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Mick Gold

Mick Gold

Mick Gold (snapped on Brighton beach in 1969) photographed rock musicians and wrote about music from 1968 to 1978. His work appeared in Let It Rock, Melody Maker, Sounds, Creem and Street Life He published a book of photo-essays about live music, Rock On The Road, 1976.

He threw it all away to produce and direct documentary films for TV. His work includes Europe After the Rain, a history of Dada and Surrealism; Schiele In Prison, a study of painting and paranoia in fin de siecle Vienna; Watergate, a 5-part history of the downfall of President Nixon which won an Emmy in 1995; Star Wars, the story of President Reagan and the Soviet Union; Hostage, a 3-part series on the hostage crisis in Lebanon; Death of Apartheid, a 3-part series on the relatively peaceful transfer of power in South Africa (Emmy nomination); and Endgame In Ireland, the secret history of the peace process in Northern Ireland (Peabody Award).

He has made several films for the BBC2 series Private Life of a Masterpiece, including Velazquez’s The Rokeby Venus, Goya’s The Third of May 1808, Degas’s Little Dancer aged Fourteen, and Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People. He lives in London with his wife and two daughters. His hobbies include spending too much money on books about rock music.

Mick on the RBP podcast

40 articles

List of articles in the library

By date | By artist | Most recently added

Grateful Dead: The Grateful Dead: Europe '72

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, February 1973

THE DEAD have never ceased to feed off their origins as a performing band in order to avoid the danger of becoming marooned in a ...

Poco: A Good Feeling To Know

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, April 1973

IT ALL DEPENDS what you expect an LP to do. If you'd like 40 minutes of rhythmic pap to plug a hole in your air ...

Derek & The Dominos: In Concert (RSO)

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, May 1973

FOR A CULTURE that was geared to acknowledging the importance of flux and individual freedom, rock is ludicrously prone to attacks of nostalgia. ...

The James Gang, Steppenwolf: The James Gang: The Best of the James Gang (Probe)/Steppenwolf: The Best of Steppenwolf (Probe)

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, June 1973

A DIFFICULT ONE to start with: who created the Mid-West Sound? Bet you don’t know. Bet you didn’t know there was a Mid-West Sound. Well, ...

J. Geils Band: The J. Geils Band: Bloodshot

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, July 1973

EVER SINCE the first Butterfield Blues Band album I’ve been waiting and hoping for a group that could combine gut mangling excitement with instrumental virtuosity ...

John Cale: Paris 1919

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, October 1973

IN THE PAST John Cale has appeared to be engaged in investing themes of madness and chaos with a deranged from of classical dignity. I ...

Dan Hicks And His Hot Licks: Where’s The Money?; Last Train to Hicksville

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, December 1973

LIFE USED TO be tough but simple in Tin Punk Alley: you made it or you didn’t. Groups would ride in their pink Cadillacs or ...

John Fahey: After The Ball (Reprise K 44246)

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, December 1973

JOHN FAHEY goes glitter! Well, the package is a neat parody of a fifties style music-to-smooch-to album cover, complete with purple spotlight and lacquered blonde. ...

Steely Dan: Countdown To Ecstasy (MCA)

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, December 1973

STEELY DAN IS a vehicle for the songwriting talents of Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, who entered the music world via a two-year gig with ...

Country Joe McDonald (1974)

Interview by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages audio, 1974

Country Joe talks about being brought up by communist parents, his current musical and political interests, the Paris Sessions album, songwriting, the Beats, jazz and... Bowie!

File format: mp3; file size: 81mb, interview length: 1h 28' 27" sound quality: ***

The Beatles: The Act You've Known For All These Years: The Beatles and Sgt. Pepper

Retrospective by Mick Gold, unpublished, 1974

ALL ENTERTAINMENT HAS AN EXISTENTIAL dimension: all successful performances imply a life-style and a sense of values, a sub-structure of assumptions upon which the performer ...

Bob Dylan: Bringing The Garbage Back Home: A.J. Weberman

Report by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, January 1974

A.J. WEBERMAN sprang into the limelight some five years ago, around the time that students and banana-smoking intellectuals everywhere loved to argue about Bob Dylan. ...

Bob Dylan: Planet Waves

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, March 1974

HE'S NOT ONLY trying to sing like he used to, he's even surfaced with some more stoned sleeve notes and two or three lines actually ...

The Band: A Tree With Roots

Profile by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, April 1974

THE LEGEND runs that in the summer of 1965 the Hawks (also known as the Crackers) were playing a night club in the seashore resort ...

Mahavishnu Orchestra: The Mahavishnu Orchestra: Live — Between Nothingness & Eternity (CBS 69046)

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, April 1974

SRI CHIMNOY must be laughing all the way to the Void. John McLaughlin cleaned up in 1973 as the guru guitarist leading his band up ...

Lou Reed: Rock N Roll Animal

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, May 1974

AND IT CAME TO PASS in the 1970's that rock culture began to doubt whether it existed at all, and every time that two or ...

Joni Mitchell: New Victoria, London

Live Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, June 1974

WHEN JONI MITCHELL sang in a cinema next to Victoria Station, her entire audience fell in love with her three nights running. For weeks afterwards ...

John Cale (1974)

Interview by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages audio, July 1974

Cale talks about his musical life, from King's College Cambridge to Fear, via La Monte Young and the Velvet Underground.

File format: mp3; file size: 48.1mb, interview length: 52' 32" sound quality: ***

Lou Reed

Overview by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, July 1974

YOU COULD hardly miss him on the first album: his rubber-stamped signature was the only wording on the front cover, while on the back his ...

John Cale: Caged Heat

Profile and Interview by Mick Gold, Melody Maker, 27 July 1974

JOHN CALE is sitting in a preview theatre, cowering in the shadow of the London Hilton to see a screening of this movie hes scored ...

John Cale: The Mysterious Journey of John Cale

Profile and Interview by Mick Gold, Creem, October 1974

Part One: I was a prisoner in a lesbian lobotomy jail. I'VE TWICE missed making contact with John Cale and I'm getting tired of ...

John Cale: Fear

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, November 1974

BILL HENDERSON of Sounds has written with seductive simplicity that Paris 1919 (Cale's last release) was an album created in America 'about' Europe, whereas Fear ...

Country Joe & The Fish: Country Joe: Gimme an F!

Interview by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, December 1974

Mick Gold interrogates Country Joe and indulges in some Fishy nostalgia ...

Dr. Feelgood (1975)

Interview by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages audio, 26 February 1975

The men from Canvey Island talk about how they got together, getting into the London pub-rock scene, their aggressive performances and recording Down by the Jetty.

File format: mp3; file size: 71.8mb, interview length: 1h 18' 25" sound quality: ***

Dr. Feelgood: Maximum R&B

Profile and Interview by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, June 1975

"We didn't set out to look like deranged bank clerks..." ...

The Band, Bob Dylan: Bob Dylan and the Band: The Basement Tapes

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, September 1975

On Blonde on Blonde, Dylan gave us his metaphysical, amphetamine dreams from some smoke-filled apartment in midtown Manhattan. On John Wesley Harding, he synthesized a ...

Pink Floyd: Wish You Were Here

Review by Mick Gold, Let It Rock, November 1975

TODAY’S LESSON is taken from the Book of Bowie, chapter 1984, side 2, track 4: ...

Crosby Stills Nash & Young, Dr. Feelgood, The Faces, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Slade: Introduction

Book Excerpt by Mick Gold, 'Rock on the Road' (Futura), 1976

THE IDEA OF doing a book of photo-essays about live music was sparked by a desire to examine two areas: what the job of being ...

Crosby Stills Nash & Young: Mel Bush: The Man Who Hired The World

Book Excerpt by Mick Gold, Rock On The Road (Futura), April 1976

A PROMOTER IS THE middleman between a musician and an audience. A promoter hires a venue, books an act, organises the publicity, is responsible for ...

Patti Smith (1976)

Interview by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages audio, 10 May 1976

Ms Smith talks at length about her poetry, her influences, live improvisation, and Bob Dylan.

File format: mp3; file size: 102.8mb, interview length: 1h 51' 56" sound quality: ***

Patti Smith: Patti in Excelsis Deo

Profile and Interview by Mick Gold, Street Life, 29 May 1976

WE LIVE in dangerous times. We live in a society that can co-opt its own downfall, sprinkle some glitter on it, and gift wrap it ...

Peter Gabriel (1981)

Interview by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages audio, 21 January 1981

On the back of his breakthrough solo hit single 'Games Without Frontiers', Gabriel talks about making Peter Gabriel 3, drum machines and technology, the influence of African music, the death of John Lennon and his take on punk, the Pistols and PiL.

File format: mp3; file size: 59.4mb, interview length: 1h 04' 53" sound quality: **

Neil Young at Heart

Essay by Mick Gold, unpublished, 1998

IT MUST HAVE been 1969 or 1970. There was a rave review of Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere in Rolling Stone and I bought it ...

Bob Dylan: Life and Life Only: Bob Dylan at 60

Retrospective by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, October 2001

HE'S BEEN RECORDING FOR 40 years, 43 albums, never-ending tours. There’s something Shakespearean about the complexity of his work: so many points of view expressed ...

Bob Dylan: He's Not There: Todd Haynes' Dylan

Essay by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, 2 December 2007

"THE MINUTE you try to grab hold of Dylan, he's no longer where he was. He's like a flame: If you try to hold him ...

Bob Dylan: Good As He's Been To You: Bob Dylan's Best Albums

Guide by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, December 2009

Mick Gold makes a personal selection of Dylan's Finest Works. A slightly modified version of an article for the Bobzine Isis. ...

Bob Dylan: HMV Apollo, London

Live Review by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, 21 November 2011

BOB-CATS PUSHED relentlessly forward against the bar at the front of the former Hammersmith Odeon, hats on their heads. Mark Knopfler was caressing liquid guitar ...

The Birth Of The Blues and The Myth Of Authenticity

Essay by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, November 2013

Film-maker Mick Gold on the blues, authenticity and Blues America – broadcast by BBC4 on Friday 29 November and Friday 6 December at 9pm. ...

Bob Dylan: A Subterranean Bicentennial Road Movie: Scorsese's Rolling Thunder Revue

Film/DVD/TV Review by Mick Gold, Rock's Backpages, 13 June 2019

WHEN ROLLING THUNDER REVUE: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese was posted on IMDb, I clicked on Full Cast & Crew and scanned the ...

Bob Dylan: "Is it rolling, Marty?": Scorsese's Rolling Thunder Revue

Essay by Mick Gold, Isis, January 2021

NOTE: An earlier version of this essay appeared in the Dylan fanzine Isis, #212-213 in January to coincide with DVD release of Scorsese's film. Here's an expanded, improved version. ...

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