Q+A: Mark Swartz on Biggie + Yoko Ono as a Crime-Fighting Duo and Other Fictional Ideas
Read the latest in our interview series!
Today, we welcome Mark Swartz, author of The Music Never Died: Tales from the Flipside. Swartz’s fictional book imagines what might have happened if some of our legendary late musicians hadn’t passed at a young age.
Tamara Palmer/Music Book Club: What inspired your book idea?
Mark Swartz: The story from the collection that came first is about Biggie and Yoko Ono, teaming up as a crime-fighting duo. The original inspiration was Andrew Shafffer's lighthearted Hope Never Dies: An Obama Biden Mystery. Then I rewatched Amadeus, and it got darker as I imagined Biggie's assassin as a mediocre rapper driven mad by jealousy. Stik Figa (an underappreciated rap talent) read the story and helped me enter this world.
If you could save just one late artist from their young demise, who would it be?
It's a tie between Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain. Both had so much room to grow and change. Even another five years of life would have given the world so much more trailblazing music.
How has the reception been?
I'm hoping music lovers are still discovering this book as more fans stumble across it and try to make sense of the surprising ways the premise unspools. I was really pleased — and relieved — when Gary Lucas said nice things about the story involving his friend and collaborator Jeff Buckley. Speaking of collaboration, the illustrator, Jeb Loy Nichols, helped me come up with the concept that each story is a pairing, a dialogue between two artists. Jeb is also a talented writer and an amazing musician.
Have you noticed a current wave of music-centric fiction?
Fleetwood Mac seems to be having a literary renaissance, with Daisy Jones & the Six (the novel and movie) and Stereophonic on Broadway.
What are a few of your favorite music books?
Greil Marcus, Greg Tate and Hanif Abdurraqib all regularly break the rules of music criticism, to the point where it becomes something much more meaningful. Jeff Tweedy and Liz Phair wrote brilliant memoirs. Don Delillo's Great Jones Street (1973) is a favorite, but for sheer audacity, nothing tops Mark Shipper's Paperback Writer: The Life and Times of the Beatles; The Spurious Chronicle of Their Rise to Stardom, Their Triumphs & Disasters, Plus the Amazing Story of Their Ultimate Reunion (1977).
Previously in our Q+A series:
