Rage Against The Machine - Stage Fighters

good detailed read

the book is about the history of the people the band sing for

I definitely learnt a lot from this book. As well as containing a wealth of information about the infamous Rage Against The Machine's journey thus far, I was bombarded with more history of racial conflict and politics than was ever even alluded to at school. `Stage Fighters' is a book that chronicles how this seminal band came into being and what has fuelled them over the years to make their music and their various choices ie. the major label signing, the naked on-stage protest against censorship, the unwitting incitement of police rioting outside the Democrat Convention Center... I could go on.What certainly does come to light is the differences in outlook between each member of the band. Whilst every one of them was politically motivated, it was Zack who really carried most of the political weight and was most pro-active. Morello also felt passionately about certain matters but sometimes they didn't always agree on what was the most important thing to be focusing their energies on. However, they were united in many things and this book will be a joy for any fan to read and a revelation for those not knowing to much about Rage Against The Machine to begin with.

A band such as Rage Against The Machine is a rare thing these days. Not just simply speaking in the sense of talent, but speaking in almost everything that surrounds and drives this band. There is a certain history to this band, one which starts before the idea of starting a band even crossed the minds of either de La Rocha or Morello. The creative genius that drives Rage is a vast world, combining the art of Morello's unique guitar style, De La Rocha's passionate blend of metal and rap, and not to be forgotten the insanely tight ability to lock together by Wilk and Commerford. The story is huge here, to truly cover the story of RATM would be a daunting task in itself. But to write the band's history, and still leave the reader wanting more? Now THAT would take someone with a major dose of skill.That my friends, is where Paul Stenning comes into the picture. As a past Stenning reader, having made my way through his incredible coverage of Iron Maiden in "30 Years of The Beast" I opened this book hoping to be blown away once again. Let me tell you, even Toto and the Wizard of Oz had a tough time sending me back to the real world after this book. I've been a fan of Rage for a long time, but embarrassingly enough, I knew very little of the band's history in the deeper waters. As I made my way through this amazingly constructed book, I found myself learning more than I could have imagined. Paul works us from the beginning by moving before the band's creation, in an attempt to show us the type of world Morello and De La Rocha would soon grow up in, both being of a racial status, and the impression they would get growing up from the overall white community. This set the steps to the core of the book. The meeting, influences, and the creation of the rage albums we know to date. Paul greatly explores parts of the band's epic story which reveals a lot of the inner gears of the machine that is Rage. Further exploring the Audioslave era as well as Rage's reunion, Paul once again delivered an incredible piece of work. Albeit appearing a short work, Paul does what he does best. No BS here, straight facts from cover to cover, no need for any filler. Quality from one cover to the other.This is a definite item in any fan of Rage's. Even if you're not, this band is greatly influenced by our present world, delivering songs driven by real life events and political pushes. Their combination of two of the world's biggest genres is covered in complete detail by one of the best in the business. Keep em coming Paul!

As interesting as this book can be to those who don't know much about the band, I can not recommend it at all.Anyone expecting a detailed biography will not be pleased by this at all - it is merely rehashed interviews taken from the internet and magazines - the only new interview is with one of their producers, and much of the detail is lifted straight from Ben Myers' book.Not only is it lacking in this respect, it is also just plain wrong in places; for example he states that the track 'Pistol Grip Pump' on Renegades is partly an original composition based on 'More Bounce To The Ounce' by Zapp - it is actually (surprisingly enough) a cover of a song called 'Pistol Grip Pump' by Mack 10. And quite a faithful cover as it happens. He also completely omits to mention that the album Renegades was originally just going to be a few covers to add to the 'Live At The Olympic Auditorium' release; infact there is a lot of information on Renegades that many Rage fans will know and is freely available on the internet that this author doesn't seem to know about. When I read a biography of a band I want to learn stuff about them, not have to correct the author on his inaccuracies.And if the lack of detail/inaccuracies wasn't bad enough the style of writing is amateurish and disjointed. Granted there is not much information for him to work from, but to state in a book that he's not sure on his conflicting (2nd-hand interview) sources is very amateurish - there is not enough information available for this book to be written in the first place and much of it is filler.Reading this book will not take anyone any serious amount of time. If you know nothing about RATM feel free to buy this - you will learn, but there is more information available on the internet than there is here.

This book is indeed interesting, I learnt a lot about the band, their goals as musicians and as political activists. However I learnt this all from the quotes from the band themselves. All the writing in between is written with the excitement, opinion and hyperbole of a 7 year old who's just spent his entire day at a particularly lavish water park. Too many assumptions were made on behalf of the writer about the impact of the band (which was indeed phenomenal) but he didn't back them up in anyway. The band deserve a better chronicler of their career or at least someone who's going to give a few more introspective insights. As a compilation of quotes it's great but not worth paying money for. It's Unofficial, Unauthorized, Twaddle, guff and trite.