Alan di Perna
Alan di Perna has been writing professionally and copiously about popular music and culture since 1980 for leading outlets that include Billboard, Creem, Musician, Rolling Stone, Grammy.com, Raygun, Keyboard, Guitar Player, Guitar World, Guitar Aficionado, Guitarist, Rock & Folk, the San Francisco Examiner Magazine and Yoga Journal. Born in Brooklyn, he came of age during the heady cultural explosion that was the psychedelic '60s and first emerged as a musician and writer amid the exuberant cross-genre hedonism of New York's early '80s post punk scene. His writing combines a musician's technical insight, a scholarly depth of critical acumen, a keen feel for cultural contexts and an engaging, streetwise style.
Books by Alan di Perna include Guitar Masters: Intimate Portraits, Green Day: The Ultimate Illustrated History and Play It Loud: An Epic History of the Style, Sound, and Revolution of the Electric Guitar. The latter book (which Alan co-authored with his longtime colleague and former Guitar World EIC Brad Tolinski) became an inspiration for the 2019-20 exhibition Play It Loud: The Instruments of Rock and Roll at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Met curator of musical instruments Jayson Dobney recruited Alan to write the lead essay for the exhibition catalog.
In the museum world, Alan has also served as a PR/curatorial consultant to the Musical Instrument Museum (MIM) in Phoenix and has written exhibit text for MIM, the Grammy Museum, the Heard Museum and the Fender Museum. Absolutely Freelance, since 1983, he has also penned reissue liner notes for CDs by Santana, Jimi Hendrix, AC/DC and David Gilmour, not to mention reams of press releases, ad, marketing and website copy.
Widely syndicated internationally, Alan’s work has been translated into French, Italian, Spanish, German, Swedish, Japanese and Korean.
26 articles
List of articles in the library
Green On Red: Living for Tomorrow
Interview by Alan di Perna, BAM, 8 November 1983
FOLK ROCK — that distinctly American, never-quite-homogeneous blend of down-home traditions and youthful rebellion. The acid-ridden stepchild of a bygone decade? A cultural curio? If ...
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, February 1986
THE CLUBHOUSE is up on the fourth floor of an office building Raymond Chandler might have called "reasonably shabby" fifty years ago. It's on a ...
Sly & Robbie: Can the Riddim Twins Rock the Mainstream?
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, August 1987
AS SUPPORTING players, they've become as recognizable and popular as comic book superheroes. Is there anyone who isn't familiar with Sly Dunbar's brightly-colored tams and ...
Bryan Ferry, Madonna: Pat Leonard: The Madonna Method
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, May 1988
PRODUCING BRYAN FERRY AND ARRANGING MADONNA IN THE WORLD OF HIGH-STAKES HIGH-TECH ...
Fleetwood Mac, Foreigner, Whitesnake: Does Keith Olsen really believe in this stuff, or what?
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, November 1988
IT'S EASY to sneer at the increasingly predictable formulas that sell records in the millions these days. What's hard is to actually believe in the ...
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, November 1988
"WITH ALBUMS, you can't just play it straight on every track. If a song wants to be a hit, if it seems like — done ...
Thomas Dolby: Has The Man of a Thousand Faces Spread Himself Too Thin?
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, May 1989
1. OPEN ON long shot of Hollywood skyline. Grimy fog and half-hearted drizzle give the city the mean, seedy look it always has when the ...
Ziggy Marley, Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club: Clubbing It with the Tom Tom Club
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, July 1989
Chris and Tina are now in "a real band." And it's not Talking Heads. ...
Ziggy Marley, Tom Tom Club: Ziggy Marley: His Own Man
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, July 1989
Ziggy Marley, with a little help from his friends, is moving out of his father's shadow. ...
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, July 1990
BOB CLEARMOUNTAIN exudes a calm, deliberate air as he moves around the cluttered interior of a recording truck parked outside L.A.'s Universal Amphitheatre. Politely negotiating ...
Carlos Santana: Finding Melody in Rhythm
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, December 1990
Quick pick tricks and global licks ...
Talking Heads, Bernie Worrell: Bernie Worrell: Aspects of the Funk
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, February 1991
Jamming with keyboardist extraordinaire Bernie Worrell ...
Patrice Rushen: The Lady Plays a Vamp
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, March 1991
Keyboard wizard Patrice Rushen unravels jazz improvisation ...
Charles Brown: Jazzin' the Blues with Charles Brown
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, April 1991
Sneaking something extra between those three chords ...
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, July 1991
Keyboard giant tells how it all started and how it all works ...
Elvis Costello, Phil Spector: Larry Knechtel Emerges
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, September 1991
On Phil Spector, waltzing with Elvis Costello and "arm playing" ...
Ice Cube, Bill Laswell, N.W.A, Public Enemy: Fear of a Rap Planet
Report and Interview by J.D. Considine, Alan di Perna, Musician, February 1992
The biggest style of the last decade has a problem with attitudes. By J.D. Considine ...
Charlie Rich: Building Better Bridges: Charlie Rich in jazz country
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, May 1992
"NOW YOU play the bridge for me." ...
Lindsey Buckingham: The Speed of Sound
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, August 1992
Lindsey Buckingham gets tight with tone ...
Jerry Donahue: Taking Tele 'Round The Bend
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, September 1992
THE BRASS NUTS OF A COUNTRY FIREBALL ...
fIREHOSE, Mike Watt: Mike Watt's Violent Extremes
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, June 1993
Free your bass and your mind will follow ...
Fishbone: Five-string Freestyle: Fishbone's Norwood Fisher
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, September 1993
AS A KID in the '70s, John Norwood Fisher listened intently to Funkadelic's Billy Bass and Aston "Family Man" Barrett from Bob Marley's band. Rather ...
The Faces, Ian McLagan: Ian McLagan: Face the Face
Interview by Alan di Perna, Musician, October 1993
On the finer points of three-chord karate ...
Report by Alan di Perna, Musician, June 1994
MUSIC, OF course, has always been interactive. People dance to it, make love to it, sing along with the lyrics and figure out the chord ...
Report by Alan di Perna, Musician, May 1995
IN JANUARY OF 1992, singer Vince Neil appeared on the cover of this magazine, lighting a cigar with a thousand-dollar bill. His band, Mötley Crüe, ...
Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers: Tom Petty: Petty Grievances
Interview by Alan di Perna, Guitar World, January 2003
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers take on the corporate giants with their new concept album, The Last DJ. ...
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