04 Dec 06
Rockin Down the Highway
Paul Grushkin
Voyageur Press £25
Cars were crucial to the birth and development of rock'n' roll, being instrumental in providing the freedom that the music's young followers needed to let their hair down away from the disapproving eyes of older generations.
Cars have also been important as subject matter for songwriters, from Jackie Brenston's paean to the Oldsmobile Model 88, the 1951 R&B hit Rocket 88 to Springsteen, Prince's Little Red Corvette and the hip hop world's current crop of automotive name-checking. So the only question around rock writer Grushkin's celebration of the 'unholy marriage of rock 'n' roll and internal combustion' is why hasn't somebody done it before?
Grushkin entertainingly details the associations between all kinds of cars - including muscle cars, hot rods, custom and tuners - and all genres of popular music. Pictures, cover art and comic book illustrations are used well in this colourful and well-designed book to chart the twin fascinations that have affected so many of over the last half-century. The perfect gift for rockin' petrolheads.
The Car Design Yearbook 5
Stephen Newbury
Merrell £25
Now in its fifth edition, The Car Design Yearbook is a well-established, end-of-year round-up of all the year's production and concept cars, this year featuring 130 models.
Newbury looks at each new car in detail, outlining its origins, purpose and design language, the text accompanied by full colour pictures and technical specs (where available). All automotive life is here, from the US to India, with everything from the Dacia Logan to the Bugatti Veyron featured, so if there's a new model you particularly want to read about, it should be here.
Apart from the comprehensive A-Z of new cars, Newbury also sticks his neck out with a section on trends, highlights and predictions, plus chapters on dashboard design and Italian design, profiles of key designers, and information on where cars where launched, motor shows and car marques and parent companies.
The Car Design Yearbook is an invaluable reference book for anyone interested in cars - which is why it would be worth picking up volumes 1-4, which are still in print and available to buy. These cover all the news cars from each of the last four years: collect the set and you'll almost qualify to join the 4Car team.
Italian Auto Legends
Michel Zumbrunn and Richard Heseltine
Merrell £29.95
Those Italians have made a few decent cars over the years, I suppose. Between them, the likes of Ferrari, Lamborghini, Lancia, Maserati and Alfa Romeo have been responsible for producing some absolute classics - which is where Italian Auto Legends fits in.
This sumptuously photographed book highlights over 50 of the most important Italian cars from 1907 to today, each with a short description of the car's history, design and performance. It really is a stunning-looking book: Zumbrunn's pictures are the height of automotive porn and it's the kind of book that will send you into reveries of winning the Lottery and owning one of these beauties. One for the Italophile in your life.
