Jim Walsh

At the dawn of "Morning in America"--a period that would nurse the rise of suit-and-tie culture--there emerged a national network of anti-corporate record shops, college radio stations, fanzines, nightclubs, and entrepreneurial record labels. In the watershed year 1981, this "indie" scene fostered several seminal releases. Among recordings by bands such as Sonic Youth, Black Flag, Husker Du, The Minutemen, and R.E.M. was an album called "Sorry Ma . . . Forgot to Take Out the Trash", recorded by a scruffy, flannel-clad quartet from Minneapolis called The Replacements. Now, for the first time, all of the hearsay, half-truths, legends, and allegations associated with this maelstrom of a rock & roll band are unraveled in this oral history by longtime Twin Cities music journalist Jim Walsh. Through interviews with family, friends, and fans; former manager Peter Jesperson; Twin/Tone record label cofounder Paul Stark; and musicians around the nation influenced by the band, Walsh lays bare with painful clarity a tale that unfolds like a tragic comedy in three perfect acts. Celebrated by national publications, "the Mats" often seemed more hell-bent on sabotaging their status as critical darlings than parlaying it. With their markedly apolitical stance amid their decidedly political peers, their uncool embrace of "classic rock" influences like KISS and The Faces, and their Dionysian appetites (and the resulting tendency to literally fall on their own faces), The Replacements lasted 12 years despite themselves. From the bands founding to their rise through the local and national club circuits, their major label deal in 1985, and the slow and painful implosion that followed, The Replacements: All Over But the Shouting lays down the gripping oral history behind the little band that could--but didn't.

All Over But the Shouting: An Oral History

The Replacements

A veteran Twin Cities journalist and raconteur summons the life of the city after reporting and recording its stories for more than thirty years Two or three times a week, as a columnist, hustling freelance writer, and genuinely curious reporter, Jim Walsh would hang out in a coffee shop or a bar, or wander in a club or on a side street, and invariably a story would unfold--one more chapter in the story of Minneapolis, the city that was his home and his beat for more than thirty years. Fear and Loving in South Minneapolis tells that story, collecting the encounters and adventures and lives that make a city hum--and make South Minneapolis what it is. Here is a man who drives around Minneapolis in a van that sports a neon sign and keeps a running tally of the soldiers killed in Iraq. Here is another, haunted by the woman he fell in love with, and lost, many years ago at the Minnesota Music Café on St. Paul's East Side. Here are strangers on a cold night on the corner of Forty-sixth and Nicollet, finding comfort in each other's company in the wake of the shootings in Paris. And here are Walsh's own memories catching up with him: the woman who joined him in representing "junior royalty" for the Minneapolis Aquatennial when they were both seven years old; the lost friend, Soul Asylum's Karl Mueller, recalled while sitting on his memorial bench at Walsh's go-to refuge, the Rose Gardens near Lake Harriet. These everyday interactions, ordinary people, and quiet moments in Jim Walsh's writing create an extraordinary picture of a city's life. James Joyce famously bragged that if Dublin were ever destroyed, it could be rebuilt in its entirety from his written works. The Minneapolis that Jim Walsh maps is more a matter of heart, of urban life built on human connections, than of streets intersecting and literal landmarks: it is that lived city, documented in measures large and small, that his book brings so vividly to mind, drafting a blueprint of a community's soul and inviting a reader into the boundless, enduring experience of Fear and Loving in South Minneapolis.

Fear and Loving in South Minneapolis

Throughout the 1990s, Prince feuded with his record label, Warner Bros., over his rights as an independent recording artist--and made some of the most brilliant music of his career. During that time, Jim Walsh covered Prince for the St. Paul Pioneer Press and wrote about him passionately, thoughtfully, exhaustively. Here, in real time, is that coverage: a clip-by-clip look back at Prince in the '90s. Walsh's newly unearthed interviews, essays, columns, and reviews make Gold Experience an essential slice of history for fans, scholars, and latecomers to the Minneapolis-born musical genius Prince Rogers Nelson (June 7, 1958-April 21, 2016). Join Walsh at the 1994 NBA All-Star game after party and release bash for the single "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World." Accompany him to the after-hours clubs Erotic City, Glam Slam, and, of course, Paisley Park. Meet Prince's wife and bandmate Mayte (and while you're at it, take in the wedding and reception). Enjoy a two-hour sit-down interview with Prince. Explore Prince's veganism, talk to fans in line for a Target Center show, preview the "Jam of the Year" concert and check in at the after party. The passions and influences, from Mozart to funk godfather Larry Graham; the gigs and the Paisley Park garage sa≤ Walsh's open letter to the artist and his reflections on religion and spirituality. This is Prince as few have seen him, reported as only Jim Walsh can: a portrait of the artist from a dizzying array of angles, captured in living color for all time.

Following Prince in The '90s

Gold Experience

John Walsh

Irish mythology gets a modern interpretation. Long ago, a war raged to extinguish all magic from this world and magic has not been felt since. But when Aisling, an angry Irish orphan, runs away from foster care, she's going to discover that the war isn't over. And with the help of an ancient Celtic warrior, a rogue priest, and a dark fairy, she will find herself on the run from the darkest creatures of the ages. Her only hope - find out where the magic went and how to bring it back! Action Lab presents the first volume of a new series that connects readers to the search for belonging, redemption, and the magic inside us. Collects The Ballad of Ronan Issues 1-3.

The Ballad of Ronan: Part One

Sarah Craig

Des McCafferty

This Combat Poverty research study examines the role of local partnerships in promoting social inclusion in Ireland. Ireland is among the EU countries who have a strong model of local partnership. The book assesses the application of the partnership model in tackling social exclusion, canvasses the views of various stakeholders as to its policy impact, and makes recommendations for the continued operation of local partnerships as an instrument of social inclusion.

Local Partnerships for Social Inclusion?

Bar Yarns and Manic Depressive Mix Tapes distills thirty delirious, jam-packed years of some of the best music writing ever to come out of the Twin Cities. As a writer and musician, the ever-curious Jim Walsh has lived a life immersed in music, and it all makes its way into his columns and feature articles, interviews and reviews, including personal essays on life, love, music, family, death, and, yes, the manic-depressive highs and lows that come with being an obsessive music lover and listener. From Minneapolis’s own Prince to such far-flung acts as David Bowie, the Waterboys, Lucinda Williams, Parliament-Funkadelic, L7, the Rolling Stones, the Ramones, U2, Hank Williams, Britney Spears, Elvis Presley and Nirvana, Walsh’s work treats us to a chorus of the voices and sounds that have made the music scene over the past three decades. The big names are here, from Rosanne Cash to Bruce Springsteen to Bob Marley and Jackson Browne, but so are those a little shy of superstardom, like the Tin Star Sisters and Uncle Tupelo, Son Volt, the Gear Daddies, Semisonic, and The Belfast Cowboys. The book is also a tour (de force) of the Twin Cities' most celebrated music venues past and present, from the Prom Ballroom to Paisley Park to Duffy's. When Walsh isn't celebrating the sheer magic of live music or dreaming to tunes blasting from the car console, he might be surveying the scene with the Hamm's Bear at Grumpy's or the Double Deuce or singing the last night at the Uptown Bar blues. Whether he's dishing dirt with Yoko Ono or digging the Replacements' roots, giving an old rocker a spin or offering a mic to the latest upstart, Jim Walsh reminds us that in the land of a thousand lakes there are a thousand dances, and the music never dies. Capturing the pure notes and character of the sound of the Twin Cities and beyond, with a keen eye for trends and the telling detail, his book truly is a mix tape of thirty years of unforgettable music.

Jim Walsh on Music from Minneapolis to the Outer Limits

Bar Yarns and Manic-Depressive Mixtapes

Dennis Pernu

Chronicles the glory years of the band, considered to be one of the best of the 1980s, through rare and candid photographs taken during their tours across America from 1979 to 1991.

Jim Walsh

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