Michel Faber for Listen: on Music, Sounds & Us

'I'm not here to change your mind about Dusty Springfield or Shostakovich or Tupac Shakur or synthpop. I'm here to change your mind about your mind.'

There are countless books on music with much analysis given to musicians, bands, eras and/or genres. But rarely does a book delve into what's going on inside us when we listen.
Now, award-winning author Michel Faber explores two big questions: how we listen to music and why we listen to music.

To answer these he considers biology, age, illness, the notion of 'cool', commerce, the dichotomy between 'good' and 'bad' taste and, through extensive interviews with musicians, unlocks some surprising answers.

Faber is the author of The Crimson Petal and the White and Under the Skin, this curious and celebratory book reflects his lifelong obsession with music of all kinds. Listen will change your relationship with the heard world.