Strange Stars: David Bowie, Pop Music, and the Decade Sci-Fi

Strange Stars: David Bowie, Pop Music, and the Decade Sci-Fi Exploded

A Hugo Award-winning author and music journalist explores theÂ weird and wild story of when rock â€™nâ€™ roll met the sci-fi world of the 1970s

As the 1960s drew to a close,Â and mankind trainedÂ its telescopes on other worlds, old conventions gave way to a new kind of hedonistic freedom thatÂ celebrated sex, drugs, and rock â€™nâ€™ roll. Derided as nerdy or dismissed as fluff, science fiction rarely gets credit for its catalyzing effect on this revolution.
InÂ Strange Stars, Jason Heller recasts sci-fi and pop music as parallel cultural forces that depended on one another to expand the horizons of books, music, and out-of-this-world imagery.

In doing so, he presents a whole generation of revered musicians as the sci-fi-obsessed conjurers they really were: from Sun Ra lecturing on the black man in the cosmos, to Pink Floyd jamming live over the broadcast of the Apollo 11 moon landing; from a wave of Star Wars disco chart toppers and synthesiser-wielding post-punks, to Jimi Hendrix distilling the â€œpurplish hazeâ€ he discovered in a pulp novel into psychedelic song. Of course, the whole scene was led by David Bowie, who hid in the balcony of a movie theater to watchÂ 2001: A Space Odyssey, and came out a changed manâ€¦

If todayâ€™s culture of Comic Con fanatics, superhero blockbusters, and classic sci-fi reboots has us thinking that the nerds have won at last, Strange Stars brings to life an era of unparalleled and unearthly creativityâ€”in magazines, novels, films, records, and concertsâ€”to point out that the nerds have been winning all along.
Country USA
Brand Melville House Publishing
Manufacturer Melville House
Binding Hardcover
ItemPartNumber 30140917
Color Multicolor
ReleaseDate 2018-06-05
UnitCount 1
EANs 9781612196978

Country	USA
Brand	Melville House Publishing
Manufacturer	Melville House
Binding	Hardcover
ItemPartNumber	30140917
Color	Multicolor
ReleaseDate	2018-06-05
UnitCount	1
EANs	9781612196978

Strange Stars: David Bowie, Pop Music, and the Decade Sci-Fi Exploded

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