Book Review: Al Kooper’s Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards (1999)

Musician, songwriter, label executive, producer – Al Kooper has made a living out of being the “Forrest Gump” of rock music. For better than thirty years, whenever something momentous was about to occur in rock ‘n’ roll, Kooper was certain to be involved in it. From his haphazard entry as a keyboardist on Dylan’s classic “Like A Rolling Stone” and playing with Dylan onstage in Newport to producing Lynyrd Skynyrd’s first three albums, Al Kooper has a resume that’s every bit as long and impressive as anybody’s in rock music. With this revised and expanded edition of Kooper’s earlier memoir, Backstage Passes, Al brings the tales of his storied career full circle.

Al Kooper’s Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards

A lively writer with an easily read, conversational style and more than a few stories under his belt, Kooper documents with Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards a career that has seen its shares of ups and downs. Beginning with the earliest stirrings of his interest in music, playing in teen bands and sharpening his skills, Kooper takes the reader on a romp through his rock ‘n’ roll universe. High points of the book include Kooper’s early days as a musical hustler, a samurai of songs writing tunes on spec for producers in need of material. Here Al provides the reader with a lesson in the economics of songwriting and the real history of the Brill Building.

Kooper’s major league breakthrough as a session player begins with his hilarious story of the session for Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone” and its aftermath. It’s as a session player that Kooper is best known, sitting in on recordings with notable artists like Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Mike Bloomfield, and far too many others to list here. Although Kooper speaks of his own solo career in Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards, he tends to give it short shrift in light of his stories of superstar session work. He goes into some detail on the formation and careers of Blues Project and Blood, Sweat & Tears, both projects in which he was an integral part until egos got in the way and Kooper would move onto the next challenge. His discovery of Lynyrd Skynyrd is, perhaps, the real feather in his cap; Kooper producing and playing on that band’s first three albums, arguably among the most important Southern Rock records ever made.

By the end of Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards, circa 1998, Kooper has pretty much given up on the music biz, going into teaching at the noted Berklee School of Music in Boston. Some reviewers of this book have made much ado over Kooper’s distinctively sour grapes attitude during the book’s last few chapters, Kooper viewing with some bitterness the current atmosphere in the music industry. Given my own fringe involvement with the industry as a critic and journalist, I can’t say that I disagree with him. The industry turns its back on older artists who aren’t still cranking out hits (and, therefore, profits).

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

As an artist, musician and producer Kooper comes from a time when, perhaps, the music mattered more than the marketing and labels weren’t quite the greedy conglomerate bastards that they’ve become today. As such, Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards is a captivating document, the honest, heartfelt memoir of, as Kooper terms himself, “a rock ‘n’ roll survivor.” Anybody who loves music should have a copy of this book on his or her shelf, right beside their latest CD purchases. Kooper’s Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards will entertain you, inform you, and keep you honest. (Billboard Books, published 1999)

Review originally published by Alt.Culture.Guide™ music zine...