Colin Larkin (writer) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Colin Larkin was the editor

Editor in chief

An editor-in-chief is a publication's primary editor, having final responsibility for the operations and policies. Additionally, the editor-in-chief is held accountable for delegating tasks to staff members as well as keeping up with the time it takes them to complete their task...

and founder

Entrepreneur

An entrepreneur is an owner or manager of a business enterprise who makes money through risk and initiative.The term was originally a loanword from French and was first defined by the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon. Entrepreneur in English is a term applied to a person who is willing to...

of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music was created in 1989 by Colin Larkin. It is the 'modern man's' equivalent of the Grove Dictionary of Music which Larkin describes in less than flattering terms.-History of the encyclopedia:...

, described by Jools Holland

Jools Holland

Julian Miles "Jools" Holland OBE, DL is an English pianist, bandleader, singer, composer, and television presenter. He was a founder of the band Squeeze and his work has involved him with many artists including Sting, Eric Clapton, George Harrison, The Who, David Gilmour and Bono.Holland is a...

as 'without question the most useful reference work on popular music' and by The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

as 'the standard against which all others must be judged’.

Along with the ten-volume Encyclopedia

Encyclopedia

An encyclopedia is a type of reference work, a compendium holding a summary of information from either all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge....

, Larkin also created and wrote the All Time Top 1000 Albums

All Time Top 1000 Albums

All Time Top 1000 Albums is a book by Colin Larkin, creator and editor of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music. The book was originally published by Guinness Publishing in 1994 and is in its 4th Revised Edition....

, and edited the Guinness Who’s Who Of Jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

, the Guinness Who’s Who Of Blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

, and the Virgin Encyclopaedia Of Heavy Rock
Hard rock
Hard rock is a loosely defined genre of rock music which has its earliest roots in mid-1960s garage rock, blues rock and psychedelic rock...

The compiler of the most extensive database of popular music in Europe and the US, a writer and book designer by trade, Larkin has over 650,000 copies in print to date. As an expert in the field of popular music, Larkin has made many appearances on live radio to discuss various artists and bands (see for example his interview on Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson

Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...

's legacy for BBC Essex) and also had a regular slot on BBC GLR for two years.

Background and education

Colin Larkin was born in Dagenham

Dagenham

Dagenham is a large suburb in East London, forming the eastern part of the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham and located east of Charing Cross. It was historically an agrarian village in the county of Essex and remained mostly undeveloped until 1921 when the London County Council began...

in 1949 in an area of Essex

Essex

Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...

that was largely populated by workers in the car industry. The post-war years proved lucrative for the Ford motor company but Larkin was raised in relative poverty, in the largest area of council housing in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

; in the suburban, industrial

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

wasteland that surrounded the Ford plant. The Becontree

Becontree

Becontree is a place in the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, east north-east of Charing Cross.-Becontree estate:The area was developed between 1921 and 1932 by the London County Council as a large council estate of 27,000 homes, intended as "homes for heroes" after World War I. With a...

estate in Dagenham began as a conglomeration of 27,000 "homes for heroes", and had no recognisable town centre

Town centre

The town centre is the term used to refer to the commercial or geographical centre or core area of a town.Town centres are traditionally associated with shopping or retail. They are also the centre of communications with major public transport hubs such as train or bus stations...

Larkin spent much of his early childhood in the twilight world of the travelling fair

Fair

A fair or fayre is a gathering of people to display or trade produce or other goods, to parade or display animals and often to enjoy associated carnival or funfair entertainment. It is normally of the essence of a fair that it is temporary; some last only an afternoon while others may ten weeks. ...

, where his father, who worked by day as a plumber for the council, moonlighted on the waltzer

Waltzer

A waltzer is a fairground ride that consists of a number of cars which are free to spin individually while rotating around a central point like a carousel. The floor of the ride is not flat and the cars rise and fall gently as the ride spins, the weight of the riders causing each car to rotate...

s to make ends meet. The contrast between daily life in the gas lit

Gas lighting

Gas lighting is production of artificial light from combustion of a gaseous fuel, including hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, or natural gas. Before electricity became sufficiently widespread and economical to allow for general public use, gas was the most...

council houses on the Becontree

Becontree

estate and life amid the electricity

Electricity

Electricity is a general term encompassing a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena, such as lightning, static electricity, and the flow of electrical current in an electrical wire...

guzzling, gaudy extravagance of the fairground, could not have been more marked. It was in the fairground, against a background of Little Richard

Little Richard

Richard Wayne Penniman , known by the stage name Little Richard, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist, and actor, considered key in the transition from rhythm and blues to rock and roll in the 1950s. He was also the first artist to put the funk in the rock and roll beat and...

on the wind-up 78 rpm turntables

Phonograph

The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...

, Larkin acquired his passion for the world of popular music

Popular music

Popular music belongs to any of a number of musical genres "having wide appeal" and is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. It stands in contrast to both art music and traditional music, which are typically disseminated academically or orally to smaller, local...

, and coincidentally, a taste for exotic pattern and vivid colour, which would re-surface in later years in books on Islamic Art

Islamic art

Islamic art encompasses the visual arts produced from the 7th century onwards by people who lived within the territory that was inhabited by or ruled by culturally Islamic populations...

and Architecture

Architecture

Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...

, and Oriental rug

Oriental rug

An authentic oriental rug is a handmade carpet that is either knotted with pile or woven without pile.By definition - Oriental rugs are rugs that come from the orient...

s.

In the 1950s he attended the South East Essex County Technical High School following which, under his own initiative he obtained an apprenticeship

Apprenticeship

Apprenticeship is a system of training a new generation of practitioners of a skill. Apprentices or protégés build their careers from apprenticeships...

as a commercial artist, enabling him to take a sandwich course at the London College of Printing (now the London College of Communication). There he studied typography

Typography

Typography is the art and technique of arranging type in order to make language visible. The arrangement of type involves the selection of typefaces, point size, line length, leading , adjusting the spaces between groups of letters and adjusting the space between pairs of letters...

and book design

Design

Design as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan...

. and was influenced by the typeface

Typeface

In typography, a typeface is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks. Each type is designed and there are thousands of different typefaces in existence, with new ones being developed constantly....

designer

Designer

A designer is a person who designs. More formally, a designer is an agent that "specifies the structural properties of a design object". In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, such as consumer products, processes, laws, games and graphics, is referred to as a...

Eric Gill

Arthur Eric Rowton Gill was a British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement...

, who is associated with the Arts and Crafts movement

Arts and Crafts movement

Arts and Crafts was an international design philosophy that originated in England and flourished between 1860 and 1910 , continuing its influence until the 1930s...

Back To Square One

Larkin began his working life in commercial art

Commercial art

Commercial art is historically a subsector of creative services, referring to art created for commercial purposes, primarily advertising. The term has become increasingly anachronistic in favor of more contemporary terms such as graphic design and advertising art.Commercial art traditionally...

, advertising design groups and for the book publisher Pearson Longmans. In 1967 he began writing for music journals and magazines.

At Longmans he became senior book designer, but he soon wearied of working for the publishing house and by 1976 had co-founded his own book publishing company, Scorpion Publishing.

From the outset Larkin was intent upon reaching areas of the book reading public that other publishers felt it unnecessary or unprofitable to reach. Scorpion Publishing published art books on Oriental carpets and Islamic Art

Islamic art

Islamic art encompasses the visual arts produced from the 7th century onwards by people who lived within the territory that was inhabited by or ruled by culturally Islamic populations...

. They also designed and published John Gorman's trilogy of Labour

Labour Party (UK)

The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...

history, Banner Bright, To Build Jerusalem and Images of Labour.
Notable music titles at this time included Timeless Flight: The Definitive Story of The Byrds and Bob Dylan’s Unreleased Recordings.

In the 1980s the idea of "an encyclopedia of popular music" was beginning to take hold of Larkin, who read music magazines avidly and was acquiring a considerable personal library of singles

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

and Albums. His passion for an encyclopaedia that would do for Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

and the Beatles what the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...

had done for 'supposedly' more worthy subjects, and moreover do it better, finally took over when in 1989 he sold his half of Scorpion Books to fund the project and founded Square One Books.

The Encyclopedia of Popular Music

In 1989 Larkin formed Square One Books to create a multi-volume Encyclopedia of Popular Music

Encyclopedia of Popular Music

The Encyclopedia of Popular Music was created in 1989 by Colin Larkin. It is the 'modern man's' equivalent of the Grove Dictionary of Music which Larkin describes in less than flattering terms.-History of the encyclopedia:...

, and to publish music related books. He published additional music biographies including those on Graham Bond

Graham Bond

Graham John Clifton Bond was an English musician, considered a founding father of the English rhythm and blues boom of the 1960s....

, R.E.M.

R.E.M.

R.E.M. was an American rock band formed in Athens, Georgia, in 1980 by singer Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills and drummer Bill Berry. One of the first popular alternative rock bands, R.E.M. gained early attention due to Buck's ringing, arpeggiated guitar style and Stipe's...

, Eric Clapton

Eric Clapton

Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...

, The Byrds

The Byrds

The Byrds were an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1964. The band underwent multiple line-up changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn remaining the sole consistent member until the group disbanded in 1973...

, Frank Zappa

Frank Zappa

Frank Vincent Zappa was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed...

and a further book on Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

, Oh No, Not Another Bob Dylan Book.

In a pre-internet

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

age, the work required to create an encyclopaedia of popular music was not unlike that required of Dr Johnson's Dictionary
A Dictionary of the English Language
Published on 15 April 1755 and written by Samuel Johnson, A Dictionary of the English Language, sometimes published as Johnson's Dictionary, is among the most influential dictionaries in the history of the English language....

. Aided by a team of contributors, a fast-growing library of music magazines, books and of course the music itself, an eventual 2000 vinyl singles, 3000 vinyl albums, 4000 music biographies and 30,000 CDs, the physical representation of an unrivalled passion for his subject, Larkin began compiling the 'data' that would form the basis of the Encyclopedia.

For the next three years two things were to consume Larkin's life: his young son, who was fighting a long slow battle with leukemia

Leukemia

Leukemia or leukaemia is a type of cancer of the blood or bone marrow characterized by an abnormal increase of immature white blood cells called "blasts". Leukemia is a broad term covering a spectrum of diseases...

; and music, which had become his strongest ally. In 1992 his son died and the first edition of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music was created in 1989 by Colin Larkin. It is the 'modern man's' equivalent of the Grove Dictionary of Music which Larkin describes in less than flattering terms.-History of the encyclopedia:...

went into print. The four volume testament to passion in the face of adversity, that had driven Larkin almost to brink of bankruptcy, was quickly recognised as monumental: Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

described the work as "musical history in the making", in The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

they called it "a work of almost frightening completeness".

Towards the end of 1990 Larkin began to realise that his method of 'data storage' was unwieldy and limiting:

"I started with a primitive database
Database
A database is an organized collection of data for one or more purposes, usually in digital form. The data are typically organized to model relevant aspects of reality , in a way that supports processes requiring this information...

towards the end of January 1990. All data was entered manually, a process not only painful, but also crude. Pretty swiftly I realised that to do other books we needed a way of retrieving text and downloading beautifully. I'm also a typographer and book designer and therefore the look and accuracy of text was my main concern. Initially, we asked an outside consultancy to build something - and for a few hundred quid they created PopBase. Since then we have developed our own software using 4D
4th Dimension (Software)
4th Dimension is a relational database management system and IDE developed by Laurent Ribardière. 4D was created in 1984....

as the main engine database. We've had about 40 upgrades, and are now on version 6.0."

Over 50 separate titles followed the creation of the Encyclopedia's database. and in 1997 Larkin sold Square One Books to Muze Inc.

Muze

Founded in 1991, Muze, Inc. is a business-to-business provider of media information, metadata, and digital preview samples that enable search, discovery, and purchase of digital entertainment content...

(an American data company), in the belief that Muze would be able to realise the potential of the Encyclopaedia on the internet:

"Muze has a massive discography
Discography
Discography is the study and listing of the details concerning sound recordings, often by specified artists or within identified musical genres...

database that's licensed to companies on the internet, and my music encyclopedia goes hand-in-hand with its data. So when you look in Yahoo for a Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...

album it returns both Muze discography data and the Hendrix encyclopedia text."

Larkin became full time editor-in-chief and ran the encyclopedia as a cottage industry.

"There are now fewer than 10 contributors on the team... "People don't believe it's done on such a small scale, but in terms of words we are producing an Agatha Christie novel a month"..."

Phoenix From The Ashes

From September 2008 Larkin ceased all involvement with Muze Inc. or any of its related companies following the closure of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music

Encyclopedia of Popular Music

as a stand alone product and his subsequent redundancy. By this time he was already at work on a new project whose original inspiration had come from the All Time Top 1000 Albums

All Time Top 1000 Albums

, called 1000Greatest.com. This evolved into 'Best Things On Earth'. On the 15th April 2009, it was announced that most of the assets of Muze Inc. were purchased by Macrovision.
According to Larkin's website, following his redundancy and the subsequent selling of Muze's assets, "there are no plans to resurrect the Encyclopedia of Popular Music

Encyclopedia of Popular Music

". Larkin is finalising Btoe otherwise known as Best Things On Earth.

Books

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Jazz, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Sixties Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Indie And New Wave Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Heavy Metal, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia Of Popular Music (1st Edition, 4 Vols), Guinness Publishing 1992.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia Of Popular Music Concise Edition, Guinness Publishing 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Seventies Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Folk Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Soul Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Blues, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Fifties Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Country Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Stage Musicals, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.

Larkin, Colin, All Time Top 1000 Albums, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Rap, Dance & Techno, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Film Musicals & Musical Films, Guinness Publishing 1994

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Reggae, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who Of Jazz (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia Of Popular Music (2nd Edition, 6 Vols), Guinness 1995 (UK),

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Indie And New Wave (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing 1995.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Blues (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who’s Who Of Heavy Metal (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Popular Music, Concise Edition, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Seventies Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Sixties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Eighties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.

Larkin, Colin, (ed) The Virgin Illustrated Encyclopedia Of Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
(also published in the US as The Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock. US 1998)

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Fifties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Indie & New Wave, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of R&B And Soul, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin, The Virgin All-Time Top 1000 Albums (2nd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Country Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Reggae, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Stage & Film Musicals, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Heavy Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Jazz (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin, The Virgin All-Time Top 1000 Albums (Pocket Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Dance Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Stage & Film Musicals, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Popular Music, Concise (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Encyclopedia Of Popular Music (3rd Edition, 8 vols). Macmillan (UK/US) 1999

Larkin, Colin, All-Time Top 1000 Albums (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2000.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Nineties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 2000.

Larkin, Colin, (ed) The Virgin Illustrated Encyclopedia Of Pop & Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 2002,(also published in the US as The Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Pop & Rock (US 2002).

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of 60s Music,(3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of 50s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of 70s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of Popular Music, Concise (4th Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia Of 80s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2003.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), Virgin Encyclopedia Of Jazz (4th Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2004.

Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Encyclopedia Of Popular Music (4th Edition 10 vols) Oxford University Press (UK/US) 2006.

Larkin, Colin (ed.) The Encyclopedia Of Popular Music: Concise 5th Edition, Omnibus Press 2007.

External links

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