'So evocative that it almost vibrates with music from the era' The i


Musician, photographer and storyteller, Chris Stein defined the sound of an era, catapulting the iconic band Blondie to #1 and selling over 20 million copies of Parallel Lines.


In this no-holds-barred autobiography, Stein reveals himself - not in songwriting or photography, which he's previously been known for but in words. From a Brooklyn boyhood, a move to the East Village in the late 1970s allowed Stein to tap into the explosive creativity that defined the era. It was a time when David Bowie and the Ramones were also making music, when Andy Warhol was promoting Jean-Michel Basquiat's work, when cool was defined not by where you came from but by what you could contribute to culture.


UNDER A ROCK is a plunge into that vanished era, and the moments that turned the fresh sound of punk and new wave into an artistic and commercial sensation. Stein takes us there in this revelatory, propulsive, distinctive memoir.