Tony Bacon, London Live: From the Yardbirds to Pink Floyd to the Sex Pistols: the Inside Story of Live Bands in the Capital's Trail-blazing Music Clubs - Fast paced, densely packed, and stuffed to the gills with amazing detail. London Live sets the scene, tracing the vibe and trends in gigging London from 1950's skiffle, through Rock'n'Roll, R&B, Psychedelia and ends in the late 1970's with Rock and Punk.

London Live paints that scene for you with a well-researched, heavily entwined narrative that makes you realise the high levels of musical activity and dense band bookings in operation in most popular venues. Street maps pick out those venues while ticket stubs, newspaper ads, posters and a liberal smattering of photographs really bring the past back to the present. An excellent touch is the inclusion of gig reviews as they appeared in magazines like 'Melody Maker' and 'Jazz Journal'. It's a bit like an annotated 'Time Out'!

The sheer amount of work bands like Georgie Fame And The Blue Flames took on is impressive; "During just one month in the 1963 the band played 43 bookings, including 13 at the Flamingo, eight at the All-Nighter, four at the Roaring 20's, three at The Scene, two at Klook's Kleek and one at Eel Pie Island. 'The busiest band in town bar none', ...". For the 60's enthusiast, the pi ce de r sistance is an appendix of venues that also lists every gig at the Marquee from 1962 to 1979. It's amazing to see the day-by-day list of headlining acts that were on offer to the hip and swinging clubbers.

There possibly could have been merit in providing more extensive first-hand accounts from club-goers of the time, which would have helped describe the vibe, plus there are some surprising omissions, like Duffy Power isn't mentioned. But as it is, and for a slenderish tome, London Live does an excellent job at capturing and evoking a tangible sense of the past. So come on pop-pickers, get on down and lets groove out to those poptastic sounds of London Live!