Knocking On Heaven's Door: Rock Obituaries
Nick Talevski
Omnibus Press 2006
Paperback, 746pp

A voluminous tome which is as up to date as these things can get when it comes to dead rock stars. Nick Talevski has undertaken some massive research to put this together, an exhaustive list of popular musicians who have died. In simple A to Z format they're all here, from June Abbit to Miki Zone (no, I've not heard of either of them). Each entry gets a couple of paragraphs detailing their history, their claim to fame (including best known recordings and highest chart positions, for example), and a note on their death.

In fact, for those who like a slightly broader perspective, there's a lot of country and early blues and soul singers listed here, partly because of natural attrition and the scope of Talevski's research and partly because of the genre crossover which was so prevalent particularly back in the 1950s and 60s.

'Knocking On Heaven's Door' is likely to become the definitive book on this subject for some years to come; it's an exhaustive list and has no obvious bias that I could detect. The most obvious bias is usually revealed by a lack of women noted in just about all histories, but such is not the case here.

However, somehow I feel Talevski has missed a trick here. Sure, the book is subtitled 'Rock Obituaries' rather than 'Gruesome Endings', but the really interesting part of so many rock deaths lies in the manner of their untimely endings. Many years ago I began research of just such an idea, envisaging a three hour radio programme as the end result... and gave up my research at about 400 names, having barely scratched the surface. The topic had become too huge, which proves there's plenty of material out there for Talevski, who often enough is content to merely list the manner of passing without any effort made to provide details. It may be ghoulish, but why buy a burger without the meat patty or the pickles, eh? All too often Talevski fails to provide the spice. That aside, this is an essential part of the library of any serious music fan.

Alex Wheaton