Animal House. Devoured the first half. The school/fanzine years are an exhilarating read. Used to see him flogging Bazag at the poly and Uni gigs and thought it must be so fucking cool to do that. I wanted to do that. I could do that. I had things I could write about. I didn’t have a fucking clue how to do that. He openly admits he was quite bombastic in his sales pitch. There was never any fucking chance I was going to ask him how he did it. Getting into the NME, I’m cheering him on, I know how it ends but I’m still willing his guerrilla campaign to succeed. Spoiler alert, it does. Interwoven with the excitement and adventure there’s also great personal sadness and sorrow in JB’s life. There’s some very, very brave writing here too.
Then there’s loaded (lower case. It’s important). You’re all probably more familiar with it than I was. I’ve never read a copy, that I can recall. We were out here while Cool Britannia exploded. On the outside looking in, again. I wouldn’t have been cool anyway. There’s plenty of drink and drug fuelled high jinx and tomfoolery, and an overriding spirit of, ‘Why not? Why can’t we?” There’s some really interesting insight into the workings of a magazine and publishing companies and their workings too. To be honest I’d like to have read more of this stuff. I’m probably in the minority.
Then there’s the split from loaded and the subsequent recruitment at British GQ. Almost like leaving an indie for a major only he’d pretty much done that already. Maybe a football analogy would work. Non league (Bazag), to Premier League (NME), Champions League group stages (loaded), Champions League knockout stages (GQ). Maybe not. Thankfully he doesn’t appear to have hit rock bottom before getting help and kicking the drink and drugs. There’s not much about Hot Dog or Jack but I understand if this does well, and I imagine it will, there’s a second memoir in the offing. It’s a good read with an interesting supporting cast assembled around him. Jim seems to genuinely appreciate his lot in life. His smarts are on display at times. He’s a quick study, for sure. But he never comes across as anything less than a fan, a fan of music, of football, of movies, of travel, of adventure. He acknowledges mentors and people who have helped him on his way and also luck. He’s modest about the number of people he has opened the door for. Over all it’s a good book, I just get the feeling it would be even better if it were twice as long.
