tech is in Austin (p. 42)--what a shock to the TTU students who've been attending classes in Lubbock since 1925
*Don Kirshner "formed his Monkees by selecting. . .Mickey 'Circus Boy' Dolenz and Davy Jones. . . [and] Peter Tork, an enthusiastic mimer of the bass guitar" (p. 62)--Don Kirshner didn't "form" the Monkees; Bert Schneider and Bob Rafelson did. Kirshner was brought in as musical supervisor after Micky (spelled without an "e"), Davy, Peter and Mike were hired (see p. 31 of Glenn Baker's _Monkeemania_). And by the way, Peter is a consumate musician who plays 10 instruments, including bass.

Each of these facts would have been very easy to check. Collis didn't bother, which provokes doubts about the accuracy of anything else he writes in _Mother Nature's Son_.

Nor is there evidence of original research; Collis' sources, when he troubles himself to credit them, are magazine interviews and clips from John Denver's autobiography. This book is a clip job. Read the original sources, especially John's _Take Me Home_, to get the facts in context.

Unlike many of the other reviewers, I am not such a dyed-in-the-wool Denver fan that I take this book's shortcomings personally. For what it is, it's fine. But this is NOT a biography. It's more like a college term paper. The author conducts a 175 page music review, focusing on quotes from others, articles in music magazines, and demographic data available to anyone. It is misrepresented as a biography. There is almost no information here about the man or his personal or inner life, his relationships with others, his struggles or victories. It was SO BORING and superficial; a 5 page magazine article could have done the same thing and done it more effectively. A total waste of paper.

Pass this one up, folks.In my opinion,this is a very mean spirited piece of work.John Denver was a remarkable talent and a committed humanitarian. he deserves better than this.To leave readers with the impression that he was a wife beating drunk is unforgivable.

This book has no basis for the items presented as facts. Obviously, not a song critic; the author shows no appreciation at all for the lyrics and verse that captured, and still captures the world. The accounts of John Denver's personality were also written as fact instead of the farce that it is. Members of his family, children and ex-wives; continue to praise on camera-his gentleness and giving. This is not the book to read if you want insight into a man who gave the world his genius and his hope for a better world in the only way he knew to share this hope. He was, however, a man and problems he had with alcohol and relationships are outlined in his autobiography...and not very different from the evils many people face from day to day.

I was vastly disappointed in this book. It would only rate a C as a freshman term paper. Collis mostly writes his gut level reaction to Denver's songs and the cultural events of the fifties through nineties with absolutely no attempt to analyze or substantiate. Why on a book about Denver do we have a page and a half about Rosa Parks? Was Denver there with her on the bus? One would find more content on Denver's life in a People Magazine article.

I was disappointed in this book. The dust cover was misleading and sensationalized minor incidents that really had nothing to do with the story. The author went off on tangents that I had a difficult time putting together with John's life. He might better have titled it Musical Timeline of John Denver. I was looking for information that I may not have garnered from " Take Me Home" and various articles I have read. I did like that the author's research made him rethink his original premise. I did like his memorial section at the last. I would not recommend this book as a straight biography.

This book is difficult to read; the writing style, often compared to a term paper is somewhat accurate. He is not completely accurate in statements and I often wondered if research was actually done for this book or if he mainly gleaned stories from rag magazines and decided to consider them as factual pieces of information to pass along.

Please read John's autobiography first before looking to other forms of information on John's life; John is brutally honest about himself, both good and bad, and his book reads as a truly factual account of his life (better yet, read the book and get the recorded copy read by John to get the true feelings that he had about his life, family & himself).

Collis' book reads and feels fake for the most part, and although this man clearly is NOT a John Denver fan, you don't really have to be to be aware of all that John had accomplished in his life. The next book I buy and read about John will have to be written by best friends and/or family members before I'm willing to trust content. This one for me was not on the mark because both of what I know factually and instinctively. This one is NOT going on my book shelf as a keeper, that's for sure.

For the most part, I found the book interesting. I enjoyed the author's entertwining the music of the different decades ... there were some things I didn't know. As for information on the subject of his book, don't expect anything in addition to Mr. Denver's own autobiography ... only a different perspective.

However, there is one glaring error the author made with regard to the space flight Mr. Denver was going to participate in with the Soviets. Mr. Denver did NOT OFFER TO PAY the 10 million dollars to participate in this mission ... that was the cost (or fee) for a year's extensive training he would have had to go through in order to go on the mission. That meant actually living in the Soviet Union for one year prior to the mission and going through extensive language training. One of the requirements is that he had to be fluent in Russian. Mr. Denver was unwilling to pay that fee and a waiver of that fee was in the works but he cancelled when it was known his second wife was expecting a baby.

I thank the author for referencing my review of the John Denver Tribute concert at the Berchmere Music Hall on January 16, 1998. These tribute concerts have continued every year since Mr. Denver's passing in his home town of Aspen, CO.