Rebel Musix, Scribe on a Vibe collects the extraordinary output of Vivien Goldman from 1975 onwards; spanning a time when punk burnt its scalding flame to scorch our musical earth and clear it for new genres, like post-punk and hip-hop. One of only a handful of women writing in the Golden Age of music journalism, Vivien was the first, most elegant and passionate chronicler of reggae, funk, free jazz and Afrobeat; a pioneer when music was a wild frontier business, lawless and exhilarating, with new epiphanies emerging as the counterculture mutated.
The sheer breadth of pieces here is overwhelming, from early encounters with Brian Eno, Robert Wyatt and Can; to rebels like Britain’s first she-punks, The Raincoats and The Slits; covering British groups like the Sex Pistols, The Clash and Aswad; America’s Public Enemy, Curtis Mayfield and George Clinton; and Jamaica’s Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and Dennis Brown. They rub up against contemporary profiles of New York’s downtown royalty (Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Richard Hell), alongside legendary interviews with Vivien’s friends Fela Kuti, Ornette Coleman and Bob Marley, who reigns over this collection like a benign and timeless deity.
Vivien single-handedly changed the course of music writing and this collection reshapes some of her major pieces into a new narrative of the principal radical artists of the late twentieth century, in the process reaffirming that her reputation as ‘The Punk Professor’ will live on.
The sheer breadth of pieces here is overwhelming, from early encounters with Brian Eno, Robert Wyatt and Can; to rebels like Britain’s first she-punks, The Raincoats and The Slits; covering British groups like the Sex Pistols, The Clash and Aswad; America’s Public Enemy, Curtis Mayfield and George Clinton; and Jamaica’s Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and Dennis Brown. They rub up against contemporary profiles of New York’s downtown royalty (Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Richard Hell), alongside legendary interviews with Vivien’s friends Fela Kuti, Ornette Coleman and Bob Marley, who reigns over this collection like a benign and timeless deity.
Vivien single-handedly changed the course of music writing and this collection reshapes some of her major pieces into a new narrative of the principal radical artists of the late twentieth century, in the process reaffirming that her reputation as ‘The Punk Professor’ will live on.
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Reviews
Punk! New Wave! Reggae! Vivien Goldman never fails to get the inside scoop. She is the messenger who reveals the truth about our music and ultimately, ourselves. Viva Vivien!
For those of us coming of age in the mid 70s, in love with rock + roll, our brains were lit on fire not only by new radical voices emerging from the fallout of hippie, but the writers turning us on to it all. Vivien Goldman's byline in whatever weekly rock mag she'd set foot in would ring as significantly potent and evocative as any pop star she felt excited to share a perspective on, be it Brian Eno or The Raincoats, in fact she seemed that much cooler than the people she was scribing about. She was even cooler than Lester Bangs who duked it out on the same pages with such hip sticks of dynamite as Lou Reed and Iggy Pop. Like contemporary Patti Smith, Vivien found equal value in writing about music as she did in performing it, completely free from any creepazoid hoary old patriarchal permission. Punk was our great experiment of liberation, our forum of total communitarianism and inclusivity, and Vivien was a light which made manifest the ideals of its truth. She said it loud from the beginning - one love, one music. The power is in the words. Read them and sing out.
Vivien campaigns with musicians fighting against racism, against misogyny, against social injustice. She celebrates the best of black, white, and Jewish musicians. She was doing it forty years ago. She's still doing it now. And that ain't nothing!
People talk about Brian Eno, Robert Wyatt, Can, Betty Davis, The Sex Pistols, George Clinton, Grace Jones all the time - but Vivien Goldman actually spoke to them. Whilst they were making that music we are still talking about. Essential reading: the making of history as it was happening. Vivien was there. And 'Launderette' is one of the best singles ever. Read it
Goldman writes with a literary elegance... an essential collection
I am very happy that Island Records helped to start Vivien off on such a positive career in the 1970s, when she briefly worked on Bob Marley and the Wailers' PR and helped make a difference. Then she became a pioneer in writing about reggae. It's incredible how back then, reggae was still thought of as novelty music, and now it has emerged and is known and loved everywhere. Vivien definitely played a part in that. It is great to have a book like this that captures our whole lives, brings things that happened ages ago to life again and connects them with today. It connects all the threads.
A vivid, endlessly engrossing time capsule
Vivien Goldman is an indisputable O.G. of music journalism: she's been a Zelig-like eyewitness to the emergence of multiple music scenes, from UK punk to Nigerian Afrobeat to US hip-hop, and a writer-as-doula who helped introduce now-iconic artists like Bob Marley and Fela Kuti to the world. Rebel Musix, Scribe on a Vibe is a thrilling display of Goldman's fearless brilliance, savvy wordplay, insouciant wit, and cosmopolitan curiosity. It also underscores her deep, enduring commitment to anti-racism, anti-fascism, and progressive feminism-values that are more essential today than ever.
There is so much to enjoy in this book . . . Her writing is spirited and punchy, idealistic and true. I found this collection inspiring from start to finish
Firstly, Vivien Goldman is genius, and no one writes quite like her. Full disclosure, she gave me my very first photo music assignment in the late 1970s, when she was Features Editor at Sounds. Looking at this amazing roster of interviews I realise I photographed many of the artists. We have been on the same journey. And all along, I have devoured Vivien's writing. There is something about her being 'often the only girl writer' , smart as a whip, her point of view is just different, more personal, intimate, funny and so descriptive. Reading these articles is like watching a great movie, like the scene in Goodfellas where Scorsese's camera pans down the bar .. Vivien notices every detail, nuance and character... reading her words you feel like you are in that room with her. Vivien is perhaps an empath, and lucky for us she is able to write it all down.
Revelatory, sensuous and incisive, Rebel Musix, Scribe On A Vibe revels in music and its profound power to shape human hearts and shake down the walls of Babylon. Vivien Goldman is not merely a scribe of the highest order, but a vibe unto herself.
Vivien Goldman has the uncanny ability to shapeshift into differing cultures, to hear the musical world through the prism of an inclusive celebration of song as it unlocks emotion. In these collected works from the seventies and eighties, she reveals the inner world of genre that transcends borders, becomes global, and speaks to us of our common humanity
A friend, an ally, a fellow musician and creative who is articulate, on point, a trailblazer and a necessary pioneer. Thank you for all your words.