The former Yes and King Crimson drummer (with detours via Genesis, UK and Bruford) shows why he's so widely revered. After all, how many drummers do you know who first become famous as rock drummers and then reinvent themselves as jazz drummers. Along the way, Bill Bruford tries his hand at composition, forms a band with Jeff Berlin and Allan Holdsworth (What is this - the band for the absurdly talented?), gets back together with King Crimson and then finally moves on to jazz drumming. Very cool book, super droll British humour, but it was the section on creativity and how difficult it is to actually do something really new and heartfelt in music that had me in tears. Bruford has since picked up a Ph.D. and written a new book on drummers who are more than just drummers. Amazing dude and seriously, do you really think we get Gavin Harrison or Neil Peart without Bill Bruford paving the way? It was great to see him along with the rest of Yes (Onward Chris Squire) at the Rock Hall of Fame reception in NYC, 2017 with Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson (of Rush) inducting them. ( )

Bill is one of my favorite drummers, but it took me twice to get throught this book. ( )

Bill Bruford came to fame early as the drummer for progressive rock band Yes before leaving to strike out into more challenging musical territory with King Crimson and then various jazz and jazz-rock groups.

This is a bittersweet autobiography, as it was written at the point at which Bruford had decided, after forty year's active service, to retire from being a professional musician. Bruford is very much a thinking drummer, and this is a thoughtful autobiography. Much of what he says about the problems of maintaining confidence in one's abilities, and of dealing with a rapidly evolving (devolving?) industry, I could identify with from my own (much more modest) writing career.

There is at times a slight whiff of "you young people today don't know how lucky you are" at which I suspect the younger Bruford would have taken umbrage - but this is still well worth reading for those interested in Bruford's musical career or in what it's like to try to maintain a meaningful career in the creative arts. ( )

It's typical of Bruford -- and of this book -- that he eschews the temptation for some natty play on words involving sticks or skins or some such and chooses the title "The Autobiography". If you're looking for tittle-tattle about the personalities of 70s rock and 80s/90s/00s jazz, this is the wrong place. Instead the book starts off with an honest attempt to describe the challenges, rewards, and everyday struggles of a musician who, over 40 years, has chosen to play to audiences of 20,000 and also to audiences of 200. It ends with a good 50 pages explaining how, after all those years, Bruford has had enough -- in fact, more than enough. He's fallen out of love with his profession and seems genuinely ill at ease that he can't impress (and I'm not making this up) a Wimbledon Estate Agent at a party. What drives him, he says, is the gaining the respect of his peer group, which includes other professional drummers, but also, bizarrely, home counties airheads. I was disappointed, too, that he made no comparison between his experience and that of his 30-year-old son, also a professional drummer. Evidently he wanted to protect the family's privacy. ( )