Head-On/Repossessed
£11.50£12.30 (-7%)
Julian Cope’s highly acclaimed autobiography and its long-awaited sequel in one extraordinary volume.
Julian Cope shot to fame with eighties band ‘Teardrop Explodes’ during the Punk era. Hailed as a visionary by those people who recognise his genius and a madman by those who find him perplexing, he has become a cult figure in the music world.
Head-On/Repossessed is written in Cope’s own inimitable style and follows his journey through a time of incredible change within the music industry.
Head-on is the highly acclaimed autobiography that The Observer viewed as “book of the year” when it was first released. Repossesed picks up in 1983 where Head On ends and continues up until 1989.
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Additional information
| Publisher | Element, New edition (4 April 2005) |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Paperback | 528 pages |
| ISBN-10 | 0007197756 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0007197750 |
| Dimensions | 12.9 x 3.7 x 19.8 cm |
by Alice King
Excellent – was really cross not to have contributed some of my own Groucho stories! Though of course- many would have been unprintable! Tells it how it was – well put together – captures the essence of the club and had me reminiscing into the night! Gob job editor Alice !
by delilah
I’m reading these two volumes for the second time and have to agree with all the previous reviewers. A fantastic read – funny, scary, gobsmacking, mad, very touching and, also, very honest. Cope might be regarded as a bit of an egomaniac, but the book has its fair share of self-doubt and self-depracation. Head-On is the better volume, at least for me. Mainly because, as a previous reviewer has said, I can remember and relate to many of the events, whereas Repossessed is off the scale of most people’s experiences, although no less interesting as a result. For anyone whose formative years include the late 70s/early 80s, this should strike many chords. If you were a Bunnymen/Teardrop fan it will do so much more. His account of the rise of the Teardrops and his relationship with Ian (“Duke McCool”!) McCulloch, is particularly fascinating, and the way in which this book is written suggests it is nothing less than a completely honest recollection of events as Cope saw, experienced and recollected them (albeit after 1981 through a drug-induced haze most of the time).
In short, I can’t recommend this book highly enough. Buy it, put on Kilimanjaro/Wilder and hold on tight: it’s going to be a bumpy ride!
by Kerouac fan
Probably the most gripping book I’ve read in 10 years. From what I’ve heard of Teardrop Explodes I’m not a big fan, I find their stuff derivative. But Julian Cope can write. He outlines the group’s trials well. Page 172/173 is worthy of Kerouac. It has sex, and drugs, and rock’n’roll in spades. His obsession with/descriptions of (lack of) personal cleanliness I find distasteful. It strikes me as honest. A good long read which held me. This is the Head On part of the double book. Good value for money. I’m reading it while self isolating durin’ the Covid pandemic.
by antonia c
I went to see Julian Cope, just knowing him as the bloke out of the Teardrop Explodes vaguely remembering something about him being a bid mad. He appeared and had gloriously metamorphised into a rampant rock god, interspersing his songs with gleeful appeals to have great bad pagan fun. I came away wanting to know alot more about him and discovered that he is also a megalith (dont know what this is yet)expert and very passionate about alot of important things. This led me to buying this book and it was just as awe inspiring as the visual experience of him.
The 2 books take you from mid 70s to 1989, and submerge you in his very up and down creative journey through the variously innocent, drug fuelled, egocentric, paranoid, love and friend filled world of the Liverpool and British alternative music scene.
The endlessly fascinating rock and roll stories and characters are set amidst a landscape of what is going on in Cope’s head throughout it all, which is what makes this book so riveting. I ended up with a notebook writing down books and people he mentioned that inspired him.
First stop his megalith book, then some George Gurdjieff, Jung……
Inspired me so much to do things I have just written my first review.
by Allenian One
Ok first off, I’ll deal with Head-On. It’s well above average. It’s an interesting rock n’roll memoir about lots of posing 80s bands in Liverpool and copious amounts of drugs. As the other reviewers say it’s witty, bitchy and all that good stuff.
Now onto the really interesting half of this two-parter. Repossessed is, I think, something really special. Something rare and beautiful. In it Cope shows he isn’t so much an eccentric, as a visionary, with his own internally consistent cosmology. There are very few people who achieve Cope’s kind of method in their madness. The closest thing I can think of is “Diary of a Genius” by Salvador Dali.
I think what most impresses me is how Cope is so painfully open. I was very sceptical at first when he started using words like “shamanistic” but later on I began to see what he was getting at. It’s that kind of book.
And there’s the fact that he never writes a dull sentence. If he wrote about washing up I would read it. Let’s hope some day he brings his autobiographies up to date with a few more volumes.
by reetpetite
I always suspected Julian cope was much more talented than he was every given credit for. His insights into the music industry and life in general are unflinching and unsparing particularly of himself. He comes across as a good apple who refused to play the fame game and consequently fell out of favour-not that that should worry him, he seems to be having the last laugh. Hope he continues with his writing.
by Beep 0608
Two rattling good reads in one. He’s a character is our Julian but has a way with the written word as well as music. Well written but in his own style, and brings these wild stories to life with heathy doses of humour and acidity. Book 1 flows seamlessly into book two. Now I want to read what happened next!
by Adrian Martin
Great book, very informative, learnt things i didnt know