The Wrecking Crew

The Inside Story of Rock and Roll's Best-Kept Secret

By: Kent Hartman

Narrated by: Dan John Miller

Audie Award Winner, History, 2013

If you were a fan of popular music in the 1960s and early '70s, you were a fan of the Wrecking Crew - whether you knew it or not.

On hit record after hit record, by everyone from the Byrds, the Beach Boys, and the Monkees to the Grass Roots, the 5th Dimension, Sonny & Cher, and Simon & Garfunkel, this collection of West Coast studio musicians from diverse backgrounds established themselves as the driving sound of pop music - sometimes over the objection of actual band members forced to make way for Wrecking Crew members.

Industry insider Kent Hartman tells the dramatic, definitive story of the musicians who forged a reputation throughout the business as the secret weapons behind the top recording stars. Mining invaluable interviews, the author follows the careers of such session masters as drummer Hal Blaine and keyboardist Larry Knechtel, as well as trailblazing bassist Carol Kaye, who went on to play in thousands of recording sessions. Listeners will discover the Wrecking Crew members who would forge careers in their own right, including Glen Campbell and Leon Russell, and learn of the relationship between the Crew and such legends as Phil Spector and Jimmy Webb.

Hartman also takes us inside the studio for the legendary sessions that gave us Pet Sounds, Bridge Over Troubled Water, and the rock classic “Layla”, which Wrecking Crew drummer Jim Gordon cowrote with Eric Clapton for Derek and the Dominos. And the author recounts priceless scenes, such as Mike Nesmith of the Monkees facing off with studio head Don Kirshner, Grass Roots lead guitarist (and future star of The Office) Creed Bratton getting fired from the group, and Michel Rubini unseating Frank Sinatra's pianist for the session in which the iconic singer improvised the hit-making ending to “Strangers in the Night”.

The Wrecking Crew tells the collective, behind-the-scenes stories of the artists who dominated Top-40 radio during the most exciting time in American popular culture.

©2012 Kent Hartman (P)2012 Tantor

Critic reviews

"[ The Wrecking Crew] has the...potent excitement of a collection of greatest hits. It makes good music sound better." (Janet Maslin, The New York Times)

Easy Listening

If you could sum up The Wrecking Crew in three words, what would they be?

light, enjoyable, informative

What other book might you compare The Wrecking Crew to and why?

Atlantic Records: The House the Ahmet Built

What three words best describe Dan John Miller’s performance?

competent, corny

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No

Any additional comments?

The anecdotes that make up this book were amusing, and I learned a lot about the music studio scene in LA in the 60s and early 70s. If you like pop music trivia, you'll probably enjoy it. On the other hand, I thought the writing was pretty hackneyed and unnecessarily repetitive. The performance was ok, but I was sort of annoyed that Dan John Miller read all quotes from women in exactly the same soft, high-pitched voice. He sort of did the same thing with some of the men, trying to distinguish voices but not really pulling it off -- Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel, and Phil Spector, for instance, sound exactly the same. I enjoyed this audiobook overall, though.

Great book.. Enjoyed it

Easy listening and interesting. It was fun to find out about the early music that I loved.

Much better than I anticipated! Yea

More information was covered than was received from the wrecking crew documentary of the same name.

Brilliant!

This is a side of music that I never knew much about. I had heard about the Wrecking Crew but never knew much about them!

This book is a must for anyone who love the music of the 1960s and the 1970s!

Very intriguing story

Several times I found myself sitting in the car listening after I arrived, not wanting to stop the audio. it's that good.