Book Review: A Man Called Destruction by Holly George-Warren

A Man Called Destruction:
The Life and Music of Alex Chilton,
From Box Tops to Big Star to Backdoor Man

By Holly George-Warren

(Viking Books)

As cult rock icons go, few were more inscrutable than Alex Chilton. He was a chart-topper at age 16, with his gruff lead vocal for The Box Tops’ “The Letter” in 1967. But he garnered a passionate throng of record collector fans with the three remarkable LPs he made as a member of Big Star, the 1970s progenitors of immaculate guitar-pop who initially released their albums to complete commercial indifference. When he went solo, at first he favored a gnarled, broken-down sound that out-punked punk and predated lo-fi. But by the mid-’80s, he had moved towards a laid-back mélange of R&B, jazz and pop. Chilton might have been the last hipster, in the original 1940s sense of the word. He was also an enigma who traveled across musical genres, sometimes with a disconcerting lack of affect. He often seemed completely dismissive about the one thing his reputation almost totally rested on — the music of Big Star. Chilton died of a heart attack at the age of 59 on March 17, 2010, a few days before he was due to play with the reconstituted Big Star at SXSW.

So in taking on a biography of Chilton, veteran music writer Holly George-Warren had her work cut out for her. By and large, A Man Called Destruction is a triumph, a book that pulls the curtain back on Chilton’s life and music, but without dissipating the allure of his mystique. George-Warren traces the roots of the Chilton family (they emigrated from England to Virginia in 1660) before moving the setting to Memphis, TN, where William Alexander Chilton, the fourth and youngest child of Sidney and Mary Chilton was born on Dec. 28, 1950.

George-Warren captures the moments of tragedy and sadness that would periodically mar Chilton’s life. If there is a defining moment, it might be the death of his oldest brother Reid, who drowned in the bathtub after suffering a seizure in June of 1957. After this event, his parents moved the family from the suburbs to the city. Sidney restarted his career as a jazz musician, and Mary turned the new home’s living room into an art gallery, giving young Alex a view of Memphis’ bohemian subculture.

For the rest of his life, Chilton would straddle that line between the music lifer who’s ready for any gig, and the erratic artiste on society’s fringes. He managed to cross paths with everyone from Charles Manson to photographer William Eggleston to Scottish indie band Teenage Fanclub.

George-Warren’s chronicle is exceedingly well-researched. She interviewed almost all of Chilton’s still-living friends, associates and family members. Chilton’s voice is also well-represented through older interviews with George-Warren and others. Throughout, she guides the reader through Chilton’s life, providing a narrative for the often bizarre career moves, the periods of alcoholic torpor, and the sense of peace he eventually arrived at.

If there is one key fault to the book, it’s that it seems to rush through the last few years of Chilton’s life. He lived in New Orleans (and was rescued by helicopter in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina), and played solo shows, or with Big Star or The Box Tops. The use of Big Star’s “In the Street” as the theme to That ’70s Show provided a little more financial security. A mere seven months before his death, he married his second wife, Laura. All this happens in only a handful of pages. Perhaps Laura Chilton’s decision not to be interviewed for the book is a reason for this abrupt section.

But in all, this is a book that does right by Chilton’s legacy, and should please his devotees. And if the recent Big Star documentary Nothing Can Hurt Me (available on Netflix Instant) left you more curious about Chilton, A Man Called Destruction is a worthy next step.

More by Mike Pelusi:

• Author/musician Wesley Stace finally puts his name above the title.
• A review of Wonderkid by Wesley Stace.