Following hard on the explosion of British punk, in 1979 Gang of Four produced post-punk's smartest record, Entertainment! For the first time, a band wedded punk's angry energy to funk's propulsive beats-and used that music to put across lyrics that brought a heady mixture of Marxist theory and situationism to exposing the cultural politics of everyday life. But for an American college student from the suburbs-and, one expects, for many, many others, including British youth-Jon King's and Andy Gill's mumbled lyrics were often all but unintelligible. Political rock 'n' roll is always something of an oxymoron: rock audiences by and large don't tune in to be lectured to. But what can it mean that a band that made pop songs as political theory actively resisted making that theory legible? Coming to terms with the impact of Entertainment! requires us to take the mondegreen-the misunderstood lyric-seriously. The old joke has it that the title of R.E.M.'s debut album should have been not Murmur, but Mumble: true, so far as it goes. But that's the title, too, of rock 'n' roll's Greatest Hits compilation-and that strategic inarticulateness itself, which creates such an important role for the listener, has an important politics.

Following hard on the explosion of British punk, in 1979 Gang of Four produced post-punk's smartest record, Entertainment! For the first time, a band wedded punk's angry energy to funk's propulsive beats�and used that music to put across lyrics that brought a heady mixture of Marxist theory and situationism to exposing the cultural politics of everyday life. But for an American college student from the suburbs�and, one expects, for many, many others, including British youth�Jon King's and Andy Gill's mumbled lyrics were often all but unintelligible. Political rock �n' roll is always something of an oxymoron: rock audiences by and large don't tune in to be lectured to. But what can it mean that a band that made pop songs as political theory actively resisted making that theory legible? Coming to terms with the impact of Entertainment! requires us to take the mondegreen�the misunderstood lyric�seriously. The old joke has it that the title of R.E.M.'s debut album should have been not Murmur, but Mumble: true, so far as it goes. But that's the title, too, of rock �n' roll's Greatest Hits compilation�and that strategic inarticulateness itself, which creates such an important role for the listener, has an important politics.

Based on detailed interviews with band members, Red Set considers the music, art and politics that shaped Gang of Four and how the band, in turn, left an indelible mark on popular music. In the autumn of 1976, two young British Fine Arts students travelled to New York on a university grant, but instead of merely studying ended up staying with one of the city’s pioneering punk journalists, visiting the Museum of Modern Art by day and hanging out in punk epicentre CBGBs by night. It is from this trip that Gang of Four emerged. Blending revelations from interviews with the band conducted by the author with snippets from newspaper articles and record reviews, Jim Dooley tells the history of Gang of Four as they remember it. From their days at art school through countless tours, records and reunions, Red Set is the definitive history of one of Britain’s greatest and most influential bands.

Seattle's Gang of Four changed the face of the city in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s by bringing four ethnic groups together in battle against city powerbrokers over development, poverty, fishing rights, and gentrification. The four leaders learned quickly that working together provided greater results than working apart. This is the story of a powerful political alliance and lifelong friendships forged through sit-ins, protest rallies, and other acts of civil disobedience. "We got very good at occupying buildings," remarked one of the Gang. Bob Santos and Gary Iwamoto recall how a Native American, Asian American, African American, and Mexican American came together to fight for their neighborhoods and their people. Bob Santos has spent most of his life in the International District of Seattle. He grew up in the N.P. Hotel with his widowed father, Sammy Santos, a professional prizefighter. He was hired in 1972 to lead the International District Improvement Association (Inter*Im). During his tenure at Inter*Im, Santos organized property owners, businesses, residents, and activists from the Asian American community to preserve the neighborhood and build new housing. Gary Iwamoto is a regular contributing writer for the International Examiner, an Asian Pacific Islander community newspaper. He has written several plays, notably Miss Minidoka 1943, which was produced by the Northwest Asian American Theater. He and Bob Santos also wrote Humbows, Not Hot Dogs in 2002.

This book, first published in 1987, tells the intriguing and culturally complex story of the art school influence on postwar British popular music. Following Romantic attitudes from life class to recording studio, it focuses on two key moments – the early 1960s, when art students like John Lennon and Eric Clapton begin to play their own versions of American rock and blues and inflected youth music with Bohemian dreams, and the late 1970s, when punk musicians emerged from design courses and fashion departments to disrupt what were, by then, art-rock routines. Sixties rock Bohemians and seventies pop Situationists were, in their different ways, trying to solve the art students’ perennial problem – how to make a living from their art. Art Into Pop shows how this problem has been shaped by the history of British art education, from its nineteenth-century origins to current arguments about ‘pure’ and ‘applied’ training. In their simultaneous pursuit of authenticity and artifice, art school musicians exemplify the postmodern condition, the collapse of any distinction between ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture, the confusions of personal and commercial creativity. And so high pop theorists rub shoulders here with low pop practitioners, experimental musicians debate avant-garde ideas with corporate packagers, and artistic integrity becomes a matter of making oneself up.

Between 1977 and 1984 Gang Of Four pioneered the concept of the indie Guitar band that could make you think as well as dance. This is the fascinating story of how the Leeds-based outfit emerged at the height of punk and helped take it in a whole new direction, adding elements of funk, disco, dub reggae and experimental rock. Through interviews with all the original band members, managers, A&R men and musicians who joined GO4 later, author Paul Lester demonstrates how the groundbreaking band paved the way for some of the world's biggest acts, including the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Franz Ferdinand.

The Valiant heroes. X-O Manowar. Bloodshot. Ninjak. The Harbinger Renegades. Unity. This is how they lived. This is how they died. Now we know. The Book of the Geomancer has recorded it all. But only a young girl Ð the last in a line of the enigmatic mystics who protect the Earth known as Geomancers Ð has seen this future come to pass, from the coming cataclysm to the dawn of the 41st century. Alone with her sworn protector, the Eternal Warrior Ð a soldier battle-forged across five thousand years of combat Ð the duo must defy their allies to stop the Dark Age that now threatens to eclipse our world. Together, they are the number one target of every hero and villain on Earth. Either the Eternal Warrior hands her overÉor they take him down. But can even he single-handedly protect one child when the entire Valiant Universe wages war against him? New York Times best-selling writer Robert Venditti (X-O MANOWAR) joins superstar-in-the-making Robert Gill (Batgirl) and visionary artist Doug Braithwaite (ARMOR HUNTERS) to begin a thousand-year journey into the future of the Valiant UniverseÉand rain, fire, blood and war on the heroes of today. Collecting BOOK OF DEATH #1Ð4.