Long train runnin' Our story of the Doobie Brothers

Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

The leaders of legendary rock band the Doobie Brothers offer a spirited tour through the five decades of music that landed them in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2020. "Destined to be the Doobie Boys," thanks to their predilection for smoking joints, Johnston and Simmons formed the group in 1970 after being introduced by friends. Within the year, they found a formidable fan base performing "Long Train Runnin' " and "Rockin' down the Highway" ("songs we would be famous for") around San Jose, Calif., and secured a recording contract with Warner Bros. But their meteoric rise was halted in 1975 when a neglected stomach ulcer forced Johnston to retire from the group. Simmons and the band persisted, honing their sound with new voices--including that of Steely Dan's Michael McDonald ("The second I heard him open up his mouth... my mind was blown," recalls bass player Tiran Porter)--until Johnston rejoined the group in 1987. While discussions of "stuff like wah-wah pedals, Echoplex parts, and... flanging guitar pedals" can bog down the narrative, the warts-and-all account of their drug-addled path to fame entertains nonetheless. Fans will be thrilled by this unvarnished look at the good, the bad, and the ugly that went into making the band. (May)

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Review by Library Journal Review

Guitarists Johnston and Pat Simmons, the founding members of the pop rock group the Doobie Brothers, work with music journalist Chris Epting to chronicle the band's musical journey. In this book, which also features remarks from other band members and insiders, Johnston and Simmons reflect upon their childhoods, the influence of musically diverse rockers Moby Grape, and forming the Doobie Brothers in San José. The duo fondly recall the band's first hit, "Listen to the Music" (1972), and describe their constant touring and continued chart successes with "Long Train Runnin'" (1973) and the number-one hit "Black Water" (1974). They credit their triumphs to their eclectic style, characterized by the use of two lead vocals, Simmons's acoustic country-blues picking, and Johnston's electric R&B-styled chording and innovative bass lines. The book explains the Doobie Brothers' progression to a more mellow pop sound in 1975, when vocalist and keyboard player Michael McDonald replaced Johnston, who suffered a life-threatening ulcer. The guitarists plow through subsequent albums, including the chart-topping, multi-platinum Minute by Minute (1978). They discuss the group's disbandment in 1982, the reunion five years later, and subsequent albums and tours up to the present. VERDICT Though they're sometimes repetitive, Johnston and Simmons ably and vividly recount the Doobie Brothers' hard-working, highly successful 50-year career. Their account will appeal to fans of '70s rock.--David P. Szatmary

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

Founding members of the Doobie Brothers Johnston and Simmons alternate their perspectives to deliver an amiable, polyphonic history of the band. It may surprise some readers to know that the Doobies--so named for the ever present joints that surrounded the band for its first decade or so--modeled themselves after Moby Grape, a San Francisco group that never got much traction, even backing up the ill-fated Skip Spence on numerous occasions. Early on, the Doobie Brothers played in Bay Area mountain towns that Ken Kesey and Hunter S. Thompson would make infamous, with lots of Hells Angels in the crowd. Still, Johnston notes, they were playing for plenty of people besides bikers: "We didn't consider ourselves anything other than a band that was growing and developing." Drawing on other members of the band, producer Ted Templeman, and other principals, Johnston and Simmons trace the births and fortunes of songs that yielded one hit record after another in the 1970s and '80s: "Natural Thing," for instance, some of the magic of which they graciously attribute to engineer Don Landee, who "was really into 'phasing' effects." The authors also praise on T. Rex mastermind Marc Bolan, whom they credit for both entertaining stagecraft and exquisite good manners. "Kind of ironic," Simmons adds parenthetically, "that, eventually, the Doobie Brothers and T. Rex would be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in the same year, 2020." It's clear that there were tensions between some band members--Jeff "Skunk" Baxter doesn't come off particularly well--and that some fans never got over Michael McDonald changing the direction of the band (replies McDonald, "It may be my voice on some of the songs, but it was the band that adapted everything, not just me"). But what's most striking is the generosity Johnston and Simmons show to everyone around them, from supporting acts to session players, roadies, and all the band members over the years. A delightfully unpretentious, pleasing account of rock stardom. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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