332 ratings | 5 reviews | avg rating:4.21

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Tim’s Bookshelves

to-read (205)
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Michael Tatum

301 books | 99 friends

Kathleen Large

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720 books | 145 friends

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Tim Riley

Goodreads Author

Born

in New York City, The United States

Website

http://www.timrileyauthor.com

Twitter

triley60

Genre

Nonfiction, History, Arts & Photography

Influences

Dickens, Faulkner, Shaw

Member Since

August 2007

URL

https://www.goodreads.com/triley60

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NPR CRITIC, AUTHOR, PIANIST, and SPEAKER TIM RILEY reviews pop and classical music for NPR's HERE AND NOW, and has written for the HUFFINGTON POST, THE WASHINGTON POST, SLATE.COM and SALON.COM. He was trained as a classical pianist at Oberlin and Eastman, and remains among the few critics who writes about both "high" and "low" culture and their overlapping concerns.

Brown University sponsored Riley as Critic-In Residence in 2008, and in 2009 he began teaching multi-media courses as Journalist In Residence at Emerson College in Boston.

His first book, Tell Me Why: A Beatles Commentary (Knopf/Vintage 1988), was hailed by the New York Times as bringing "new insight to the act we've known for all these years..."

A staple author in college course ...more

250 posts
Tim Riley's Blog

Turnkey Nerds

Great tension spills out between her looks and her personality, stumping and intriguing her colleagues, but she steers more activity through her intelligence than anything else...

Combine Editions
Tim Riley’s books

Average rating: 3.97 · 1,288 ratings · 135 reviews · 28 distinct works • Similar authors

	Tell Me Why: The Beatles: Album By Album, Song By Song, The Sixties And After 4.11 avg rating — 720 ratings — published 1988 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Lennon: The Man, the Myth, the Music - The Definitive Life 3.89 avg rating — 478 ratings — published 2010 — 23 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Hard Rain: A Dylan Commentary 3.48 avg rating — 52 ratings — published 1992 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Fever: How Rock 'n' Roll Transformed Gender in America 2.50 avg rating — 20 ratings — published 2004 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Hard Rain: A Bob Dylan Commentary liked it 3.00 avg rating — 2 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	How to Live an Unstuck Life: Subdue Stress, Unwind Anxiety, and Quiet Your Busy Brain really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 1 rating	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Madonna Illustrated liked it 3.00 avg rating — 1 rating — published 1992 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Lennon: de mens, de mythe, de muziek by Tim Riley (Goodreads Author), Maarten Polman (Translator), Meile Snijders (Translator) liked it 3.00 avg rating — 1 rating	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	How to Raise Good Little People: To Do Good When No One Is Looking liked it 3.00 avg rating — 1 rating	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Jake & Jacob 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings — published 2012	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Tim Riley…

Tim is Currently Reading

Tim Riley is currently reading

The Things They Carried

by Tim O'Brien

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Mar 19, 2020 08:25AM

Tim Riley is currently reading

Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America

by Ibram X. Kendi (Goodreads Author)

bookshelves: currently-reading

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Feb 11, 2020 08:33AM

Tim Riley is currently reading

The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, a Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal

by Ben Mezrich (Goodreads Author)

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Jun 16, 2019 06:25AM

Quotes by Tim Riley (?)

“Harrison’s visit to Dylan’s Woodstock sessions and his invitation to Eric Clapton to solo on “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” convinced him that an outsider could revive stalled sessions. Dylan and the Band treated Harrison as an equal, while in his own band, Lennon and McCartney persistently patronized his material, even as it began to peak. (Lennon, in fact, sat out most of Harrison’s Beatle recordings from here on out.) Taking in an ally could only ease Harrison’s reentry into the contentious Beatle orbit. Along with lobbying for Ringo Starr to replace Pete Best, bringing Preston into the Get Back project stands as a defining move for Harrison: he single-handedly rescued Let It Be, and pushed his material throughout 1969, until Abbey Road featured his best work yet.”
― Tim Riley, Lennon

4 likes

“As usual, Ringo Starr uttered the best break-up quote: “This is all news to me.”
― Tim Riley, Lennon

3 likes

“The wires noted how all four Beatles attended Bob Dylan’s Royal Festival Hall appearance, captured by D. A. Pennebaker’s Don’t Look Back documentary. Dylan’s recent Bringing It All Back Home featured a side of electric rock, and this would be his last acoustic-only tour. Convulsed over Dylan’s identity, his British audience parsed every lyric, mistrusting his flirtation with rock ’n’ roll more for its flight from literary pretense than inexplicable lack of explicit social protest. The Beatles’ attendance conferred royal approval of Dylan’s vexing persona, whichever guise it took. With the publication of Lennon’s second book, A Spaniard in the Works, the Dylan rivalry intensified. Spaniard was both hastier than its predecessor and more ambitious, with more wordplay by the pound.”
― Tim Riley, Lennon

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Topics Mentioning This Author

topics	posts	views	last activity
Reading Book Club: Bill Medley, “The Time of My Life: A Righteous Brother’s Memoir”	1	1	Oct 19, 2015 06:15AM
Goodreads Librari...: please combine	985	332	Sep 19, 2021 06:44AM

Tim’s Quotes

“Once Presley grabbed hold, he spoke like an oracle, your new teen mentor, sitting on your shoulder, urging you to embrace romance, kiss that girl, and take a thousand other risks, even as his doubt and hesitation whispered uncertainty and dread.”
― Tim Riley, Lennon

2 likes