The Uncool by Cameron Crowe audiobook review – memoir of an awestruck insider

The film-maker and author narrates this vivid account of his wide-eyed adventures as a young music journalist in 70s America, hanging out with heroes from David Bowie to Led ZeppelinThe title of The Uncool refers to rock critic Lester Bangs’s assessment of Cameron Crowe, whose adventures as a music journalist were loosely depicted in his 2000 movie, Almost Famous. Long before he became a film-maker, the teenage Crowe travelled around the US interviewing some of the biggest rocks acts of the era, among them Gram Parsons, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, the Eagles and the Allman Brothers Band. Crowe’s memoir reveals him as the perennial outsider who, unlike his interviewees, cared little about sex, booze and drugs and who lacked a certain savoir-faire. Yet rock stars liked having him around, enjoying his sincerity and the fact that he was more admiring fan than dispassionate reporter.Crowe is the reader, delivering a warm and vivacious narration that conveys the wide-eyed astonishment of