Jack: The Biography of Jack Bruce (Hardback)

Click for larger image

Our Price:  £17.95 Delivery:  Free delivery on this item (UK mainland only) Availability:

Jack: The Biography of Jack Bruce 

On November 26 1968, at The Royal Albert Hall, the rock band Cream played their farewell concert. Although only together for a little over two years, they had established themselves as one of Britain’s most exciting, innovative and important bands. Cream created a jazz/blues/rock fusion which re-defined contemporary music. All three were hugely talented musicians in their own right, and their music had authority and, above all else, unparalleled power and drive.

Then, in May 2005, they returned. To the huge surprise and delight of their millions of fans, they played four gigs in one week – back at The Royal Albert Hall. For many it was almost beyond belief that a reunion would ever happen. The tickets sold out in record time, and fans came from all over the world.

After the 1968 farewell concert, Cream’s bass player, vocalist and co-songwriter, Jack Bruce, quickly created a new and hugely successful solo career – starting with his greatly admired ‘Songs For A Tailor’ album. Since then he has played with some of the most respected musicians in the world, has released many albums and performed live in front of several million people. Through the late Seventies and Eighties though his life was blighted by drink and drugs problems. During this period his first marriage collapsed and he also had to endure the death of his eldest son. In the autumn of 2003 he survived potentially fatal complications following a liver transplant.

Born in Glasgow in 1943 into a poor and politically very active family, Jack was recognised as a gifted musician from an early age. He studied composition at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and developed a broad musical taste. When he was still only sixteen, in any one week he would be playing with a jazz band, a country and western group and a full-scale orchestra – and be composing classical music. He bought his first car months before he was old enough to drive it; already earning more than his father. His passions, he says, were music, girls and cars. In the early Sixties he moved from the acoustic bass to the electric bass and was caught up in the emerging London r ‘n b scene. He rapidly gained a formidable reputation as a very powerful and creative player, with a highly distinctive style.

A biography of Jack Bruce is long overdue. Working very closely with Jack – and the huge number of people who have known him and worked with him over the past forty-five years – Steven Myatt has now written that book. It includes a large number of personal photographs which have never been seen before, and will be the first biography of this uniquely talented man – let alone the first authorised biography.