Review of Howard Stern Comes Again
Howard Stern wants you to know that he'south really really really really inverse. In his first volume in nearly a quarter century, Stern apologizes for his early autobiographies, Private Parts (adjusted into a pretty skilful moving picture) and Miss America, characterizing them equally works of a workaholic, bridge-burning bedlamite. That guy, he says in the new book Howard Stern Comes Again, was out of touch with himself, his family, and guests on his trailblazing radio prove, doing anything for express joy and scorching the world when he should have been listening more.
All this is probably true, simply that guy, who in one case showed his doughy white ass to the nation as Fartman on the MTV Video Music Awards, was the i who got famous. The one who battled the FCC, the i who almost unmarried-handedly saved Sirius XM radio from the engineering dustbin, who already did a lot to repair his epitome as a off-white, lively judge on America's Got Talent.
As anyone who's been listening to the Sirius XM "Howard Stern Show" since 2006 knows, Stern's move to satellite radio, crumbling, a second spousal relationship, and a lot of therapy have led to a wiser, slower-paced, and much kinder Howard Stern. Feuds with celebrities such equally Rosie O'Donnell and Jon Bon Jovi have turned into loving friendships. The guy lives with dozens of cats considering his wife is super-into animal rescue with North Shore Animal League. And the "Shock Jock" characterization, some 40 years into his career, is finally starting to fade.
The Skilful Stern
Howard Stern Comes Again is evidence of his growth as a man. His interviewing skills have blossomed, turning his long-form conversations into frequently revelatory listening. At that place are still phony phone calls and weird sexual practice adventures and harrowing stories from the surviving members of the show'south Wack Pack. Just the interviews largely drive the evidence and frequently make headlines. Stern'due south ability to empathize with guests and go them to open produces about one very good interview a week on his show, depending on the guest lineup.
He'due south nerveless the best of these (or the weirdest, or the most revealing) in volume grade for posterity. Information technology's mostly a expect back at the last two decades of work.
It's unclear if Stern volition continue his radio show afterwards his contract ends adjacent yr. So the book acts as both a mea culpa to his old rivals also every bit a victory lap not just for his career, but for his evolving into a better person.
The Wisdom of Jerry Seinfeld
Merely it's besides, every bit Stern explains, a mode to capture some of the wisdom from guests that can get lost from hearing the conversations as audio. He prefaces the major interviews with guests like Madonna, Jay-Z, and Joan Rivers with new introductions summing up his thoughts on the person, or why he included that particular talk.
In the atomic number 82-up to a 2014 Chris Rock interview, Stern writes, "When I heed to these interviews – possibly because of the pacing or considering I'm caught up in the sound of the voices–I miss things. In the case of Chris Rock, whose heed moves at the speed of low-cal, the potential for oversight is even greater. There'due south cloth in this interview that you lot're near to read that, in my opinion, rates with the greatest stand up-upwardly Chris has always performed."
He's non completely correct: off-the-cuff Rock is not about equally thoughtful and polished every bit Rock in Bring the Pain. But he'south correct that, on the folio, it's easier to absorb what Jerry Seinfeld has learned most comedy and marriage, or what Courtney Beloved is actually talking most at any given moment.
The longer interviews typically run nigh 10 pages, while Stern has collected some shorter bits into sections on "Sexual activity & Relationships," "Coin & Fame," "Drugs & Sobriety," "Religion & Spirituality" and "Gone Too Soon," with celebrity reflections on Tupac Shakur, Amy Winehouse, John Belushi and others.
They're all expert interviews, fifty-fifty the weird ones with filmmaker Vincent Gallo and self-described mob murderer Henry Hill. The Harvey Weinstein and Bill O'Reilly interviews show, with hindsight, the way those two hid behind their ain words and public personas.
And Now a Word From Our President
But the most revealing bits might be xi interview excerpts called "And Now a Word from Our President," a range of Stern Bear witness appearances by President Donald Trump. What's almost shocking about them is how little they daze. The boasts, the threats, the evaluations of women, and the self-aggrandizing business claims sound all likewise familiar.
Merely ane interview, a 2001 fight between Trump and gossip columnist A.J. Benza nigh a model they both dated, serves at the pettiest material in the entire book, an opera of misplaced adulthood and cruelty. It reveals more than virtually Trump'southward nature than any of his presidential debates with Hillary Clinton did.
Howard Stern Comes Again is an accomplishment, a very savvy legacy-PR motility, and a smart collection of well-chosen career highlights. Just actually reading the book terminate to end is a huge job. Information technology'south a slog that doesn't line upwardly with the radio pioneer's power to entertain an audience for hours at a fourth dimension, mean solar day after twenty-four hour period, for decades. Instead it's the kind of book to skim, and jump effectually in, to read in short bursts and discover that some interview subjects, such as Ed Sheeran and the Kardashians, are much more interesting that you lot could take always imagined.
(Simon & Schuster, May 14, 2019)
Source: https://bookandfilmglobe.com/nonfiction/book-review-howard-stern-comes-again/
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