12 Great Books for the Music Lovers in Your Life

For many music fans, the next best thing to the actual songs is the story “behind the music.” For book lovers who are also music lovers, the well-written and often unexpected music book is a treat to feed both passions. Music books come in a variety of formats including band memoirs, music criticism, and pop culture philosophizing. From Lester Bangs’ collection of reviews in Psychotic Reactions & Carburetor Dung to Henry Rollins’ incredible journal-turned-memoir Get in the Van: On the Road with Black Flag, the music book is a valuable part of the art and the industry.

I can still recall the first music book that grabbed and held my attention from cover to cover – No One Here Gets Out Alive (1981), the seminal biography of legendary Doors frontman Jim Morrison, by Danny Sugarman. That book was more than just a memoir – it was a key player in my rock-n-roll coming of age. The last few years have seen numerous bestselling books from the music genre. Now, as the holiday season approaches, here’s a list of great reads for the music lover in your life.


Black Punk Now (2024) – Edited by James Spooner and Chris L. Terry – James Spooner, the filmmaker and graphic novelist known for the 2003 documentary Afro-Punk, begins this fascinating mixed media anthology by recalling how after purchasing his first computer in 2001, “one of the first things I did was Google ‘Black Punk.’ There were exactly zero links.” Spooner’s feeling of being all alone, and his certainty that “I wasn’t the only one,” grounds the book and its importance in chronicling the significance of race in the punk movement. From the seminal all-Black proto-punk band Death developing during the Motown era of Detroit to the rise of hardcore pioneers Bad Brains, the connection between punk culture and the African-American experience is profound. Bobby Hackney of Vermont punk band Rough Francis tells the story of discovering that his father and uncle were in the band Death, and he writes “Being Black and punk challenges the notions of what people think ‘Black’ is supposed to be … and that is so punk.” The multi-genre format of the collection with zines, fiction, nonfiction, comics, and more emphasizes the intersectionality and DIY spirit of punk culture. With discussions of “Sista Grrrl Riot,” extensive personal narratives about being Black and punk, and a short film script called Let Me Be Misunderstood by Kash Abdulmalik, this book is a treasure trove of insight on music, race, and culture. Abdulmalik explains, “Nobody is more punk than the Black youth of America.” Black Punk Now affirms that belief.

The Creative Act: A Way of Being (2023) – Rick Rubin – Rick Rubin is a musician’s producer, despite being a man who claims to be not remotely musical. The founder of Def Jam records has played a pivotal role in countless noteworthy and even-career altering albums over a diverse collection of bands ranging from LL Cool J and The Red Hot Chili Peppers to Johnny Cash and Adele. This book is not specifically focused on music and the art of making it – though Rubin has vast knowledge and experience about some of the most significant music recordings of the past thirty years. Instead, Rubin’s somewhat stream-of-consciousness pondering about the process of creativity is rooted in one basic idea – an artist must make art first and foremost and solely for themselves if they want to achieve their maximum creativity. Anything created with a market in mind is automatically less authentic, and though the music industry pushes incessantly for musicians to compromise their artistic voice in search of greater marketability, Rubin believes the best music comes from artists uninterested in such economic compromise. While not technically a music book, Rubin’s tome is an investigation to explore the creative process in perhaps the same way that some artists have done under his tutelage.

Girl in a Band: a Memoir (2015) – Kim Gordon – Beginning with a raw, honest, and heartfelt chapter titled “The End,” recounting the last live show from Sonic Youth, Gordon poignantly describes how “When we came onstage for our last show, the night was all about the boys.” She describes keeping her distance from Thurston Moore, the couple just a month removed from a record company announcement of their separation and divorce. And then Gordon goes back to the beginning with an exhaustive account of her career in music and notably Sonic Youth, where she was the girl in a band. The history is rich and honest, delving deep into her relationship with her brother, an inspiration and a burden as he struggled with mental illness. She shares honest but casual references to times like when Sonic Youth played Lawrence, KS, opening for REM when she and Thurston joined Michael Stipe to visit beat writer and legend William Burroughs. “That day, all I could think of was how much Burroughs reminded me of my dad,” she writes. Chronicling a true rock and roll life, Gordon’s story, unlike many memoirs, doesn’t stick to chronology, instead focusing more on themes and feelings. And it’s filled with song-specific chapters that read like essays of music and pop culture criticism. It’s somewhat emotionally distant while also coming across as honest and vulnerable, and it’s exactly the type of book fans might expect from the badass female bass player from one of post-punk’s most significant and enduring bands. Granted this book is a few years old; but it must be mentioned in any list containing the book from Gordon’s ex-husband/bandmate Thurston Moore.

Hip Hop is History (2024) – Questlove – Framed against the Hip-Hop 50 Tribute for the 2023 Grammys, the book is a definitive history of hip-hop, establishing that hip-hop is, in fact, a significant and indispensable component of the history of America at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century. In fact, one could argue, it’s impossible to understand late contemporary American history without understanding the role hip-hop culture has played. Inspired by common reflection of the pandemic years, Questlove says “I began to think more about preservation. Too much culture, especially Black culture, has passed into the past without a second thought.” From the man who directed Summer of Soul, the Oscar-winning documentary about the Harlem Culture Festival of 1969, the book is an incredible academic achievement that is incredibly familiar and readable as a bit of pop culture criticism. He begins pondering: “So here we are at the fiftieth anniversary of this wonderful bottomless creative meaning-crying shape shifting genre. So what is the state of the art?” Questlove answers that question tenfold. Talking about “The Roots” – which is a perfect name for his group, the Tonight Show band – he watches new hip-hop come and go, and shares sweet moments like when he talks fondly of artists like Doja Cat who not only knows his generation but also knows the music that influenced his generation. Picking up on and playing off his previous memoir Music is History, songs he picked out which have formed his own history, this latest work is a beautiful blend of memoir and criticism.

Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and Other Sole Survivors from the Songs of Steely Dan (2024) – Alex Pappademas and Joan LeMay – This collaborative mixed media work between a pop culture writer and a contemporary fine art painter delves into one of the most loved/hated bands in music history. The catalog of Steely Dan is nothing short of Dickensian or Dylanesque in the characters and stories it contains, and music fans all know about protagonists like Rikki who shouldn't “lose that number.” From “Dr. Wu” to “Cousin Dupree” or even a nostalgic dreamer just known by the address “Hey, Nineteen,” the people of Steely Dan songs are a cast as varied and interesting as many of the most well known characters from American literature. And the music of Walter Becker and Donald Fagen draws from a seemingly endless well of influences, with everything from existential philosophy to the inner workings of jazz legends. Pappademas, the senior culture editor for GQ and author of Keanu Reeves: Most Triumphant— The Movies and Meaning of an Irrepressible Icon (2022), has done some thorough scholarly investigative work into the history of “the Dan” and has amassed a thorough collection of the stories behind the songs. This innovative book is a work of art unto itself with the detailed commentary of Pappademas alongside the captivating art of LeMay.

Rebel Girl: My Life as a Feminist Punk (2024) – Kathleen Hanna – When Bikini Kill hit the road for a huge summer tour, it was clear the hard core feminism that grounded Riot Grrrl remains more important than ever. Thus, it just makes sense for punk rock badass Kathleen Hanna to tell her story. The memoir, obviously building off the Kill’s seminal “Riot Grrrl” song, is both a timely and important reminder of the reason the genre exists, and the important role music plays in social movements. If #MeToo had a soundtrack, then Bikini Kill would be an indispensable track. Hanna’s story is raw and honest and vulnerable while also coming across as hardened, tough and ultimately triumphant. Hanna pulls no punches and bluntly recounts and indicts the harsh misogyny endemic to the music industry – a condition necessitating the rise of Riot Grrrl “girls to the front” battle cry. The stories come across as almost conversational, like we’re sitting around with Hanna recollecting the highs, lows, and in-betweens of a legendary career. And she delivers her soft recollections of Kurt Cobain while also recounting the strange story of how she contributed to the title of Nirvana’s breakthrough hit “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Hanna has seen it all in the music world, and her stories are invaluable to the history of the industry.

She Come by It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs (2021) Sara Smarsh – Sarah Smarsh is an award-winning journalist from Kansas who has chronicled the lives of working class people from the country’s Heartland, and she writes with honesty and integrity about the challenge of being poor in the richest country on Earth. Her book on the music of Dolly Parton and the lives of the people her songs honor began as a long-form series for the roots-music magazine No Depression about music that tells the stories of America’s unsung people. Smarsh is well-versed in both the lives of the people and the music of country’s queen, and she brings an honest, often painfully so, portrait of people like her grandma Betty who are the truest portrait of feminism while also being averse, or simply too busy to acknowledge and understand, the term and its political implications. Smarsh weaves her narrative and music commentary with an authentic voice that understands how “Parton jokes that she had to get rich to sing like she was poor again.” Growing up rural and poor while working to rise above her challenges, Smarsh explains through true stories and characters from Parton’s songs how “People can be found packing up and leaving in the lyrics of most musical genres, but there is something particularly poor, female, and American in the the leaving that happens in country music.”

60 Songs that Explain the 90s (2023) – Rob Havilla – Music critic and pop culture writer Havilla writes he is “loathe to lay on you some ulta pretentious Grand Unified Theory of the 90s, which is far away enough to feel like the past, but close enough to be hounding the present …” And he doesn’t actually do that, but he clearly has a thesis about the 90s, and this fascinating collection of music commentary is the mix-tape soundtrack for his theory. Havilla astutely notes how “The music you loved as a teenager will be the sweetest music you’ll ever hear, the music will be in all likelihood the greatest wildest purest love affair of your whole life.” Havilla covers all the genres and doesn't shy away from explaining why Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On” is every bit as significant as Eminem’s “My Name Is” and Beck’s “Loser.” And he ponders unique historical moments such as the philosophical significance of Dion “the bombastic pop diva” and Elliot Smith “the sad quiet guy with the acoustic guitar” both performing at the Academy Awards for best movie theme song in 1999. Havilla’s knowledge and research are vast, and readers will enjoy loving and challenging his opinions.

Sonic Life: a Memoir (2023) – Thurston Moore – When a band breaks up, fans often feel like the children of divorce, betrayed and confused by the division. That situation was all the more significant during the breakup of post-punk pioneers Sonic Youth, which featured a punk rock power couple of cool in Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon. And now fans have two books exploring the history and dissolution of the band. Actually, with Moore’s memoir, the relationship, and more importantly his infidelity that ultimately derailed it, is loudly noticeably absent. What’s not is a nearly encyclopedic recollection of the rise of punk rock, its control of a young fan, and its impact on a seminal second wave band. In fact the memoir is so detailed, you’d think Moore kept a daily journal of his forty year career, beginning with the noise rock movement connected to the late 70s/early 80s punk scene in New York City. The book is so filled with vivid narrative recounting of his endless stream of influences – The Stooges, Patti Smith, Television Talking Heads, Ramones – it seems like he listened to and deconstructed every band he heard on the way to forming a unique musical experiment known as Sonic Youth. The book seems to be simply and exclusively about his love affair with music. And he talks a great deal more about other bands than he does the significance of his own. In fact, Moore was so embedded in the early scene, he sounds like a true historian at times, and that’s the appeal of this book, chronicling his first hand experience of the rise of the punk movement.

There Was Nothing You Could Do: Bruce Springsteen's "Born In The U.S.A." and the End of the Heartland (2024) – Steve Hyden – Perhaps the most academically and culturally ambitious book on the list, Hyden’s tome is incredibly well-researched and insightful and might just be one of the best overall books of the year. As the music critic at large for UPROXX, Hyden is the consummate Gen X music fan, and he has published numerous books and lists of significant music and its historical context. In fact, his 2023 book Long Road: Pearl Jam and the Soundtrack of a Generation was an innovative and insightful bit of music criticism, as Hyden explained the history of the band through fifteen songs, a chapter for each song and moment in the band’s incredible history. With this book – how is he so prolific? – Hyden acknowledges that while most fans would cite Born to Run as Springsteen’s masterpiece, he believes “Born in the USA is undoubtedly his most iconic record from a pop culture perspective. It’s the album that defines his persona in the broadest sense. The way Bruce sounds, looks, and acts in the popular imagination derives mostly from the BUSA era.” Steve Hyden is a critic’s critic with an everyman’s voice, and the Springsteen book is an impressive achievement. His intricate music knowledge enables him to connect the album’s influence on 21st century politics and sociology.

The Freaks Came Out to Write: The Definitive History of the Village Voice, the Radical Paper That Changed American Culture (2024) – Tricia Romano – While it’s not technically a music book per se, it spotlights the original alt-weekly newspaper Village Voice, which played a key role in the music scene, not just on the lower East Side, but ultimately all of New York and the rest of the country. For, as the New York Times review notes, “both Blondie and Springsteen got their drummers by placing ads in the back” of the Village Voice. Little tidbits of history like that fill this book, and music fans will appreciate the vast insider history of the scene from actual voices who recorded it. Its music criticism played a key role in the industry, and it was one of the earliest news voices writing about the rise of hip hop. With headlines like “There’s some music coming out of the Bronx called rap,” this collection of recollections is as surprising as it is insightful. At more than 500 pages, this type of oral history is one to be checked in with casually. The Voice’s early writing about Donald Trump is a fascinating time capsule, especially because it documents how he mentioned running for president in 1987. The book is organized as a series of casual recollections from people like Greil Marcus and Lester Bangs,and with quips acknowledging graffiti as art while subsequently documenting the careers of icons like Basquiat and Haring, the book is certainly worth a look from music and arts fans.

Where Are Your Boys Tonight? The Oral History of Emo’s Mainstream Explosion 1999-2008 (2024) – Chris Payne – According to the author’s disclaimer, “This book is not meant to be an encyclopedia of emo, but a narrative of a specific moment in history.” Granted with interviews of more than 150 people over three hundred hours, Payne has certainly amassed an encyclopedic history of that moment in the early 2000s, a time during which the heirs to punk, post-punk, hardcore, indie rock and grunge became immensely popular in the third wave of emo. Payne even concedes that many bands mentioned would not consider themselves emo, likely because of the negativity surrounding the term at various times. That said, the bands from My Chemical Romance to Panic! At the Disco to Fall Out Boy to Paramore truly represent a notable musical movement that was rich and varied and synonymous with the popular culture of the era. Organized as an oral history with a cinematic “cast of characters” introducing each section of the book, the book aptly covers the various disconnected but relative emo scenes geographically and somewhat chronologically. Movements like punk and all its offshoots including the various waves of emo are rooted in local scenes, and Payne’s incredibly well researched and insightful history effortlessly moves from New Jersey to Chicago to south Florida, documenting each scene as every bit as influential on emo as the Lower East side or DC or Berkely were to early punk waves.

High Mountain Stoner Rock Returns in Denver Power Trio Luna Sol

They call it stoner rock, but it gives me early Soundgarden and Alice in Chains vibes. Whatever it is, Luna Sol's new LP is a killer groove of blues-based rock in the tradition of the best power rock trios. And if you're in Denver, there's a release this Friday.


From rock's first supergroup, Cream, to grunge pioneer Nirvana and the pop-punk masters in Green Day, the power-rock trio is an undeniable musical force, scaled down to a simple equation of guitar, bass and drums, all amped up for maximum sonic effect. And that tradition is maintained by Denver trio Luna Sol, which comprises Dave Angstrom (guitar and vocals), Doug Tackett (bass) and Zeth Pedulla (drums). Hear for yourself when the band drops its latest album, Vita Mors, with a release show at Bar 404 on Friday, September 20.

Vita Mors showcases the band's "high mountain stoner rock," as Angstrom puts it, and it's the band's first record to include Tackett and Pedulla, musician friends he'd known from their work in the band Horse. "Stoner rock is a big genre of heavy rock," Angstrom says, "but I added the 'high mountain.'"

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11 Incredible Albums Recorded at the Legendary Blasting Room

While the word "iconic" is thrown around far too much, it definitely applies to the Blasting Room, the Fort Collins recording studio founded by Descendents and ALL drummer Bill Stevenson in 1994. Numerous punk-rock heavyweights such as NOFX and Bad Religion have made the trek to the legendary music institution to record, and it has also become the home base to a large number of Colorado bands, including Reno Divorce, Flobots and Teenage Bottlerocket.

Musicians have made some of their best music throughout the history of the Blasting Room, and some might even consider the studio a breakthrough location in their recording career: Rise Against's first Blasting Room album reached the Billboard Top 10 and garnered international acclaim. Others, like Mustard Plug, have realized the Blasting Room is the only place to record: "Every time we don’t go there, we’re slightly disappointed," the band's lead singer told us. "And when we do go there, we’re happy with it.”

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How Metallica Is Helping Front Range Community College Students Get Jobs

“There’s a nationwide talent crisis in skilled labor,” says Chris McGilvray, dean of the manufacturing program at Front Range Community College. Now, support for closing that gap in the workforce is coming from an unlikely source: Metallica, one of the greatest heavy-metal bands in history. Metallica Scholars is a scholarship program supporting education in trades and skilled labor, and it’s entering its second year of funding at Front Range Community College.
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The impetus for supporting education, specifically in the trades, came about when lead singer and guitarist James Hetfield’s kids were in school. Richardson notes that all the bandmembers are on the foundation’s board, and at a meeting, “James stood up and passionately spoke up about how his kids were coming through school and no one was telling them they could have a very successful career working with their hands, as a plumber or carpenter or mechanic.”

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Frail Talk Hosts LP Release Party With Slow Caves and Sound of Honey at the Aggie

In the alternative indie music world, new bands with distinct sounds are described in ever-more inventive ways. Frail Talk, an intriguing duo out of Fort Collins, may be the first band whose sound has been described as “squiggly.” Yet the longer you listen to this innovative group, the more the term makes sense.

“Squiggly can mean so many things,” says Frail Talk's Alex Woodchek. “But we like that word for how we are as we explore sounds, not shying away from authenticity and our values, and just following whatever squiggly spirit is running through our instruments.” The result is a self-described “weird blend” of acoustic and synthetic sounds, honoring folk roots while discovering new melodic variations.

“A sine wave is sort of a squiggly symbol used in synth music as a technical way of understanding how a note is generated," adds bandmate Cor Wright. "That squiggly-ness is not sharp but smooth.” And technically, it's acoustically pure.

The squiggly quality carries over to the creative ways fans receive Frail Talk's music. “It’s interesting to hear the fun ways people describe our sound," says Woodchek, adding that one of the more fascinating descriptors came from “a fan who told me after a show that we write lullaby bangers.”

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The Dirty Turkeys Are Bringing New Life to Acid Rock

What kind of band walks into the studio for the first time and records two albums of 28 songs in just two days? The Dirty Turkeys, that's who.

The Madchester movement that gave the world acid-rock royalty the Stone Roses has a distant heir in a groovy new band on the Colorado music scene. The Dirty Turkeys are a Boulder-based act that’s been making a name for itself with a funky new sound and a reputation for raucous live shows. The Turkeys fuse classic rock, rockabilly, acid rock, psychedelia and even a bit of surf punk to create a whimsical style it's deemed “Acid Cowpunk.”

With the April release of the single “Benny,” a sardonically soulful acid-rock groove that evokes the genre’s classic-rock roots with a bluesy guitar riff, the band launched an ambitious return to the scene with a tour and planned LP drop in the fall. The Dirty Turkeys recently unveiled a second single, “Undercover Billionaire,” from the upcoming album Cowboy Caravan, and its first full-length music video for the song premiered on August 19. With those two singles, the Turkeys are charting a new musical direction that will expand their audience while also pleasing longtime fans.

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Local Band Radio Fluke Plays Red Rocks for the First Time

Denver alt-rock band Radio Fluke has been rocking the Front Range since 2018, but its members feel like they’ve finally arrived with the dream Colorado gig: playing Red Rocks. After winning the Sundown Throwdown, sponsored by Colorado Native beer, Red Rocks Amphitheatre and Denver Film, the band will bring its funky, eclectic, blues-influenced rock and roll to Red Rocks on Monday, August 19, as the opener for the popular Film on the Rocks series, featuring 2015's post-apocalyptic classic Mad Max: Fury Road.On August 14, the band dropped its second of three singles this summer, leading up to an LP release in November. “Fade Away” follows the June release of “Blue Light,” and if these tunes are any indication, Radio Fluke’s fourth studio album is not to be missed.

“Fade Away” played a key role in securing the Red Rocks gig. Radio Fluke's initial submission was a live version of the song from a February show at the Oriental Theater, for local band Tireshoe’s EP-release party. It’s not surprising the song won Radio Fluke a chance to play in the Throwdown: The band's live show is a groove, and "Fade Away" has a broad range, starting on a pensive guitar hook that pulls you in, then throttles up with power guitar chords. The single’s revved-up, slowed-down tempo is both engaging and thoughtful.

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Australian Indie-Pop Band Sheppard to Kick Off Tour in Denver

In the fall of 2023, the Australian indie-pop band Sheppard took a leap of faith and moved across the world, relocating to Nashville from its lifelong home in Brisbane. That positive adventurous spirit aligns perfectly with the philosophy behind the band’s biggest hit, “Geronimo,” which celebrates its tenth anniversary this year. 

Following the move and release of Sheppard's fourth studio album, Zora, the Aussie sibling trio is hitting the road for the West Coast run of its “Say Geronimo Tour,” kicking off in the Moon Room at Summit on Tuesday, August 20.The band completed an East Coast run in the spring, and “seeing the fans come back out after we didn’t tour our last album was really gratifying," says bassist Emma Sheppard. "This is one of the most important and special tours we’ve done.”

The trio put together the tour as a true DIY project. “Now that we’re in America, it’s just the band and our partners,” Emma says. Like the act itself, “the tour is a real family affair," she adds. "There's no crew, we’re driving ourselves, selling the merch, carrying the gear. Plus, we’re getting to see a lot of the States, which we haven’t done before.”

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Country's Largest Juried Sculpture Show Celebrates Fortieth Anniversary in Loveland

Just how did the small town of Loveland, Colorado, amass one of the largest collections of contemporary public sculpture in the United States?
Forty years ago, a group of five Loveland artists sat down over beers and decided the town needed an art show. The resulting event, now known as Sculpture in the Park, is the largest outdoor juried sculpture show in the country, and it returns this weekend for its fortieth anniversary at Benson Sculpture Garden in downtown Loveland.

Dennis Sohocki, a contemporary abstract sculptor from Sedona, has participated from the beginning. “In 1984, Loveland had well-known fine-art casting foundries, and artists came from across the country to cast work there," he recalls. "The town thought it’d be nice to retain some of the art for the city. So five artists — George Lundeen, Dan Ostermiller, George Walbye, Fritz White and Hollis Williford — said, 'We’ll put on a show to earn money and buy art for the town.”

The artists connected with city leaders to develop a show whose proceeds would go toward purchasing a monument-sized sculpture for the city of Loveland. “Everyone from the mayor on down was in favor,” Walbye recalls. “Not a negative comment or hesitation. To this day, it just amazes me how many people come from everywhere to enjoy the park.”

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Guster Discusses Its Milestone Concert at Red Rocks With the Colorado Symphony

The Colorado music landscape is rich and varied, and what could be a better celebration of the area’s musical diversity than a collaboration between orchestral symphonic music and ’90s alternative rock? That’s what awaits fans at Red Rocks on Thursday, August 1, for Guster’s 25th anniversary show of the band’s breakthrough album Lost & Gone Forever in collaboration with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and special guest Kevin Morby.

Formed in 1991 in the dorms of Tufts University, Guster has been a mainstay of the alt-rock music scene for more than thirty years, with a loyal fan following and an ever-evolving catalogue of new music. Known for its unique instrumentation, including eclectic variations on percussion, Guster is a model of musical innovation, and for a decade now it has been part of the band circuit fusing rock music with classical compositions. In a community of vast musical subcultures, this collaboration is exactly what a music scene like Colorado's appreciates.

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Denver Indigenous Indie-Pop Group Cherokee Social to Drop Debut Music Video

Alien girls, bounty hunters, space outlaws and a strange musical virus called “Cinnamon Sugar” — it could be a kids’ make-believe game or perhaps a cyberpunk sci-fi graphic novel or even the latest cinematic spin-off from the Star Wars franchise. But it’s actually the debut music video from Denver’s innovative Indigenous indie-pop band Cherokee Social. The official release date for the video is Saturday, July 13, but you can preview the song now on YouTube and streaming platforms.

Evolving from Julian Navarro’s previous project Faceless Ones, the duo Cherokee Social, comprising percussionist and vocalist Navarro and guitarist Alex Creighton, is finding its niche in the Denver indie scene. “We have an ongoing joke that I’m Cherokee and Alex is Social," Navarro says. "Obviously, I’m the Native American in the band.” But Navarro emphasizes inclusivity in teaming with Creighton, even encouraging him to embrace Indigenous attire, such as the beaded guitar strap given to the band by the Mother Sierra organization. In Navarro’s cultural experience, “If you hunt with us and stay with us and eat with us, you’re part of the tribe. Well, Alex and I live together, so we check those boxes.”

Talking with the band is as wacky and fun as the video for “Cinnamon Sugar,” with Alex and Julian often finishing each other’s sentences or elaborating on an idea. It’s easy to see how their creative process leads to collaboration and the writing of hundreds of songs. In fact, the band is set to release its first full-length album of twelve new songs with Pretty Boy Modeling School, though the single “Cinnamon Sugar” isn’t even on the LP because, according to Navarro, “'Cinnamon Sugar'’s era has not happened yet in Cherokee Social.”

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Bask in the Music of John Prine at Four Mile Historic Park

Any discussion of American songwriting must include the legendary country-folk singer John Prine. Once called the "Mark Twain of American songwriting” by Rolling Stone, Prine is considered one of the most influential musicians and songwriters of the twentieth century. His songs are pure Americana, sharing stories of joy and pain with a touch of sardonic wit and the calm, comfortable twang of a rural everyman telling stories on the front porch.

For Brian Johanson of Fort Collins honky-tonk band Sugar Britches, Prine is more than just an influence — he’s an inspiration. Prine’s life and career are a piece of American history, with a musical legacy reaching back to folk legend Woody Guthrie. “His life is just such a great story,” Johanson notes — “returning from military service and working as a postman, writing songs in his head while walking his route.” Prine’s untimely death during the pandemic hit Johanson particularly hard, and from the moment he heard the news, he wanted to do something to remember and honor the man and his music.

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