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TYNESIDE BOOK CLUB

A book group in gateshead, tyneside

Clothes, music, boys and the book club

17/5/2016

 
Book cover of Clothes, Music, Boys by Viv AlbertineMembers were divided on whether they found much to like about Viv Albertine

Disappointingly, Tyneside Book Club Members failed to embrace the punk aesthetic when discussing the memoir of musician Viv Albertine - in fact there wasn't a bin bag or safety pin in sight.

But this account of her life in and out of punk pioneers The Slits  did get some members alternately pogoing and gobbing, even if few of us had encountered her music.

Much of the discussion of Clothes, Music, Boys centred on how likeable members found Albertine. Most agreed this was a well-written autobiography - helpfully provided in digestible short chapters.

But while some saw her as refreshingly honest, and her flaws engaging; others saw her as rather self-centred and Narcissistic. Was she a hero, a feminist exemplar, or just a rather unpleasant woman? That didn't necessarily mar people's appreciation of the book but it did colour it.

And while some were fascinated by her account of the punk years, and encounters with Sid Vicious, Malcolm McLaren, Vivienne Westwood et al, others found the later sections about post-punk life - IVF, relationship problems and a musical renaissance - more engrossing and emotional.

All this helped though to produce a lively and impassioned discussion.

Next month we return to fiction, and swap the 1970s for the 19th Century with Canadian author Linda Holeman's The Moonlit Cage. 




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