SPACECAKE
chronicles the misadventures of a debauched and dangerous masochist as
he tantrums his way through the sleazy worlds of Rock & Roll, music
video and technology, each squalid escapade dragging him ever deeper
into a repugnant maelstrom of sordid excess...well sort of. A wee bit.
Actually...not remotely.
It’s all about the work really.
If
you don’t recognize the name, Kevin Godley was a founder member of
ground breaking UK band 10cc. (Their single, “I'm Not In Love” continues
to be one of the best selling records of all time). As one half of
Godley & Creme he went on to pioneer the notion of music video as an
art form and was responsible for iconic clips by artists such as Herbie
Hancock, The Police, Duran Duran, Lou Reed & Frankie Goes to
Hollywood etc, continuing to up his game in solo mode with U2, Frank
Sinatra, Paul McCartney, The Beatles & Blur amongst others. KG
thrives on re-inventing himself and SPACECAKE, his first book, takes you
on an interactive tour of his life via pictures, music, film clips and
27 chapters of abstract insight into how everything from the first hits
to WholeWorldBand, his music/video collaboration app, got made. It’s
dark in some of the corners though...so make sure you bring a torch.
Kevin
Michael Godley (born 7 October 1945, Prestwich, Lancashire, England) is
a British musician, writer and music video director.
He
was born in a family with Jewish ancestry, and went to North Cestrian
Grammar School in Altrincham. His first band was Group 17 which had its
origins in the Jewish Lads Brigade (The JLB). The members were Henri
Shalam, Bernard Suffrin, Sydney Kaye and Jeffrey Baker, whose father may
have inspired the “Sergeant Baker” character in the 10cc song, “Rubber
Bullets”.
While
attending art college in Manchester Godley met Lol Creme and formed
several bands, most notably Hotlegs and 10cc. After leaving 10cc the two
became known as Godley & Creme, both as musicians and music video /
TV commercials directors. They won many MTV awards for their unique
films and were jointly nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Music
Video, Long Form for: The Police: Synchronicity Concert in 1986.
Godley
writes, sings, and plays drums and percussion and in 1990 conceived and
directed the TV music special “One World One Voice” that featured a
global piece of music focussing on environmental and ecological issues.
Godley also became a vegetarian during this period.
Both
Godley and Lol Creme briefly “reunited” with their former 10cc
bandmates Eric Stewart and Graham Gouldman on the 1992 album,
“Meanwhile”. However, Godley claims that their involvement with the
project was very limited, as the album was dominated by studio
musicians. He performed the lead vocal on “The Stars Didn't Show”, the
band's tribute to the late Roy Orbison. It was the only song on the
album not sung by Stewart. Following “Meanwhile”, Godley and Creme went
their separate ways.
He
reunited with another former 10cc member, Graham Gouldman, to record
new music in 2006 as GG/06, and together they have recorded six new
songs which are available via their website www.gg06.co.uk
Recently,
Godley has moved into developing a music platform that combines audio
and video to create a global recording studio in the cloud called
“WholeWorldBand” (www.wholeworldband.com).
The company was nominated for the “SXSW Music Accelerator Award” in
2013 and was one of eight finalists selected from a pool of over 500.
SPACECAKE, the book, is available for download from iBooks and can be read on any Mac iOS device.
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