‘Literally changed the course of my life’ James Murphy
‘The chapter on Larry Levan alone transformed me into wanting to be your favorite DJ’ Questlove
‘The original and still the best’ Gilles Peterson
‘We can’t tell the story of dance music without speaking the names of Sharon White and Judy Weinstein, so I welcome this vital update’ The Blessed Madonna
When someone says, ‘You have to know your history…’ this is it. This classic book is the whole unruly story of dance music in one volume. It recreates the dancefloors that made history, conjuring their atmosphere with loving detail and bringing you the voices of the DJs and clubbers at their heart – from grime, garage, house, hip hop and disco, to techno, soul, reggae, rock’n’roll, and EDM. Whether musical outlaw, obsessive crate-digger or overpaid superstar, the DJ has been at the spinning centre of nightlife for a century, making parties wilder, pushing clubbers harder, and driving music into completely new shapes and styles. In 1999 this was the first book to do justice to the DJ’s rollercoaster ride. Twenty years later, it’s fully refreshed, carefully updated and filled with even more stories, including two brand new chapters. This edition comes with a new foreword by James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem).