Product Description

A witty and self-deprecating memoir about headbanging your way through growing up. Seb Hunter was a Heavy Metal fan and he's not proud. This is the story of his misguided 15-year Heavy Metal mission: from the first guitar (his dad's), to the first gig (conquering Winchester with his riffs), on through groupies and girlfriends and too many drugs to a faltering career in London, where outrageous egos, artistic differences and the dreaded arrival of Grunge (and a much needed haircut) kill the Heavy Metal dream. Along the way Seb imparts the important distinctions between Thrash Metal and Glam and casts his connoisseur's eye over the Metal guitar. You'll learn when to play a drum solo, the correct way to wear Spandex and exactly what to do when you're in the middle of a field at the Donington Festival and you desperately need a piss. Affectionate, irreverent, and very funny, Hell Bent For Leather is a moving story about growing up, of playing air guitar in your bedroom, of living with parental disapproval and of struggling with the laughter of your friends. It is a memoir about the glorious adolescent obsessions everybody has but no-one will admit to. Featuring music from: AC/DC, Iron Maiden, Led Zeppelin, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Slayer, Kiss, W.A.S.P., Aerosmith The Scorpians and Guns 'n' Roses.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #47530 in Books
• Published on: 2005-03-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
What springs to mind when you contemplate the title of Seb Hunter's Hell Bent for Leather: Confessions of a Heavy Metal Addict? Sex, drugs, Spandex trousers; big hair and studded leather mitts? And groups with a devil-may-care approach to spelling when it comes to names and song titles, a preponderance of the letter Z, for instance? Interminable guitar solos. Drum solos. Yep, all feature here. Lyrics about squeezing lemons and taking elevators; double albums about kings and their rings sung by mutant dwarves who appeared to have severed their middle fingers in gardening accidents.

Now, let's add Winchester into the mix. No, really. Not familiar Brit metal metropolises Birmingham (Black Sabbath), Sheffield (Def Leppard), Newcastle (Venom) or, at push, Barnsley (Saxon), but Winchester in Hampshire. Winchester provides much of the backdrop to this coming-of-age cum hard-rock odyssey--a Lost in Music for metallers, ex-metallers and a primer for the Darkness fans and anyone perplexed by the whole metal phenomena. (For neophytes, subsections on the wilder tendrils of this musical genre are included.)

Exposed to the delicate, lyrical nuances of AC/DC's "Let's Get it Up at 10", Hunter sold his soul to the fret-tapping end of rock&roll until his early 20s when sanity and Grunge prevailed ("Kurt Cobain Kills Us" is one subheading). It is, therefore, an "I can laugh about it now" account of a youth spent worshipping, and then emulating, rock gods. Hunter's first metal group achieved the not inconsiderably feat of being bootlegged in the Winchester area, but little else. Decamping to squatney London to hit the big time (or, this being the Glam metal heyday, camping it up in squatney London), Hunter joined a series of combos who remained stubbornly unknown to all but a few hardened, if poodle-haired, drinkers in The Intrepid Fox. Underpinned by a poignant examination of his relationship with his late father, Hunter's memoir, much like the film Spinal Tap, is destined to induce rictus grins among the metal faithful but it reminds us of the ludicrous power of cheap music, and, importantly, shows that the love of a good woman can satiate any would-be rock star's appetite for destruction. --Travis Elborough

Review
'It's simple to milk laughs from metal, but surely much harder to use the genre to write a book that's simultaneously hilarious, strangely moving and which identifies the very essence of why music is so important to life. So raise a devil's horn salute to Seb Hunter, whose self-depreciating memoir of an adolescence dominated by Kiss and Iron Maiden rivals Giles Smith's Lost In Music as a perceptive and witty study of musical obsession. Anyone who has ever been in a rubbish band will wince with recognition at Hunter's doomed bid to become a rock icon, but metal's loss is writing's gain. Magic.' Q Magazine 'Hunter's memoir manages to be both funny and genuinely touching as he relives the developments that shook the metal world to its stack-heeled foundations.' Guardian

Guardian
'Funny and genuinely touching ... he relives the developments that shook the metal world to its stack-heeled foundations.'

Customer Reviews

If you are a male aged 35 or over, this will be the best book you'll read this year
What do these phrases mean to you? We all came out to Montreux on the Lake Geneva Shoreline. Finished with my woman cause she couldn't help me with my mind. If the answer is nothing- move along, there's nothing to see here.
If,on the other hand, your head is moving up and down, and your hands are waving in the air, twisting and bending invisible guitar strings, then this is the book for you!!!
Quite simply, this is 'Fever Pitch' rewritten by Ozzy Osbourne. It's funny, charming, touching- and an encyclopaedic guide to that most maligned of musical genres Heavy Metal. Or Metal. Or death Metal. Or Thrash Metal. And if you don't know the difference between the genres, read this book. It explains them clearly and with humour.
This may not be the best book I've read this year, but it is far and away the most enjoyable.
If you've ever played in a hopeless band with people who hate each other. If you've ever worshipped a rock group far beyong their musical merits.
If you've ever posed in front of a mirror and wished your hair was just that little bit longer...
This is the book for you!
Recommended unreservedly. It's that rare beast: an autobiographical tome which sparks that glimmer of recognition in all men of a certain age.
It makes you feel 14 again, and ready to rock.

The best biography you'll read about Heavy Metal
I have just finished reading this book. Probably the most embarrassing thing I have read in ages, I just couldn't put it down! At every digression Seb makes, my memories came flooding back. Memories of my own misspent youth, time abused with my spotty mates trying to decipher the hidden meaning to our favourite Judas Priest tracks! It seems at times to be almost spoof like, perhaps as a consequence of extremely honest and upfront writing style.

Seb leads us from his sheltered upbringing to the London stage, the world famous Marquee club. The "swine and swill" he occasionally mixed with, on his way to filling that musical void he felt inside. He mentions places in London I remember so well from my own youth, the sacred shrine that was Shades record store and the Borderline club. He mentions bands, both good and bad, that sadly I must admit to still having in my, now carefully boxed, vinyl collection. The low points of his drug habits and the need to conform, in what is often seen as the most non-conformist genre in music, really hit home. I suppose the most important thing to walk away from the book with is the need to stand back once in a while, seriously try to look at yourself and laugh at how ridiculous we really are when were young.

As it says, this book will work for anyone, metal fan or not. If you really enjoyed that late 80-95 period, spent with our favourite heroes, then buy this book now. I promise you will be laughing out loud and confusing non-metallers, when you try to explain why you couldn't like Winger over WASP and importance of why you had to choose sides in the Van Halen Roth/Hagar spat!

Now a sad 32 year old metal fan, but with wife, kids, mortgage and short hair, I want give thanks to Seb to letting me see what I missed out on, by just not making the serious effort with the bands I failed in!

Cheers Seb!

Sarcasm doesn't suit you
I really enjoyed the book in the beginning, thinking that Hunter was a real metal fan just writing to share his story but as the book wore on I could feel my empathy towards him slipping - this guy is not a true fan, as it even states on the back - 'Seb Hunter WAS a metal fan, and he's not proud' Not proud? Well don't write about it then!

I could tell that by the end of the book there would be a description of how Hunter left not only playing metal but being associated with it. Yeah, he 'grew up man' and found 'real' music like Primal Scream and Ride, give me a break! The problem seems to be Hunter's favoured form of rock was glam and by the time Nirvana happened, this music was almost totally cleaned out. If Hunter had been a fan of real metal he wouldn't have seen his favourite music go down the pan. Glam disappeared because it was a complete image drenched fashion show to begin with!

He was a typical glam fan, into the music for girls and pretty much to fit in. It was a passing phase, something to look back at with disdain and sarcasm. When he is not being critical or sarcastic about metal the book is rather good, and certainly funny in places but his opinions soon become pointless and the story ludicrously self indulgent, in fact the story part of it would probably have worked better as fiction. He thrusts opinions onto us - 'The Friday Rock Show' was 'shit'. Oh really?! Apparently thrash was crap too but then in his top 5 metal albums he lists 'Reign In Blood' so he's a typical token thrash observer, the type who 'only needs one album from that genre'.

I came away thinking this newly grown up ADULT with a lovely new hair style has only garnered good reviews because he mocks metal for the most part, and mainstream mags love to do that too. He fails to tell us what he's doing now but his music career is no more. It's a shame it ends in such a dull fashion with the author coming across like a pretentious parody of himself but I'm afraid it does.

I'd only recommend the book to non-metal fans as if you're seriously into metal this book will offend you if you have any true sense of your identity. It's not that I don't see the funny side to taking the piss out of metal - cos there is plenty to attack - I just find it offensive when it's done in such a subservient way. There are better books out there, which really focus on the power, and the glory of heavy metal. The title is an insult too!