Let me start by declaring an interest. I commissioned, edited and published the book ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock’n'Roll: The Life Of Ian Dury’ by Richard Balls which was first published in 2000 by Omnibus Press.
This book contains 145,000 words over 336 pages and in the course of his research Richard interviewed around 50 people, fellow musicians from the Blockheads and Kilburns, business associates of Ian at Stiff and elsewhere, and many personal friends. He also met Ian and through him was granted access to an elderly relative who filled him in on the Dury ancestry. Ian was aware of the book and though he declined to be interviewed himself gave the green light to others to be interviewed.
The book has done very well. We sold almost 15,000 in hardback and it’s now done slightly more than that in a B-format (small) soft-back edition. It continues to shift around 25 a month. By rock biog standards this is pretty damn good.
In many ways this isn’t surprising. Richard, an experienced journalist on a regional daily, did a very professional job, as reflected in the reviews. Q: “This splendid bawdy account grips right from the start”; Time Out: “Very thoroughly researched…. indispensible”; The Times: “Grips right from the start”; Uncut: “A refreshing, honest, moving account”. The reviews by readers on Amazon vary from 4 to 5 star.
I mention all this because it has come to my attention that in January Sidgwick & Jackson will publish a book entitled ‘Ian Dury: The Definitive Biography’ by Will Birch.
Now I have nothing against Will Birch who by all accounts is a grand bloke and his book on Ian certainly won’t be shabby. However, its publishers are promoting it with blurb that opens with the following statement:
This groundbreaking and authoritative book gives the first in-depth and compelling account of the life of this charismatic yet complex artist.
The implication here is that this new book is the first decent biography of Ian. This is an outright lie. Richard’s book was and remains the first in-depth and compelling account of Ian’s life. It is and remains definitive.
There are some who might accuse me of sour grapes here, but it seems iniquitous to me that when a reasonable length of time has elapsed between biographies, in this case a decade, publishers seem to think they can make claims for the merits a new biography while ignoring the existence of a previous (equally meritorious) biography. The hope, of course, is that reviewers of the new book will be unfamiliar with the previous work, regurgitate the blurb and fail to note that – and I’m guessing here, of course – it reiterates biographical information that has been readily available for a considerable period of time.
Here’s hoping that those who bought ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock’n’Roll’ – and there’s well over 30,000 of them, almost all in the UK – won’t make the same mistake.
4 Responses to IAN DURY BIOGRAPHY
I have much sympathy, Chris, though Will’s book will I’m sure be interesting.
A week ago the Guardian trumpeted its interview with Liz Fraser as the first time she’d spoken to the press since 1998, ignoring the fact that I interviewed her for a big MOJO feature on the Cocteau Twins two years after that. These wee things do stick in the craw, do they not.
At least the publishers’ blurbers should get their facts right.
Thanks Barney.
It would seem as though I may have the last laugh anyway. The new book has been timed to coincide with the release of a film about Ian which is titled, happily for me, Sex & Drugs & Rock\’n\’Roll. Now I have no doubt that the publishers of the new book would dearly have loved to call their book S&D&R\’n\’R but were unable to do so because – although there is no copyright on titles – we got there first and to have two books with the same title would have caused confusion in the book trade, ie customers both wholesale and retail might order one book and be supplied with the other. (Heaven forbid that customers wanting the new book would be supplied with ours!)
As it happens we have quite a bit of stock left so we\’re not in a position to reprint immediately with a new cover or whatever, but we\’re thinking of stickering the remaining stock \’Now A Major Movie\’ or something like that. Either way, our book is £8 cheaper than the rival book. Also, it\’s established so the book trade know it\’s a winner.
Chris,
It was good to see you last night at Zoe’s book launch.
Please don’t think I was in any way offended by your earlier comments on RBP regarding ‘The Definitive Biography’ (my publisher’s title) versus your Richard Balls Ian Dury book.
They are two very different and equally worthy (IMHO) attempts to tell Ian’s story, which in my case was greatly assisted by the lengthy interviews I conducted with Ian Dury during his lifetime and which form the backbone of my biography, plus I was able to get to the bottom of Ian’s paternal genealogy, which I believe helps the reader to understand perhaps why Ian was such a complex character.
Best,
Will
Hi Will… my beef wasn’t with the title of your book but that the publishers promoted it with a statement that implied it was the first ever decent sized book on Ian which was clearly untrue. I realise this wasn’t your doing and that the publishers were to blame, but I felt the need to draw attention to this and, on a wider level, condemn the practise whereby publishers promote books with outright lies intended to mislead customers.