FREAKS OUT!: Freaks, Weirdos, and Misfits

The Rise and Fall of Rock and Roll as It Should Be

This is a book about freaks and for freaks, crafted by a major freak. In his latest madness, Luke Haines composes a secret and underground history of rock based on its most eminent freaks. With maddening and sharp humor and prodigious lucidity, the former leader of The Auteurs and Black Box Recorder —among many other incarnations— signs a memorable manifesto and probably one of the most entertaining volumes in music literature.

Crawling through these pages are weird creatures like Gene Vincent, The Shadows, The Incredible String Band, Jim Morrison, T. Rex, Gary Glitter, Lou Reed, Morrissey, The Fall, The Go-Betweens, the Manson girls, and a bunch of wrestling villains dressed in leotards, among other creepy beings. Freaks Out! is a glorious celebration of otherness and anomaly, and it is by no means suitable reading for normal people.