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I bought this from Urbis at the weekend, more because I hadn't got it than because I actually wanted to read it. I wasn't expecting too much from it at all. I'm about halfway through it and have to say it's one of the best Factory books I've read, both for the quality of the material and the writing style.
Loads of things I didn't know, new anecdotes and some fairly original points of view.
Anyone else read it? Anyone know any feedback from the band?
I thought it was good, right up to the last chapter when when Sharp admits he didn't go (probably a euphamism for 'wasn't invited') to Hannett's funeral because he'd lost touch with him 10 years earlier, and it was quite clear that he was cashing in by embellishing a few drug fuelled memories of a bloke he knew for about three months.
Old Blue wrote: I thought it was good, right up to the last chapter when when Sharp admits he didn't go (probably a euphamism for 'wasn't invited') to Hannett's funeral because he'd lost touch with him 10 years earlier, and it was quite clear that he was cashing in by embellishing a few drug fuelled memories of a bloke he knew for about three months.
Totally agree, it falls on it's arse at the end and on reflection you realise a lot is obviously made up, i.e how could he know what Hannetts trips were like or whether he swallowed his vomit while being pushed about in the shopping trolley.
Not a bad read though!
what I'd like is a book by the engineers at the studios, about the gear used and what settings were used etc, but then I'm a techie muso who loves stuff like that.
I remember reading the first chapter or two and thinking it was a load of shite but i persevered and thought it got better.... until the end, which was absolute fucking nonsense. If Sharp was his so-called best friend why, hadn't he seen him since 1981? He was obviously a drug-buddy for a while and has dined off it ever since. My girlfriend knows somebody who was interviewd for the book and they also thought that Sharp was a chancer.
It should have been called 'Who Cashed In On Martin Hannett?'
Don't waste your pocket money kids...
noorder wrote: Who killed Martin Hannet?
Jack Daniels?...
Seriously. Stupid title for the book. But certainly is an attention graber.
Well I've finished it now and I enjoyed it right to the end. Throughout the book, a clear distinction is made between real events and those which have been dramatised to some extent by the use of the two fonts. This subtle device doesn't intrude on the narrative unduly, but is an honest way of acknowledging when a part of the story had been embellished/surmised/made up.
As for the author not seeing Hannet for a few years before his death, I see that as just another story of someone who is forced to remove himself from a friend's company in order to break a destructive cycle.
The fact that Sharpe is working, clean and, well, alive, shows that sometimes the only way to stop a destructive relationship from dragging you down is to remove yourself entirely.
It wouldn't have been much of a book if he's ended it in 1981, or whenever they stopped hanging around together, so it was quite right for him to finish the story in his fictionalised style. He doesn't labour it; only a couple of chapters painting a picture of the chaos surrounding Hannet's decline and the sorry portrait of his family at the funeral, surrounded by crazies and half-friends and parasites who blighted him in life.
The "Who Killed..." device is a little pointless, as is the speculation at the end of the book. You really don't have to look very far to find a cause of death for a 22 stone drug addict whatever their age. You rarely hear about them dying whilst skydiving, put it that way.
The end result is a fascinating and very disturbing tale of the decline of several drug users, and a rare insight into Hannet's life and ways. If Sharpe wasn't all that close to Hannet, he's done a great job of telling a story about someone who was.
