Veteran U.K. music journalist Mick Brown was the last reporter to interview Phil Spector before he was arrested and charged with the murder of Lana Clarkson. During their rambling four-hour discussion, the legendary producer tellingly admitted, “I have devils inside that fight me. And I’m my own worst enemy.” The story ran in the U.K. Telegraph just two days before Clarkson was found shot to death in Spector’s spooky Alhambra mansion, and undoubtedly this book would not exist if it weren’t for that bizarre incident. Still, Brown’s sympathetic story traces Spector’s incredible rise in the early ’60s, with a real understanding of how the producer turned the three-minute pop song into works of art like “Be My Baby,” “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” and “River Deep, Mountain High,” only to inspire the very same British Invasion that would, at first, replace him on the charts, then ultimately give him a second chance through his work on The Beatles’ Let It Be and the solo albums of John Lennon and George Harrison. It’s easy to compare Spector’s career trajectory to that of Orson Welles, another youthful phenom never able to top himself, whose own Citizen Kane provides a convenient parallel to the producer’s eventual self-exile from the world behind the gates of his gothic manse, with his Rosebud the early suicide of his father and the constant hectoring of an overbearing mother. But that doesn’t begin to explain the combination of obsession, stubbornness and unbridled ambition that led Spector to create pop masterpieces that took teen angst to mythic heights. Brown leaves little doubt that Spector’s continuing fascination with guns, and his penchant for waving them around to get his way, would eventually lead to a tragedy like this, without necessarily condemning him. What we’re left with is a feeling of tremendous waste. For all of Spector’s accomplishments, for all his desire to create a larger-than-life image of himself that would effectively shadow his intense vulnerability and feeling of insecurity, he will undoubtedly be remembered for those final pathetic images, of a wigged nut job brought down by his own Achilles’ heel. To know him is not to love him, but rather to feel sorry for him…which is something Phil Spector spent his life running from. - Roy Trakin

Until the last few years it would have been considered unusual to have a biographical tome delivered in the middle of one’s continued political assent (as opposed to years later.) But modern day campaigns have dictated that the ‘approved’ biography be released almost as a marketing tool of the political aspirant. Such is not the case here. Famed investigative reporter Bernstein spent the last eight years researching and writing this extensive book interviewing over 200 friends, enemies, staffers and acquaintances creating a broad and balanced portrait of one of the most polarizing figures in modern American politics. From her domineering father to her Methodist upbringing in Park Ridge, Illinois, to her Yale law school days, political and legal life in Arkansas and finally to eight years on Pennsylvania Avenue, Bernstein paints a highly detailed picture of a woman who is gloves-off ambitious, determined in action, but sometimes confused in her approach and one who must continually make complex judgments (not always successfully - first term health care reform, for example) yet learn from her mistakes. Her long and twisting relationship with husband Bill is given a wide berth here as well. Bernstein pulls back the curtain on headlines from Whitewater to Clintongate as we learn much of the background now from the other half’s side. Her’s is a view that while generally concealed under a calm demeanor, is as conflicted and frustrated as it is often headstrong. The only regret is that, unlike what the title might imply, we get only a small view of what HRC is like when she really is in charge, meaning the years since she got out from under the shadow and served in the US Senate. The historical importance of this book is now inextricably tied to what happens at the polls. - Tim Devine

The lead sheet that comes with this book says “The importance of the Clash to modern music is almost impossible to overstate.” A strong statement, to be sure, but one that is hard to argue. And while the band was certainly not solely one man’s vision, Strummer (nee John Mellor) was the captain of it’s apocalyptic view. Salewicz, a longtime writer for England’s New Musical Express (NME) is in a fortunate position to write this revealing, up-close-and-personal account of the frontman’s life as he covered the punk revolution from it’s inception in the UK as well as having been a longtime friend of the subject at hand. (He even wrote his obit for the Independent in London.) In his three years of researching the book, Salewicz leaves no stone unturned - interviewing all of Joe’s main band mates, managers, A&R men, etc. as well as a multitude of friends, wives, lovers and professional cohorts - taking us through his early days with the 101′ers all the way to the band’s final stadium shows with the Who and even past the last show with Mick Jones at California’s famed ‘Us’ festival. What comes across is a man full of contradictions - a sometimes angry spokesman for the beaten down proletariat, a man who when approaching his ‘wilderness years’ remained full of self doubt, through to his rebuilding of position with the Pogues and finally his latest band the Muscaleros. As both a journalist as well as a close friend, Salewicz gives perhaps the best view yet into this conflicted soul who fronted what many consider to be the most important band in rock’n'roll. Cheeseburger! - Tim Devine

Can you believe it? Bill and Hillary Clinton had “a secret pact” for her to help him reform the Democratic Party, then attain the presidency, after which he’d help her become the nation’s first female president. This breathless revelation would be stunning if it weren’t so obvious.

It’s admittedly tough for competing biographers to gain a foothold on the ladder of book sales in an election year, and New York Times veterans Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta, jr. are up against the redoubtable Carl Bernstein, who is hawking his own biography this season. But it’s still annoying for readers to chase moonbeams only to learn that an alleged blockbuster is largely derivative or oversold.

The authors reveal that they spoke with Marla Crider, an old Bill Clinton girlfriend (who wasn’t?), who stumbled on a letter from Hillary on Bill’s Arkansas desk before their marriage, outlining their future plans. Crider makes the catty observation that the letter was all about their careers; “so unusual that there was no talk of a home, family and marriage.” Even so, the authors concede in an endnote that Crider’s account first appeared in a 2000 book by Jerry Oppenheimer. Crider says Oppenheimer’s account “was not totally accurate,” but the authors don’t say in what way.

The authors, not surprisingly, find tension in the relationship between the former first lady and former Veep Al Gore, based on secondary sources and unattributed interviews. Both policy wonks were scrambling to gain the ear of the president on a range of issues. That tension will resemble a tea party if a reinvented Gore jumps into the presidential primary pool this fall, setting the stage for the battle of the two 800-pound gorillas. - Steve Goddard’s History Wire

Much has been written of this renegade singer-songwriter since his untimely death of inoperable mesothelioma in September of 2003. As one of the early rock poets of the California 70’s (beginning with a stint in the Everly Bros. before becoming Jackson Browne’s protege and a songwriter whose pennings were covered by Ronstadt, Dylan and numerous others) the acerbic, mercurial Zevon became a celebrated cult figure (despite his big 70’s hits “Werewolves of London” and “Lawyers, Guns and Money”) for his twisted, sometimes auto-biographical musical characterizations presented with a wit and vivid intelligence rarely seen in rock’n'roll. During his final year he requested that his former wife and friend chronicle his life in book form which she has done appropriately enough in the way of an oral history combined with Zevon’s journal entries. Fellow musicians, managers, label execs, lovers and friends from Springsteen to Browne to Bonnie Raitt as well as a cadre of his literary chums like Mitch Ablom and Carl Heissan all add to the story of a well intentioned but oft-times troubled soul who more than dabbled along the dark edge of life. Stories of ex-wives and girlfriends, sexual addiction, guns, alcohol, OCD and even an obsession with collecting Calvin Klein gray T-shirts (and never opening them!) all contribute to a complete picture of the singer that Rolling Stone’s Dave Marsh once described as “a visceral intellectual, except that he reminded me early in our talk of (Raymond) Chandler’s advice: “Eddie, don’t get complicated. When a guy gets complicated, he gets unhappy. When he gets unhappy, his luck runs out.” - Tim Devine