Jeff Apter Writer

Jeff Apter
Jeff Apter is one of Australia's foremost writers of non-fiction. In a career spanning more than 20 years he has written nine commercially and critically well-received biographies, and has contributed to such publications as Rolling Stone (where he spent five years as Music Editor), the Sydney Morning Herald, GQ and The Bulletin. He is a Music Contributor to Australian Vogue.

His books include studies of the bands Silverchair, the Cure and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jeff Buckley, Keith Urban and test cricketer Michael Slater.

Click here for full bio

Click here to hear Jeff interviewed about A Pure Drop.

Hear Jeff interviewed by Merrick & Rosso.

To read a new interview with Jeff, click on the link below:
www.neildaniels.com/Apter.html

Recommended Reading
nashvilles unwritten rules

Latest Project
	Fortunate Son: The Unlikely Rise of Keith Urban My latest release is a biography of country singer, Nashville superstar and tabloid favourite, Keith Urban, which is now in Australian book stores. It also recently featured on the Angus & Robertson recommended reading list. What follows is the background to both Keith's remarkable rise and my book. More. To order from Australia please click here or here for North America. Fortunate Son will soon be available in US book stores. Read an extract. Read a Q&A on Fortunate Son. Press release These reviews are from www.amazon.com Click here to read a Sydney Morning Herald feature story.
Just Released
	Jeff Buckley A Pure Drop: The Life Of Jeff Buckley, is out now in the UK and Australia and has just been released in North America, featuring a new, Merri Cyr photographed cover (left). The following is the book's introduction, which spells out how it came together and my motivation for writing the book. Introduction I've written books where the subject has been willing to have their life turned inside out, and other books where the subject has been more elusive than Spiderman. There's a vast difference between someone not wanting to speak in their own defence, and someone not being able to do so, as is the case with Jeff Buckley. more Click here to buy book in Australia and here for North America. You can check out some reader's reviews at Barnes & Noble's website. A Pure Drop is currently top of the Musicroom.com.au Top 100 Popular Biography Bestsellers list. Click here for on-line mag Treble's coverage of the book. I was also fortunate enough to write the new foreword for the softcover version of Merri Cyr's excellent A Wished-For Song. "I just finished A Pure Drop. Brilliant. Truly great stuff. You connect deeply with Jeff's extraordinary talents, his deeply conflicted emotional states, his soaring poetic nature, and of course with his love/hate relationship with the music biz. I think you did a bang-up job." Lee Underwood, musician and author of Blue Melody: Tim Buckley Remembered
Book Reviews for A Pure Drop
*A Pure Drop* "This solid biography records in great detail not only the life of Jeff Buckley but also that of his father, Tim Buckley. This a book for anyone who wants to know everything about young Buckley. Apter has done his research." *Bruce Elder Sydney Morning Herald* “Jeff Apter’s lively biography, sympathetic but not hagiographical, makes you feel for those who have to have the struggle with their father in public. As Apter remarks, Buckley paved the way for a whole legion of maudlin boys, from Coldplay to Snow Patrol, who can’t compare with his vitality: Buckley could do the emotional splurge, and how.” *Owen Richardson The Age / A2* "This candid biography shows his many faces: a gifted impressionist, covers enthusiast, prankster and, most comically, an avid dog stalker . . . We get to see Buckley's personality crack as relationships strain due to touring Grace (his drinking put him on 'an emotional asteroid'), although he finds peace again cycling around Memphis shortly before that fateful swim." *Classic Rock 7/10* "In A Pure Drop: The Life of Jeff Buckley, Australian Jeff Apter explores the nooks and crannies of Buckley's short life, from his California childhood through to his fledgling music career in New York and beyond, and includes a chapter, The Wizard of Oz, that draws on accounts of those who were around him in Australia to paint a picture of a multi-layered personality; a fun-loving, mischievous party animal who was also quiet, introverted, secretive and volatile, and a great musician." *Iain Shedden The Australian* "Apter resists mawkishness or sentimentality in this account of Buckley's life and death, to reveal a difficult – if charismatic – man who doesn't quite match the idealised image of the gifted lost boy destroyed by fame and family." Q more reviews...

A Pure Drop
The Life of Jeff Buckley
Hardcover, 256 pages,
Published in UK, Australia and Germany, September 2008; North America March 2009 more

A New Tomorrow -
The Silverchair Story
Paperback, 360 pages,
December 2006 more
Click here to read a Q&A about this book

A Simple Kind Of Life:
Gwen Stefani & No Doubt
Hardcover, 232 pages, July 2007
more

Fornication:
The Red Hot Chilli Peppers Hardcover, 360 pages,
July 2004,
Paperback August 2005
Also published in German, Dutch and Italian more

Never Enough:
The Story Of The Cure
Hardcover, 338 pages, September 2005,
Updated Paperback April 2009
Also published in German, Italian, French, Greek and Polish more

The Dave Grohl Story
Hardcover, 277 pages,
January 2006,
Paperback April 2008
Also published in German
more

Slats: The Michael Slater Story
Published 2005
more

In Harm's Way
Paperback, 288 pages,
September 2008
more