Oh, Manchester, So Much To Answer For

Walter Yetnikoff was one crazy motherfucker. The president of CBS Records from 1975-90, he shepherded Michael Jackson from being, well, just another Jackson to being a global superstar - and he took personal calls from everyone from Springsteen to Streisand. He also fucked, drank, and snorted nearly everything in sight, and (cliché alert) lived to tell the tales. And oh, what tales he's got to tell. His autobiography, Howling at the Moon (written with David Ritz) is a dishy hoot, serving up embarassing stories about the aforementioned stars and many others, alongside some superb inside scoop on the biz of record retailing. Yetnikoff pulls no punches - least of all with himself. Frankly, he comes off in these pages as a sometimes brilliant supreme asshole. He cleaned up his act (at least the booze-and-drugs portion of it) 15 years ago, and now seems at relative peace. But what a life he's crammed into 70-plus years. Thanks for sharing, Velvel. If you care an iota about the record industry, read this book. A-