Eddie Trunk’s Essential Hard Rock and Heavy Metal
By: Eddie Trunk
Published: April 1, 2011 – 240 pages

What does Eddie want this book to be?

Probably the most difficult review I have ever written about a book. Why? Because I both like the book and dislike the book. Mostly because how he has choosen to write the book.

I will explain. But I will start a with a little general about the book. The size, layout and pictures are really cool. So visually I really like the the book. And at first glance It seems really cool. Even if the parts on each band aren’t that large or deep It seems that It is enough for fans of each the bands to buy it.

The book is in one way Eddie’s little run through of essential  ‘Hard Rock and Heavy Metal’ bands with Eddie’s personal history intertwined into the text. That is probably were my first problem with this book is. What does Eddie want this book to be? His personal history in the music business or a run through of his favorite bands? I guess probably the first, because a newbie in the ‘metal-world’ would never buy this book or would know who Eddie Trunk is anyway. If he wanted to make this a book about him he should have made the book much more chronically and included a lot more personal and candid shots. I have seen a lot of them during the years. So I know they exist.

OK. Whats the Kiss stuff like then?

When It comes to the Kiss portion/content of the book It’s really quite cool. The pictures are really nice and not the ones you see all over the place. And the candid shots are great even if I would have liked to see a lot more. His references to Kiss and Ace is also all over the book. Like the portion from the 70′s were he tells us that his only alibi for liking Van Halen was because Gene Simmons had produced their first demo and discovered them in the first place.

He also dives into his relationship with Paul in the Kiss portion of the book. He really doesn’t understand why Paul does not like him? Even if they had a much better relationship before and Paul used to be quite friendly with him. I just can’t understand why this should be a big mystery to him. He even writes that he does dislike the current version of the band because of the makeup issue with the “new members”. And he has been very vocal about it and has given Ace and Peter a lot of room to bicker about it on his radio show  in the last ten years. So the answer more or less given by itself.

For Gods sake, It’s just makeup. It’s the music that’s important. If you were able to love/like all the incarnations of band without Peter and Ace in the band. I really don’t understand how a Kiss fan could dislike this version of the band musically. Specially after they have released their best record at least since Lick It Up with Sonic Boom (Revenge is about as good).

But all in all the book is quite good. And the text about the different bands are quite good even if the book itself is a little unfocused. The pictures and layout is I said great.

Verdict: 6/10