"Queen" Live by Greg Brooks

michaelkars wrote:

yes :

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1844496600/qid=1113510058/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-6094742-9771847?v=glance&s=books

and (in Dutch):

http://www.nl.bol.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/nl/-/EUR/BOL_DisplayProductInformation-Start;sid=e3DnqCgKRcrnpmqUYlPZn8jd4XeMkzcJYK4=?BOL_OWNER_ID=1001004002504875&Section=BOOK_EN&lgl=1&plid=&lgl_BOL_OWNER_ID=1&lgl_Section=1

So then this is in fact the newest version we've been waiting for from Greg?

I get the book today, really a lot to read. But I wondered, the book is smaller then I thought. It has 292 pages (not 176 like the describtion at amazon sys) and is paperback.

Just to confirm that indeed the updated version is now out. I nought my copy today.

It's a lot smaller, has new prologue by Greg from Jan 2005, and a foreword from Brian from late 2004.

I don't own the original so can't comment on any further differences.

There are acknowledgements to plenty of posters here from Greg, the most amusing being to our beloved Inu Yasha, whose name is misspelled.

So it is out. Amazing!!!
We'll see, we'll see... If he fucked up- there is no excuse really, is there?

I have it. My copy came down yesterday. Its got some nice pics..

Could someone compare the two- old and new? I'm interested in the info in it, no pictures or format. Question is- is it good? If yes- FINALLY. If not... Well...

I havent seen the old one, but Greg reckons its now 99% accurate... compared to 90%.. Of course, I realise this is of no use to you, but..

Yeah, it's fair to say the old book was about 90% accurate. There were hundreds of mistakes. I and several others submitted corrections to Greg, so hopefully this edition will be much more accurate. My copy should be arriving any day now from Greg.

Ok, as I said, I don't own the original version, but today I read up to about 1975 and already I cannot believe the amount of mistakes I've noticed. And I'm not even a live expert.

The book clearly hasn't been proofread, or if it has, it was by a 6 year old. In 50 or so pages, I've spotted at least 15 typos/spelling mistakes ("ocassion", "esculate")/grammatical errors/omitted words, which is unforgiveable if you ask me, because I'm a pedant.

There are also blatant contradictions and inconsistencies in the text, sometimes in the space of a couple of entries/paragraphs. For a start, the intro from the 1995 edition is included as well as the new foreword, yet despite the earlier foreword being listed as by Greg in August 95, it's clearly written in 2004. WTF?

As for the nuts and bolts of it - the setlists and concert info - I can't comment on how accurate or improved they are, as I don't have the knowledge and expertise, but I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the experts here still find mistakes.

It still looks an awesome book to me, and it's obviously a fantastic resource, I just find it incredible that such an error-ridden book like this could be publised and printed in the state it's in.

OK, I got it yesterday (thanks, Greg) but I'm not impressed.

First of all, I would expect a link to my site. Considering he used about 80% of memorabilia from my site (the resized scans in the book look really bad though - I wonder why) and about 5 pages are a direct 1:1 copy from my site (typical setlists of tours, info about support bands etc.). Yet he links to some sites incl. some "QOLBreakthru" MSN community which I have never heard of. Strange. It's a Queen Live book, isn't it? What else does he want to credit if not a Queen Live site? :-)

Oh wait, I found my name among the 100+ credited people... he got it wrong though (Scully is my nickname though and definitely NOT my real name :-)

I read only a few pages so far, got to 1972... I wonder why he doesn't list the Marquee 1972 setlist (considering there IS a recording available, owned by Queen I think).

Some info from the prologue:
1. There probably won't be any live DVD at all - HamOdeon 75 was considered but abandoned.
2. There are few audio recordings in Queen vaults, he says "probably 10%".

I'm a bit disappointed to hear of this, but I wasn't expecting all that much anyway. I still pre-ordered it, but it's going to take a few weeks to get here (damn). It would be a nice replacement for my well-worn original, but with such resources as Martin's site, it's obviously against some tough competition. From the sound of it, Martin's site is clearly superior in every way (not that that's a revelation, of course).

I won't judge it myself until I actually get it, but I find it weird that there are such amazing, glossy books about The Who (''Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere''), Led Zeppelin (''Led Zeppelin Live'', which is unfortunately out of print and mucho expensive to buy used), and Pink Floyd (''In The Flesh'', ''Wearing The Inside Out''), yet absolutely fuck all for Queen.

Is it worth buying this book?

<font color=red>King Rick I wrote:

Is it worth buying this book?

..depends on how much you wanna spend!

>>Is it worth buying this book?

>..depends on how much you wanna spend!

No. Use Martin's website instead - he isn't trying to make money out of other fans, where as Greggy-boy clearly is.

Has he included the MISSING concerts from the 1977 tour?

Has he left out the pointless lists at the end of the book?

Are the pictures annotated correctly?

Has he bothered to go back over the WHOLE original and correct everything?

I doubt it.

I found the bootleg list at the end useless. And the live discography? Well, that's great, but why not just do a solo concertography instead?