Pitched somewhere between Almost Famous and Withnail and I, Apathy for the Devil is a unique document of this most fascinating and troubling of decades - a story of success, burn out and ultimately recovery.
As a 20-something college dropout Nick Kent's first five interviews as a young writer were the MC5, Captain Beefheart, The Grateful Dead, Iggy Pop and Lou Reed. Along with Charles Shaar Murray and Ian MacDonald he would go on to define and establish the NME as the leading home of British music writing. And as boyfriend of Chrissie Hynde, confidant of Iggy Pop, trusted scribe for Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones, most notably, and early member of the Sex Pistols, his was an extraordinary decade, which after the brilliance of its early years turned inevitably toward the darker excesses of its era.
Like Howard Marks' similarly larger than life Mr Nice - and recent rock tome's such as Motley Crue's Dirt and Slash's autobiography - Apathy for the Devil is a brilliant and revealing despatch from an extraordinary life.
