Both Sides…or at least his side

Not Dead Yet is a memoir of my favorite musical artist. I will be honest that I am not much of a memoir/biography guy and have avoided reading them unless cornered into doing so. However, Not Dead Yet is actually a pretty entertaining read.

Phil Collin’s delivery of his memories can be a little jarring at first. I would liken it to talking with an older relative who is both verbose and perhaps boiling over with memories to share. Often during the course of the memoir a period of linear story telling will jump forward in time to other events that relate to a small part of the story. It can be a bit disconcerting but I also found it to be humanizing, if something embarrassing or personally monumental occurred wouldn’t we all want to ramble on about other related events that either smoothed it out or highlighted it?

As far as content, if you have followed Phil Collins on his artistic journey from Genesis to solo artist you’ll find this book to be an interesting read. There is a great deal of dialogue that occurs between him and a lot of other big name artists of the time. Sometimes I felt there was too much of that and not enough focus on his personal life, but then again spending too much time in the music and not enough time on his personal life is a bit of a theme. I was afraid coming into the book that I would learn too much about my favorite artist and come out not enjoying the music anymore, but thankfully this is not the case. Phil Collins writes the book well, he has a lot to say and does so in an entertaining fashion, and is a very articulate person.

This is my first review so with time hopefully I’ll get better, also I’m sure this review is a bit light on content, but being a memoir I’d rather review the delivery than the content itself in this case. Review one down!