When I Grow Up – Juliana Hatfield

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc, Copyright 2008

This book ranks as one the most enjoyable and honest books that I have read in 2008. Juliana exhibits a clear writing style which reveals her deep love of music as well as her pain, self-doubt and shyness. At the same time she shows the reader a very strong willed young woman determined to make her music and please her fans without any hint of whining about the often crude realities of playing to her fans in small rock club venues.

This is a must read for all Juliana Hatfield fans and any beginning musician starting their musical career.

As an editor, hundreds of books come across my desk each month and I assign most of them to writers. My position makes me a random reader since I select a variety of books for my own enjoyment. For instance in the last three weeks I have read Day in the Life of Ivan Denovich by Alexander Solshenitzin, Heaven and Hell by Don Felder and Wendy Holden and this book by Juliana Hatfield and in the above order. I found all three books to be enjoyable and informative.

Heaven and Hell gives one an insider’s viewpoint at life with the Eagles rock group from the lead guitarist’s view point. The careers of Felder and Hatfield are a study of contrasts. The Eagles play to tens of thousands of fans at each stop on the tour and Juliana plays to the smaller rock clubs.

The Eagles are provided luxury hotels, limos and exotic list of foods in their dressing rooms. Juliana and her band of two other musicians, a sound person and merchandise person are staying in cheap concrete box inns, playing clubs with closets or storage rooms for dressing rooms and their rider may be bottle water, sandwiches and chips or no rider at all.

This is a memoir of her musical life up to the present written by Juliana without the need of a ghostwriter. Like her songs, her memoir is painfully honest and clearly written. You do have to read it carefully because she is precise with her words and does not dumb down her writing.

This book is essential for any musician who is starting a career. I would guess that 95% of all new musicians will dream of being in a band like the Eagles, but in reality go down the Juliana Hatfield road, rather than the Don Felder road in their career.

Even more so today when the1996 Communications act destroyed am/fm radio and turned it into one national play list that few new musicians can break into, and without that type of break they will never escape the small rock club venues. Juliana makes it clear that this was a huge factor in stalling her career. She does not whine about this factor or the many unpleasant elements of her musical career. In spite of these she retains to this day her absolute love of her music and her fans and her ability to make good music.