Best of 2020: Our favourite pop culture books of the year

While it’s often been hard to focus and detach long enough during this pandemic to get much reading done, there’s been no shortage of great pop culture titles released this year, from a revealing oral history of Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused to a massive 800-page biography of Sex Pistols mastermind Malcolm McLaren.

We’ve selected ten of our favourite pop culture books of the year below. Be sure to visit our Books section to check out interviews with a number of these authors, including The Life & Times of Malcolm McLaren author Paul Gorman, and music industry legend Michael Alago, author of I Am Michael Alago: Breathing Music. Signing Metallica. Beating Death. For even more book recommendations, check out our Best Pop Culture Books of 2019 list.

Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative  – Justin Erickson (Mondo/Insight Editions)
Bruce Timm’s Batman: The Animated Series is one of the most faithful versions of the iconic character to ever hit the screen. With a great visual style and some of the best voice work in modern animation, it’s no surprise that it remains one of the most beloved superhero shows of all time. Fans of the show (and pop art in general) can now relive some of their favourite episodes with Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative, a deluxe new coffee table book featuring dozens of interpretations of the show by artist Justin Erickson, from episode-specific poster art to the covers and record designs for the recent vinyl soundtrack collections. You’ve never seen Batman look so good.

The Dark Crystal Bestiary: The Definitive Guide to the Creatures of Thra – Adam Cesare, Iris Compiet (Insight Editions)
If you’re still trying to process the news that Netflix’s incredible The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance series won’t be returning for a second season, this beautiful new art book focused on all the various creatures of The Dark Crystal universe should be on the top of your book-buying list. Encompassing all beasts great and small from Jim Henson’s 1982 classic film right up to the greatly-expanded world of Thra featured in the Netflix series, the Bestiary features in-depth character backstories provided by author Adam Cesare, along with over 200 striking illustrations by Iris Compiet, who worked under original Dark Crystal designer Brian Froud. This is a great resource to help wrap your head around the Dark Crystal mythos and is sure to make you want to delve deeper into the various Dark Crystal novels and comics that have sprung up in recent years.

Confess – Rob Halford (Hachette)
Judas Priest frontman and heavy metal icon Rob Halford finally delivers his long-awaited autobiography, and it was definitely worth the wait. From the inspiring rise of Judas Priest from their working-class English backgrounds to Halford’s battles with drugs and alcohol and his eventual coming out after decades of keeping his sexuality under wraps, Halford’s story is unlike any other in heavy music. A wry and often self-deprecating narrator, Confess has enough to satiate even the staunchest metal fans while offering up a compelling story about success and self-discovery that should appeal even to those normies who never strapped on a patches-laden jean jacket and rocked out to Screaming for Vengeance.

This Isn’t Happening: Radiohead’s Kid A and The Beginning of the 21st Century – Steven Hyden (Hachette)
Steven Hyden explores Radiohead’s infamous left turn in this eminently readable new book focused on the band’s most controversial album (pre-King of Limbs, that is). Hyden brings up back to the chaotic era leading up to Radiohead’s initially divisive Kid A release in 2000, which featured the band scrapping the sweeping arena rock of the wildly successful OK Computer for the paranoia-infused electronica of Kid A. While Kid A is filled with angst about an uncertain and possibly apocalyptic future, Hyden adds plenty of levity here, from sharing his glowing review of Radiohead’s Pablo Honey written when he was a teenager to contrasting the band’s career trajectory to that of U2, The Rolling Stones, and even Linkin Park (it makes sense in context). This Isn’t Happening is an enthralling look back at the beginning of the millennium when Kid A was birthed, just before Radiohead and the world at large would be forever changed in the coming year. 

The Life & Times of Malcolm McLaren – Paul Gorman (Constable)
The mastermind behind the Sex Pistols and a highly-influential, boundary-pushing, multi-disciplinary artist in his own right, Malcolm McLaren’s legacy has unfortunately rested on his self-made claims of being a “swindler” and a “manipulator” in the early days of the Pistols. Author Paul Gorman aims to reclaim McLaren’s legacy for posterity in this massive new 800-page biography that asserts McLaren’s huge contributions to popular music, fashion, marketing, the visual arts, and youth culture. From the turbulent 70s era of the Pistols, his striking fashion lines with Vivienne Westwood, and his own musical career that incorporated everything from early hip hop to opera, Gorman paints a picture of an artist bursting forth with ideas, who remained exciting and unpredictable until the very end. Read our wide-ranging interview with Gorman about the book here.

Total F*cking Godhead: The Biography of Chris Cornell – Corbin Reiff (Post Hill Press)
It seems ridiculous to claim that Chris Cornell is underrated. As the vocalist for Soundgarden and Audioslave, he sold millions of records around the world and played to huge audiences for decades. Yet despite the ever-growing library of books about the Seattle music scene in the ’90s, there hasn’t been a biography of Cornell until now. Music journalist Corbin Reiff’s Total F*cking Godhead: The Biography of Chris Cornell is a comprehensive look at Cornell’s life and enduring legacy. While Cornell’s former bandmates and family did not participate, Reiff digs deep into primary sources from the era including old zines and interviews to construct a narrative that relies mostly on Cornell’s own words, along with a slew of interviews from his collaborators, friends, and even Artis the Spoonman himself. While much of Cornell’s music was brooding and introspective, Total F*cking Godhead goes beyond the stereotype to reveal a funny and thoughtful person who never lost the desire to experiment and reinvent himself. Following his tragic death in 2017, this loving tribute puts the focus back on Cornell’s music and showcases the breadth of his discography, from the down-tuned heaviness of Soundgarden to his intimate solo career. We spoke with Reiff to discuss putting the book together, his favourite Soundgarden albums, and Cornell’s musical legacy; read the interview here.

Alright, Alright, Alright: The Oral History of Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused – Melissa Maerz (Harper)
Richard Linklater claims that his 1993 cult classic Dazed and Confused was meant to be an anti-nostalgia film, which only goes to show that creators can never really know just how their work is going to resonate with audiences once it’s out of their hands. Now considered an incredibly nostalgic look back at not only the 70s but whichever decade the viewer graduated from high school, Dazed and Confused has become a touchstone coming-of-age film, generally regarded as a classic by fans who come back to it time and time again. Melissa Maerz traces the history of the beloved film in Alright, Alright, Alright, a thorough and incredibly entertaining oral history that follows writer-director Richard Linklater’s production of the film, his often contentious dealings with the studio, the sleepaway camp-like camaraderie of the sprawling young cast (the film would launch the mainstream careers of Matthew McConaughey, Ben Affleck, and Parker Posey), the film’s disastrous initial release, and it’s slow evolution into a cult classic. Crack open a cold PBR, fire up the Foghat, and dig in.

I Am Michael Alago: Breathing Music. Signing Metallica. Beating Death – Michael Alago and Laura Davis-Chanin (Backbeat)
Perhaps best known for singing Metallica to Elektra Records in the 80s and helping propel them into becoming the biggest metal band of all-time, Michael Alago’s story as a highly-influential A&R man, a respected photographer, and an out gay man in the 80s metal and punk scene is a wildly entertaining tale of a kid with an overabundance of chutzpah who channeled his passions into a remarkable career. Alago’s autobiography takes readers through his early dealings with Metallica, his long working relationship with the incomparable Nina Simone, his time in the burgeoning New York punk and metal worlds, his years of drug and alcohol abuse, and his frightening AIDS diagnosis in the 80s when that was still considered a death sentence. Read more about Alago’s wild times and career in our in-depth interview.

Do What You Want: The Story of Bad Religion – Bad Religion and Jim Rutland (Hachette)
L.A. punks Bad Religion celebrated their 40th-anniversary (!) with Do What You Want, a “group autobiography” written with author Jim Ruland. Tracing their origins from a scrappy underground punk band in the San Fernando Valley to one of the most successful and respected punk groups in the world, Do What You Want is a must-read for fans of the band, offering up a deep dive into every album and showcasing how the band’s blistering musical ability and pointed political and sociological lyrics have evolved over the decades. Rutland and the band do a good job of balancing insight into the band’s creative process and life on the road with just enough behind-the-scenes drama to keep things moving along. Fans will eat up the lesser-known tidbits (like Brett Gurewitz writing 1994’s “Infected” to appeal to the grunge crowd), while newcomers will get a thorough look at one of the most consistent and thought-provoking punk bands of all time.

Sing Backwards and Weep: A Memoir – Mark Lanegan
Mark Lanegan’s long-awaited autobiography opens with a nail-biting botched drug transaction, and never lets up from there. As the frontman for 90s Seattle greats Screaming Trees, and with a long career as an intense boundary-pushing singer-songwriter that makes Nick Cave look downright cheerful, Lanegan has lived an incredibly rough life and somehow made it through to the other side (though he clearly still has his demons). Written in a no-nonsense style of prose that reads like diary entries, Lanegan takes us through his years as a desperate junkie on the streets of Seattle, his brush with fame with Screaming Trees, his friendship with Kurt Cobain, countless brawls and overdoses, and much more. It’s a thrilling and often difficult read that feels like a Scorsese film filled with a 90s grunge soundtrack. It’s a shame the book barely touches on Lanegan’s incredible solo work, but hopefully, that’s what the next book is for.