LISTEN

Prompted by the closing of New York s mythical CBGB music club in 2006 and her desire to capture it, photographer and artist Rhona Bitner set out to record the most iconic places of the American musical landscape the recording studios, concert halls, arenas, ballrooms, prisons, and parks where the most important songs were inspired, recorded, played, and listened to. This new volume presents Bitner s seminal images in book form for the very first time. Taken over a period of 12 years, the photographs constitute a mapping of 300 unique places across 26 different states and 89 cities. From Jimi Hendrix s recording studio and Elvis Presley s music room at Graceland, to Aretha Franklin s childhood church, the Georgia lounge where Otis Redding, James Brown, and B. B. King took the stage, and the high school auditorium where Bob Dylan began to perform, each locale played a seminal role in the soundtracks of generations of music fans. And while Bitner decided to capture the sites empty and silent, the reverberations of fabled tunes still echo from them. Complete with a foreword by the godfather of punk himself Iggy Pop and contributions by Greil Marcus, Natalie Bell, and Jason Moran, this encyclopaedic collection of pictures is a must-have addition to the libraries of pop culture and music aficionados everywhere.