Take a Walk on the Dark Side
Rock and Roll Myths, Legends, and Curses
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Narrated by:
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Mike Dawson
About this listen
Take a Walk on the Dark Side is the ultimate book for today's rock and roll fan: a fascinating compendium of facts, fictions, prophecies, premonitions, coincidences, hoaxes, doomsday scenarios, and other urban legends about some of the world's most beloved and mysterious pop icons. Updating, revising, and expanding on material from his cult classic Hellhounds on Their Trail, Patterson offers up a delectable feast of strange and occasionally frightening rock and roll tales, featuring the ironies associated with the tragic deaths of many rock icons, unsolved murders, and other tales from the fell clutch of circumstance.
Beginning with the fateful place where it all started - a deserted country crossroads just outside Clarksdale, Mississippi, where Robert Johnson made his deal with the devil - through the Buddy Holly curse (rock and roll's first great tragedy) and beyond, this incredible volume uncovers some of rock and roll's most celebrated murders, twists of fate, and decades-long streaks of bad luck that defy rational explanation. In it you'll find:
- Facts about Jimmy Page and the Zeppelin curse.
- Chilling quirks of fate surrounding the deaths of musicians in the Allman Brothers Band and Lynyrd Skynyrd.
- A provocative look at "The Club", membership in which requires an untimely death at age 27 and whose inductees include Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and Janis Joplin.
- Cryptic messages in song lyrics that have proved eerily prophetic.
Carefully researched, wildly enjoyable, and often harrowing, Take a Walk on the Dark Side takes the listener on a mysterious ride through rock and roll history. Narrated by Mike Dawson (Left of Boom, Mistrial, The Adam Carolla Show)
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- By: David Hepworth
- Narrated by: Matthew Lloyd Davies
- Length: 10 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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The age of the rock star, like the age of the cowboy, has passed. Like the cowboy, the idea of the rock star lives on in our imaginations. What did we see in them? Swagger. Recklessness. Sexual charisma. Damn-the-torpedoes self-belief. A certain way of carrying themselves. Good hair. Interesting shoes. Talent we wished we had. What did we want of them? To be larger than life but also like us. To live out their songs. To stay young forever. No wonder many didn't stay the course.
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INSIGHTFULL!
- By CLAUDIA R KENNEDY on 02-18-18
By: David Hepworth
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Brian Jones
- The Making of the Rolling Stones
- By: Paul Trynka
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Brian Jones is a forensic, thrilling account of Jones' life, which for the first time details his pioneering achievements and messy unraveling. With more than 120 new interviews, Trynka offers countless new revelations and sets straight the tall tales that have long marred Jones' legacy. His story is a gripping battle between creativity and ambition, between self-sabotage and betrayal. It's all here: the girlfriends, the drugs, and some of the greatest music of all time.
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Great story, exceptionally well narrated
- By M. Graham on 11-17-15
By: Paul Trynka
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When Giants Walked the Earth
- A Biography of Led Zeppelin
- By: Mick Wall
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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They were the last great band of the '60s and the first great band of the '70s. They rose, somewhat unpromisingly, from the ashes of the Yardbirds to become one of the biggest-selling rock bands of all time - and eventually paid the price for it, with disaster, drug addiction, and death.
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Very annoying but tolerable for serious fans.
- By M. Allen on 08-14-19
By: Mick Wall
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1965
- The Most Revolutionary Year in Music
- By: Andrew Grant Jackson
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 11 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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During 12 unforgettable months in the middle of the turbulent '60s, America saw the rise of innovative new sounds that would change popular music as we knew it. In 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music, music historian Andrew Grant Jackson (Still the Greatest: The Essential Songs of The Beatles' Solo Careers) chronicles a groundbreaking year of creativity fueled by rivalries between musicians and continents, sweeping social changes, and technological breakthroughs.
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Seems like a good overview
- By wylie smith on 01-12-23
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Tearing Down the Wall of Sound
- The Rise and Fall of Phil Spector
- By: Mick Brown
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 17 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Phil Spector, born in the Bronx in 1940, grew up an outsider despised by his peers. But he formed a band, and had a number-one hit with "To Know Him Is to Love Him". He quickly became the top producer of early rock and roll and the originator of such girl groups as the Ronettes. Hit followed hit, and for all of them he used a new recording style called the "wall of sound". But the reign of the boy-man who owned pop music was doomed, and Spector spiraled into paranoid isolation and peculiar behavior.
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Descent Into Madness
- By Chris on 06-11-12
By: Mick Brown
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Lords of Chaos
- The Bloody Rise of the Satanic Metal Underground
- By: Michael Moynihan, Didrik Soderlind
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 13 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Lords of Chaos focuses on the scene surrounding the extreme heavy metal subgenre black metal in Norway in the early 1990s, with a focus on the string of church burnings and murders that occurred in the country around 1993.
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Intentionally Misleading
- By Chris on 10-29-19
By: Michael Moynihan, and others
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Fornication
- The Red Hot Chili Peppers Story
- By: Jeff Apter
- Narrated by: Adrian Mulraney
- Length: 15 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Despite an epic reputation for exhibitionism, drug taking, and drunkenness, through it all the Chili Peppers have continued to produce records that shock, challenge, and intrigue their fans. Jeff Apter tells the complete Red Hot Chili Peppers story, from their first meeting at a Los Angeles high school to the creation of such career-defining albums as BloodSugarSexMagik, Californication and By The Way.
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Cabron
- By Amazon Customer on 10-02-19
By: Jeff Apter
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Beatles '66
- The Revolutionary Year
- By: Steve Turner
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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The year that changed everything for the Beatles was 1966 - the year of their last concert and of Revolver, their first album created to be listened to rather than performed. This was the year the Beatles risked their popularity by retiring from live performances, recording songs that explored alternative states of consciousness, experimenting with avant-garde ideas, and speaking their minds on issues of politics, war, and religion. Music journalist and Beatles expert Steve Turner investigates the enormous changes that took place in the Beatles' lives and work during 1966.
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Great listen
- By Tad Davis on 07-28-18
By: Steve Turner
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Keith Richards
- The Unauthorised Biography
- By: Victor Bockris
- Narrated by: Adrian Mulraney
- Length: 20 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1992, Victor Bockris' celebrated biography was the first to recognize Richards' pivotal role in the legend of the Rolling Stones. Now that book on rock's most incredible survivor has been expanded. Here are the true facts behind Richards' battles with his demons: the women, the drugs and the love-hate relationship with Jagger. His struggle with heroin and his status as the rock star most likely to die in the 1970s. His scarcely believable rebirth as a family man in the 1980s. Illuminated with revealing quotes and thoughtful insights into the man behind the band that goes on forever.
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doesn't comapre to LIFE
- By A. Garofalo on 02-20-14
By: Victor Bockris
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Fire and Rain
- The Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, James Taylor, CSNY and the Lost Story of 1970
- By: David Browne
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
- Length: 11 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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January 1970: the Beatles assemble one more time to put the finishing touches on Let It Be; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young are wrapping up Déjà Vu; Simon and Garfunkel are unveiling Bridge Over Troubled Water; James Taylor is an upstart singer-songwriter who's just completed Sweet Baby James. Over the course of the next twelve months, their lives---and the world around them---will change irrevocably.
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Fascinating information, easy to listen
- By NCKitkat on 07-28-11
By: David Browne
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Somebody to Love
- The Life, Death and Legacy of Freddie Mercury
- By: Matt Richards, Mark Langthorne
- Narrated by: Tim Bruce
- Length: 15 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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When Freddie Mercury died in 1991, aged just 45, the world was rocked by the vibrant and flamboyant star's tragic secret that he had been battling AIDS. That Mercury had even been diagnosed came as a shock to his millions of fans, with his announcement coming less than 24 hours before his death. In Somebody to Love, biographers Mark Langthorne and Matt Richards skilfully weave Freddie Mercury's incredible pursuit of musical greatness with Queen, his upbringing and his endless search for love with the story of a terrible disease.
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Stunning dual biography of Freddie and AIDS
- By tru britty on 07-19-18
By: Matt Richards, and others
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Lynyrd Skynyrd
- Remembering the Free Birds of Southern Rock
- By: Gene Odom, Frank Dorman - contributor
- Narrated by: Arthur Flavell
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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In the summer of 1964 Jacksonville, Florida teenager Ronnie Van Zant and some of his friends hatched the idea of forming a band to play covers of the Rolling Stones, Beatles, Yardbirds, and the country and blues-rock music they had grown to love. Naming their band after Leonard Skinner, the gym teacher at Robert E. Lee Senior High School who constantly badgered the long-haired aspiring musicians to get haircuts, they were soon playing gigs at parties, and bars throughout the South.
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A tragic sorry, but honestly told
- By Mark D. Schnittman on 09-27-21
By: Gene Odom, and others
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Thelonious Monk
- The Life and Times of an American Original
- By: Robin DG Kelley
- Narrated by: Sean Crisden
- Length: 25 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Thelonious Monk is the critically acclaimed, gripping saga of an artist's struggle to "make it" without compromising his musical vision. It is a story that, like its subject, reflects the tidal ebbs and flows of American history in the 20th century. To his fans, he was the ultimate hipster; to his detractors, he was temperamental, eccentric, taciturn, or childlike. His angular melodies and dissonant harmonies shook the jazz world to its foundations, ushering in the birth of "bebop" and establishing Monk as one of America's greatest composers.
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The definitive bio of Monk
- By ricardo on 12-27-17
By: Robin DG Kelley
What listeners say about Take a Walk on the Dark Side
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Steve
- 01-07-19
Mostly contrived but interesting.
Worth a read/listen, since it's pretty comprehensive, but most of *legends* and *myths* are a stretch at best but mostly contrived especially when it gets into the numerology stuff.
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- Brenda Evans
- 11-06-17
Enlightening
What an in depth summary of things I've heard of were true or rumors, but never could substantiate. The voice used for this audio version was epic.
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7 people found this helpful
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- dj
- 05-10-20
A REAL WALK ON THE DARK SIDE
I totally enjoyed this audiobook. I've read other works by R. Gary Patterson but wanted to read this one again. Too bad his other books are not available in audio form. This book is well organized, moves along quickly but still takes the time needed to completely cover the person or event being discussed. There's so much information, much of it unknown to many people and they will be surprised by some of the info on their favorite classic rock musician. I miss hearing Gary's interviews and will miss never having any new works by him. His stories are great, like the dirt from the crossroads! Wow. Very good book.
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1 person found this helpful
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- TM Conway
- 12-31-18
Left me wanting more
This one provided information that was new to me and left me wanting more. This book, in my opinion, belongs in a set with Weird Tales from the Canyon. For almost any music/music history lover, this is a fascinating listen. To be fair, much of the material is just a deeper delving into the topics music fans have probably already heard. But it does go deeper into these topics. I wish I could find more books like this.
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- Lono
- 12-16-17
Interesting tale, mostly coincidence
I think the author was looking to hard to find spooky coincidences across rock history. Not tough find.
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1 person found this helpful
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- John M. ONeal
- 07-04-18
Too much fun!!!
The late/great R. Gary Patterson of Coast to Coast Fame does a wonderful job of creating a thought provoking exploration of the myths, legends, and curses of Rock and Roll. From Blues Legend Robert Johnson, who is believed to have made a pact with the Devil at the paranormal charged crossroads, to guitar great Jimmy Page's obsession with Occult Legend/Satan incarnate Aleister Crowley, this intriguing book is pure entertainment from beginning to end. It includes the 27 club and bizarre coincidence/synchronicity involving all that leave one wondering if there is, in fact, something to the idea that our rock idols and performers are, indeed, on a Highway to Hell that definitely involves the existence of the paranormal and even the mythical Devil himself. Therefore, listen at your own risk! This is quite a memorable listen to say the least. Mike Dawson, the narrator, even has that deep gravely voice of someone who might even be familiar himself with the rigors of the road.
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- C. M. Logan
- 11-20-19
Mike Dawson is the best.
Fantastic stories from the history of Rock! Mike Dawson makes everything sound better! highly entertaining listen!
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- JokerHaHaHa79
- 01-26-23
RIP R. Gary Patterson
if you're a fan of rock n roll you will enjoy this book. The narrator's voice is a perfect fit for this subject matter.
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- Carrie DeBord
- 04-30-19
That’s Rock&Roll!
This was a fantastic compilation of all the tales and legends that rock fans heard through out multiple generations. Narrator, Mike Dawson is amazing! I’d listen to him read a phone book.
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- Lou
- 02-22-19
Great listen, amazing
Great listen and Dawson's narration rocks a can't miss lots of interesting bits off information
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