Dennis Seaton, chair of the Ladder Association’s Training Committee, has prevented many accidents and fatalities by running training programmes for construction professionals who work at height. Seaton, though, started his working life as the 15-year-old singer of Birmingham’s Musical Youth: with their enduring hit Pass The Dutchie, the closest this country had to the Jackson 5 circa 1982. As Nick Duerden writes in his book Exit Stage Left, what happened next with Musical Youth is “a cautionary tale all future child stars would be wise to take note of.”
Seaton luckily escaped unscathed and what he did next is just one of many fascinating stories told herein. Another recent music industry-related book, Ian Winwood’s Bodies, teems with tales of alcohol and drug-fuelled endeavours; Exit Stage Left primarily concentrates on what happened next to musicians who quit the game on their own accord, were deemed too old by a youth-infatuated industry as their hits dried, chose to soldier on defiantly without any compromise, or diversified by specialising within different non-musical fields.
There are some revealing testimonies within the book from Shaun Ryder, Rufus Wainwright, Lisa Maffia, Lloyd Cole and many others from pop, rock, dance and indie, making Nick Duerden’s book an enlightening, humorous and extremely entertaining read.
Exit Stage Left: The Curious Afterlife Of Pop Stars, Nick Duerden (Headline)
Price: £20. Info: here
words DAVID NOBAKHT