Marc Almond [Old Edition]: The Last Star [Paperback]

Jeremy Reed (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1996

The Last Star is the best-selling, in-depth aesthetic account of the life, loves, attitudes, lyrics and music of Marc Almond. In this new edition, author Jeremy Reed traces the evolution of Almond's music and lyrics from the legendary Soft Cell, through the various solo records and collaborations, to his emergence as perhaps the greatest male torch singer of his generation. The result is a sympathetic and vivid portrayal of a controversial, enigmatic modern star living and working at the creative edge of his art. Includes 24 pages of photography and complete discography.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Shapely, salty and sexy. -- Loaded --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: The Tears Corporation/Creation; 1st ed edition (March 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1871592615
• ISBN-13: 978-1871592610
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,904,289 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A Fan Letter From a Sycophant, November 6, 2001

By 

Damian Ramsey (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Marc Almond [Old Edition]: The Last Star (Paperback)

Every media figure must get them. Fawning, gushing letters from fanboys and fangirls who dream of sharing in the public intimacy of stardom. In a perfect world, Jeremy Reed would have written his letter to Marc Almond, and Marc's secretary would have sent him an autographed picture and a sign-up form for the official fanclub.

In this world, Jeremy Reed published his fan letter as a biography and called it a work of art.

Suffice it to say it's neither.

Biographies succeed if they not only put us in silent observation of the subject's greatness, but also in observation of their flaws, which comprise the other half of their essential humanity. Reed's inability to find any flaw in Almond puts the reader an unassailable distance from him. Almond is the figure we see vaguely from an upper balcony while Reed forever sits beside us, excitedly talking our ear off.

For all its verbosity, this biography never tells us that much about Marc. There is no information about his birth, his childhood, or his adolescence. His time with Soft Cell gets only a vague mention, with five years going by in sixteen pages. Though he complains of small-minded music critics throughout the book, Reed seems incapable of being objective himself. Just as he dispises the critics for failing to appreciate Marc Almond's later torch singing, he himself fails utterly to understand the aesthetics of Soft Cell. Dave Ball is flippantly dismissed as "an offbeat keyboard player," and the group is portrayed as almost an impediment to Marc's own realization of his endless talent.

After that, though, Reed never seems to run out of breathless praise, metaphors involving colors, half-baked gender theory, and emotional cliche to dance around the one central, unexamined fact of this book: Marc Almond is everything Jeremy Reed likes and is nothing Jeremy Reed doesn't.

Marc Almond in The Last Star is the autographed photo, glossy and fey, perfect and paper-thin.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Prose that shimmers like Almond's Vocals, May 11, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Marc Almond: The Last Star (Paperback)

There's no point in writing about an artist's music at length unless you have real sympathy for the work. Dislike or ambivalence is better served in a half-dozen pithy pages. No question Jeremy Reed's full-length study of Marc Almond is half love-letter, but it is written by a lover who has lived long with and through his subject.

Lovers see the beloved with a unique and peculiar clarity, and this is Reed's strength here. He brings you very close to his subject, but really much closer to the subjective experience of a profound and critical listener lovingly engaging over the years with Almond's diverse art.

Almond's measure of musical genius has grown over the years in reverse proportion to the number of people willing to listen. He started as a star of limited ability and became a has-been of enormous power. Almond has been brave, exploring many musical avenues with rare emotional honesty, making the myriad boulevards of sound glitter. Reed is at least as brave and at least as gifted. His poetry, literary and music criticism is as great as Almond's music; would that more people paid serious attention to both. This book is a fine introduction to Marc Almond, and to Jeremy Reed as well.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars As intoxicating as Almond himself, September 26, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Marc Almond: The Last Star (Paperback)

It's great to read a well written biography and artistic examination of such a multi faceted performer/songwriter/genius. Reed writes with such beauty it's almost like reading Almond's lyrics and poetry itself. Also recommended for it's exhaustive discography and the beautiful photographs of the hero of the piece. This should compliment the imminent release of Almond's autobiography "Tainted Love".