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Spirit of Talk Talk

Classic Edition

Cover of Spirit of Talk Talk by
By
James Marsh, Chris Roberts, Toby Benjamin
Hardback ISBN
9781906615390

Spirit of Talk Talk is a finely crafted and lavishly produced book celebrating the music created by Talk Talk and illustrated with a treasure trove of images from long-time collaborator and renowned art designer James Marsh. Displayed alongside large original artworks and previously unseen sketches and alternative covers, are rare and previously unseen photographs of the band and a specially commissioned biography of Talk Talk by music journalist and author Chris Roberts. Photographic images have been supplied from the archives of photography luminaries Lawrence Watson, Richard Haughton and Sheila Rock amongst others.

The book includes the full transcript of Mark Hollis’s final interview about the band and numerous tributes and eulogies from musicians, artists, producers, and people who worked with the band and knew them intimately. There are also honest, touching, and revealing tributes from musicians, artists friends and fans who were, and continue to be, influenced by Talk Talk’s music.

Reviews

The first Talk Talk biography is a thing of beauty – your Deluxe Edition even comes in a clamshell box – that explores the group’s bewitching music and James Marsh’s striking cover art. Lacking any input from the estranged band members, it’s still flush with new information. The group’s associates share memories of a 1986 German tour, where everyone got tipsy on Long Island Ice Teas and fooled about on the set of TV war drama Das Boot, but also of the tense sessions for 1991’s Laughing Stock, Talk Talk’s revered but commercially calamitous swansong, recorded amid nervous and marital breakdowns. With contributions from famous admirers, including Guy Garvey and Sir Peter Blake, it should send any reader dashing back to the music, celebrated here by Arcade Fire’s Richard Reed Parry for “each note sounding as if it’s being played for the very first time.”

Mark Blake, Mojo

Spirit of Talk Talk has been lovingly compiled with unqualified enthusiasm and meticulous research. It is the most comprehensive retrospective look at the legacy of one of Britain’s most important, influential and inexplicably underrated bands. Long overdue and unmissable.

Alan Wilder, Depeche Mode / Recoil

This book will give any Talk Talk fan a fascinating insight into just how far reaching their influence has been on current artists, I can’t wait.

Olly Knights, Turin Breaks

Fans of Talk Talk unite! This is an incredible book on the band … I will be helping to support this, and I really hope you will too!

Jason Lytle, Grandaddy

Wonderfully evocative

Pierre Perrone, The Independent

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