Favorite music-oriented novel?

[unclemeat]

Few "music-oriented" novels spring to mind.
In Joris-Karl Huysmans' Against nature [aka Against the grain] (1884) (ch. IV), Des Esseintes plays the "mouth organ" to create imaginary compositions via a synaesthetic association of musical notes and liquors : Indeed, each several liquor corresponded, so he held, in taste with the sound of a particular instrument. Dry curacao, for instance, was like the clarinet with its shrill, velvety note; kummel like the oboe, whose timbre is sonorous and nasal; creme de menthe and anisette like the flute, at one and the same time sweet and poignant, whining and soft. Then, to complete the orchestra, comes kirsch, blowing a wild trumpet blast; gin and whisky, deafening the palate with their harsh outbursts of comets and trombones; liqueur brandy, blaring with the overwhelming crash of the tubas, while the thunder peals of the cymbals and the big drum, beaten might and main, are reproduced in the mouth by the rakis of Chios and the mastics.
cf the famous pianocktail in Boris Vian's Froth on the Daydream (1947).
There are also numerous strange musical references in Raymond Roussel (Locus Solus, Impressions of Africa).
Truffaut's film Shoot the piano player is based on David Goodis' Down there.

[Mister Triscuits]

1. Sacred Locomotive Flies, by the late great Richard A. Lupoff. One of the first psychedelic science fiction novels, it's about the adventures of a band called Sacred Locomotive. At one point, they play 21st Century Schizoid Man. Very funny.

Just finished this. Pretty wild! It reminds me a lot of the Illuminatus! books.

[Sturgeon's Lawyer]

It reminds me a lot of the Illuminatus! books.

...which it precedes by a few years.

If you liked that, you might also like his Space War Blues, or, for other reasons, Chester A. Anderson's The Butterfly Kid...

[Mister Triscuits]

If you liked that, you might also like his Space War Blues, or, for other reasons, Chester A. Anderson's The Butterfly Kid...

Indeed! I own both of those, the former in the Gregg Press hardcover.

[Sturgeon's Lawyer]

Indeed! I own both of those, the former in the Gregg Press hardcover.

Both my Gregg h/c and my original p/b are autographed, so nyaah.

[Mascodagama]

Michael Moorcock's - The Cornelius Chronicles frequently has his band related fantasy sequences scattered around.

There is also The Time of the Hawklords, a 1976 novel co-written by Moorcock and Michael Butterworth that revolves around the members of Hawkwind as characters. My suspicion is that it was mostly written by Butterworth and Moorcock's name made it publishable. On its merits I don't think it would have been, it's terrible and I wouldn't recommend seeking it out to anyone except possibly the most diehard of Hawkwind completists. Still, if you really want to read a novel where Lemmy is a character, as far as I know this is your only option.

[Mascodagama]

I get it. Nobody's perfect but I don't want to read stuff like that either. Apparently H.P. Lovecraft was a racist. I'll have to research that a little more to see how much of that infiltrates his writing.

Most of his best stuff is not really that impacted by it, but it shows through in places in a really unpleasant way. There's a very nasty passage in The Case of Charles Dexter Ward about a Jewish landlord and his black tenants. And there's a story he co-wrote with Zealia Bishop, Medusa's Coil, where the racism is pretty much the point of the story, and it is absolutely vile.

[Mascodagama]

My two recommendations based on being brilliantly written, but neither being prog related, are The Horn by John Clellon Holmes (about a jazz musician in the 1950s) and This Is Memorial Device by David Keenan (early eighties post-punk group, Scotland).

[Mascodagama]

Of possible interest, Mick Farren who sang with punk-before-punk band The Deviants wrote numerous novels. The one I read, Phaid the Gambler, was some kind of SF opus and I'm pretty sure involved a guitarist and/or rock band quite heavily. I didn't find it memorable and didn't read anything else he wrote.

[Lopez]

There is also The Time of the Hawklords, a 1976 novel co-written by Moorcock and David Butterworth that revolves around the members of Hawkwind as characters. My suspicion is that it was mostly written by Butterworth and Moorcock's name made it publishable. On its merits I don't think it would have been, it's terrible and I wouldn't recommend seeking it out to anyone except possibly the most diehard of Hawkwind completists. Still, if you really want to read a novel where Lemmy is a character, as far as I know this is your only option.

I found a copy of Time of the Hawklords in a used book store about a year ago. Haven't read it yet, and on your disrecommendation, I just may not ever. I'll keep it, nonetheless.

[boilk]

I just recently got into reading novels (I do read a lot, but up until now, it has been books about horror/sf/fantasy movies and their making). My second novel has been Peter Goddard's The Sounding. Peter Goddard was a long time music critic and writer for the Toronto newspapers the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star. Here he weaves an intriguing tale of the music business, focusing a 'retired' mega rock star from the 70s who is now in hiding somewhere in France. A president of a music label sends a producer out to find him and from there all sorts of strange things happen, including sending out broadcasts over satellites that somehow cause the ear to hear things differently and potentially drive you mad.

It's a robust tale of behind the scenes music figures, mega-rock stars, sex and intrigue, and it weaves in some background with real world musicians.

A good read.

Neil

[Mascodagama]

Another one that is at least worth a mention is Pinball by Jerzy Kosinski (1982). I read this as a teenager and I liked it mainly because it had a lot of explicit and often kinky sexual content. The story of a has-been classical composer hired to discover the true identity of an enigmatic rock star is fairly intriguing, and from recollection (it has been a long time) the writing about music was better than perfunctory. I suspect it has not aged well and would come across as high-class sleaze at best, misogynist trash at worst.

[Sturgeon's Lawyer]

There is also The Time of the Hawklords, a 1976 novel co-written by Moorcock and Michael Butterworth that revolves around the members of Hawkwind as characters. My suspicion is that it was mostly written by Butterworth and Moorcock's name made it publishable. On its merits I don't think it would have been, it's terrible and I wouldn't recommend seeking it out to anyone except possibly the most diehard of Hawkwind completists. Still, if you really want to read a novel where Lemmy is a character, as far as I know this is your only option.

You're right that Butterworth wrote more of it than Moorcock (and wrote two sequels on his own), but Moorcock's stamp is definitely on it. Also, Moorcock not only wrote some lyrics for Hawkwind -- and some of their other songs were based on stories by him (e.g., "The Black Corridor" and the entire Chronicle of the Black Sword longplayer), but appeared on stage with them on numerous occasions. He can be heard on the two-CD version of the Live Chronicles album. (He also wrote lyrics to three songs by BOC.)

[Progbear]

There is also The Time of the Hawklords, a 1976 novel co-written by Moorcock and Michael Butterworth that revolves around the members of Hawkwind as characters. My suspicion is that it was mostly written by Butterworth and Moorcock's name made it publishable. On its merits I don't think it would have been, it's terrible and I wouldn't recommend seeking it out to anyone except possibly the most diehard of Hawkwind completists. Still, if you really want to read a novel where Lemmy is a character, as far as I know this is your only option.

I spotted a copy in a bookstore in Concord (CA, not NH) ages ago but balked at buying it, even though the idea of a Hawkwind-based SF novel made me titter. I don't doubt that Moorcock wrote it; he crapped out some real "written as quickly as possible to earn a paycheck" garbage in his time, which is why I was reticent in picking up Time of the Hawkwlords. They can't all be The Final Programme or Gloriana, is I guess what I'm trying to say.

That said, I'm kind of kicking myself for not buying it. It would have made a great conversation piece, even if it only sat on a shelf unread. As I recall, the cover art was hilarious!

[Geoff O'Donoghue]

I spotted a copy in a bookstore in Concord (CA, not NH) ages ago but balked at buying it, even though the idea of a Hawkwind-based SF novel made me titter. I don't doubt that Moorcock wrote it; he crapped out some real "written as quickly as possible to earn a paycheck" garbage in his time, which is why I was reticent in picking up Time of the Hawkwlords. They can't all be The Final Programme or Gloriana, is I guess what I'm trying to say.

That said, I'm kind of kicking myself for not buying it. It would have made a great conversation piece, even if it only sat on a shelf unread. As I recall, the cover art was hilarious!

I read this a long time ago and it was indeed bad. I think I bought it second-hand and I should have kept it as a curiosity. I thought the cover art was quite good.

timeofhawklords.jpg

[Mascodagama]

You're right that Butterworth wrote more of it than Moorcock (and wrote two sequels on his own), but Moorcock's stamp is definitely on it. Also, Moorcock not only wrote some lyrics for Hawkwind -- and some of their other songs were based on stories by him (e.g., "The Black Corridor" and the entire Chronicle of the Black Sword longplayer), but appeared on stage with them on numerous occasions. He can be heard on the two-CD version of the Live Chronicles album. (He also wrote lyrics to three songs by BOC.)

Yeah, I knew the Moorcock / Hawkwind collaborations. I think that in early days of the band they were all part of the same Ladbroke Grove milieu, it was a counter-cultural hotbed at that time. Of course Moorcock also had his own band Deep Fix, with some overlapping personnel. Their record wasn’t much good from what I recall.