Career Denise Sullivan

1 career

1.1 music journalist
1.2 author
1.3 other writing

career
music journalist

sullivan wrote “the show goes on” live-music column contra costa times 1992 2006. during time writing music articles san francisco chronicle, sf weekly, sf bay guardian, express, bam , raygun, among others. writer rolling stone’s online site, popular 90s rock webzine addicted noise.

in 2007, sullivan began “the origin of song” column crawdaddy! online, contributed reviews, profiles , interviews classic rock , soul musicians. profiled rock icons in “what makes legend” feature , focused on punk , new wave in “class of ’77 series.” sullivan’s interview subjects during crawdaddy! tenure included bettye lavette, yoko ono, van dyke parks, richie havens, janis ian, buffy sainte-marie, , solomon burke. post-crawdaddy! has freelanced music magazines paste , blurt, activism website, stir action.

sullivan has contributed several music-reference books including music guide rock, rough guide country music, mojo collection, , girl’s guide taking on world.

author

sullivan has written music biographies on white stripes (the white stripes: sweethearts of blues) , r.e.m. (r.e.m. – talk passion). collection of work, rip up! rock’n’roll rulebreakers, features interviews array of iconoclasts in rock world, including wanda jackson, kinks, camper van beethoven, , late ike turner.

sullivan’s 2011 book, keep on pushing: black power music blues hip hop, covers history of african american music , significance in civil rights movement. history , analysis of roots, blues, jazz, disco, punk , hip-hop, book focuses on popular music force social transformation. through oral history , historical research, keep on pushing guide music gave rise black power movement, further linked gay rights , feminism. book features profile of folk musician , activist, len chandler, 1 of few interviews singer-songwriter appear in print.

stephen shames documentary photography in 2006 book, black panthers, initial inspiration keep on pushing. being self-confessed “record geek,” sullivan found book’s storyline in american music, noting, in quote attributed odetta, “you can either lie down , die, or insist on own individual life. people made songs ones insisted upon life , living…”. sullivan defines music in keep on pushing history, “…and when talking american music change, tied directly african american struggle freedom , equality.” clarifies book is, “…an alternative usual history, people’s history, emphasis on musicians , songs.”

the book has received favorable reviews. david ensminger, of popmatters, praises sullivan’s focus on women musicians linked civil rights movement, noting “…odetta , nina simone, hold sway , never surrender; billie holiday, associated bygone generation, provides strange fruit kind of template, way ignore simple plaintive sentiment , jazz-spiel in favor of concerns justice , probe of history, pain intact.” ensminger points out book not “…an all-inclusive, push-button reference,” serves “to examine oft-overlooked underdogs work powerful , challenging.”

more reviews:

a pleasing survey of soul music, lead belly johnny otis michael franti louis farrakhan...sullivan offers welcome exploration of how african-american popular music became america’s vernacular. — kirkus reviews

sullivan...combines impressive research , wide-ranging interviews in multilayered narrative power of music within black liberation, civil rights, antiwar, , gender-related movements...this interested in thorough analysis of music commanding force in change continually evolving artistic presence. — library journal

great book...go it. — chuck d, public enemy

other writing

sullivan has contributed virgin guide san francisco (virgin publishing, 2000) , underground san francisco (manic d press, 1995).