‘The Uncool: A Memoir,’ Cameron Crowe

Long before Cameron Crowe became synonymous with films like Say Anything, Jerry Maguire, and Almost Famous, he was a fresh-faced, teenaged writer for this magazine. He zeroes in on those formative years in The Uncool, a charming, vulnerable memoir that celebrates both rock & roll and journalism during a time when both, but especially the latter, can feel devalued. To Crowe, they remain lifeblood. He revels in recounting surreal, detail-rich hangs with Led Zeppelin and Lynyrd Skynyrd, along with a wee-hours run-in with Gregg Allman that is downright frightening. It’s that Allman Brothers tale that inspired Almost Famous. “One person that you meet, interviewing them for the magazine introduces you to another person, and that chain-link fence becomes your life and your dream,” Crowe told RS‘s Angie Martoccio this year. “The book is really about that.” —Joseph Hudak