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Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus

Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus

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Author: Alex Halberstadt
Publisher: Da Capo Press
Category: Book

List Price: $16.00
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Avg. Customer Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars 11 reviews
Sales Rank: 735067

Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 272
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8 x 5.4 x 1

ISBN: 0306815648
Dewey Decimal Number: 780
EAN: 9780306815645
ASIN: 0306815648

Publication Date: February 25, 2008
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Also Available In:

  • Paperback - Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus
  • Hardcover - Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus
  • Hardcover - Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus

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Editorial Reviews:

Product Description
One of the most original, influential, and commercially successful American songwriters, Doc Pomus (1927-1991) was a role model for several generations of composers, renowned for his mastery of virtually every popular style, and for the numerous hits he wrote during rock ’n’ roll’s first decade. But despite his successes, few knew that this writer of jukebox hits led one of the most dramatic lives of his time. Spanning the extremes between extravagant wealth and desperate poverty, suburban family life and the depths of New York’s underworld, enduring love and persistent loneliness, and touching on more than a half-century of American popular music, Lonely Avenue reveals with novelistic flair the whole of Doc’s experience-one of the great untold American stories.



Customer Reviews:   Read 6 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars Music libraries will find it an excellent addition   October 7, 2008
 1 out of 1 found this review helpful

During rock 'n' roll's early years Doc Pomus wrote some of the biggest hits from his Lonely Avenue to Save the Last Dance for Me and Hushabye. His works were picked up by Elvis Presley, B.B. King, Bob Dylan and more - and LONELY AVENUE documents his life, inspiration, achievement, and times in an outstanding blend of quotes from his journals and biographical examination. Music libraries will find it an excellent addition.


4 out of 5 stars A nice little gem...   May 25, 2008
 0 out of 2 found this review helpful

Biographical reviews tend to have a standardized format: several chapters on the linage of the subject, tales of early childhood, struggle and (usually)success.

Haberstadt's biography is much the same, except the author does a nice job of leading the reader thru the parts we have to endure by building a strong sense of the frustration and difficulties Doc Pomus faced throughout his life. The book isn't overbearing, and he paints an interesting enough picture of the determination this polio-stricken hall of famer had.

If there is a weakness, it's that you never get a real strong sense of what exactly it was that Doc did. I mean, I still haven't figured out if his contributions to some of the greatest songs were his lyrics, his sense of rhythm, his music, or a combination of all three. Certainly it is poignant to think that "Save the last dance for me" was written as he watched his new wife dance at her wedding, but there was too little addressing the mechanics of Doc's writing for my taste.

I thought it was a most interesting and useful book to have on one of the great contributors to rock and roll.... and long overdue.



5 out of 5 stars Wow!   March 23, 2008
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

What a great book. You never think about songwriters when you listen to a song but after reading this book you will. It's the story about the man behind some of the biggest hits of the 50' and 60's but it's so much more. Doc's story is more then his music, it's the life that he led and the trials he overcame to get there. If you're into music or not this is one book that will make you laugh, cry and just revel in one man's life and times.


5 out of 5 stars excellent   February 2, 2008
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

Great book. I got choked up reading about Doc writing Save the Last Dance for Me.


5 out of 5 stars Lonely Avenue, Doc Pomus   December 11, 2007
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

The writer did his homework, and I'd recomend this book to anyone, also visit the Brill Building, There's Always Magic In The Air.

Great reading!


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