SEBASTIAN BACH's '18 And Life On Skid Row' Memoir Due In January

May 26, 2015

Dey Street Books (formerly It Books),an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, has set a January 19, 2016 release date for "18 And Life On Skid Row", the much-anticipated autobiography from former SKID ROW singer Sebastian Bach.

Official book description: "In this uncensored, unfiltered memoir, the musician and former front man for SKID ROW tells the story of how a choir boy became a mega-successful hair metal god, rode the wave of fame in heavy metal's heyday, and came out alive on the other side when glam rock went the way of the cassette tape and the Walkman.

"Sebastian Bach is an iconic rock vocalist who has sold in excess of twenty million records worldwide. Best known for his powerful high vocal range and his flowing blonde locks, he's been a stand out member of the metal music scene since he was fourteen. From first joining KID WIKKID, Bach has rocked out with SKID ROW, MADAM X, THE LAST HARD MEN, THE FROGS, and FRAMESHIFT, and with famous friends such as AEROSMITH, BON JOVI, SOUNDGARDEN, PANTERA and GUNS N' ROSES.

"But eventually the party bus stopped and the rock star grew up. Yet the fun didn't end. Bach established a successful solo career as an actor, musician, and singer, appearing on numerous television shows and on Broadway.

"In this no-holds-barred memoir — raw, powerful, wild, funny, and reflective — he charts his unconventional childhood, first in the Bahamas and then in his rise from small-town Canada to the world's greatest concert stages to the Great White Way and beyond. There's the usual sex, drugs, parties, women, hair products, and headbanging rock ‘n' roll, but there is also a lot more. Here is a rock star who can write, tell a great story, and has kept his career moving forward despite the changing musical landscape. Through it all, this talented artist remained devoted to his craft, and to having a damn good time."

In an October 2014 interview with Psycho Babble TV, Bach stated about his upcoming autobiography: "My first impulse was not to have a typical book of, like, starting at your childhood, going through, and then you rise and then you fall and then you come back… that whole typical storyline. When I read Neil Young's book, 'Waging Heavy Peace', I'm a big Neil Young fan, and his book's not linear, it's not, like, 'Here's me as a kid, here's…' I just found it interesting. I like to be surprised. I don't like to be bored. Being bored is boring. But, having said that, when I read Paul Stanley's book, the story of how he was not famous, or KISS was not famous, and then they became KISS, and what that is like, to go from being a normal person and then being a rock star, that is fascinating to read by anybody, and I have that story. So, even thought I might not personally find that totally interesting to me, to the reader, to read about, okay, I was, like, a teenager and then a millionaire on television and touring the world, that's a fascinating story. So I wanna tell those details."

Bach talked in more detail about the writing process for his autobiography in a 2013 interview with Metalshrine. He said: "When I first got the [book] deal [with HarperCollins], they wanted me to use a co-writer and I thought that was bullshit, but at the same time, I had proved to them that I was capable of writing a book, so they said, 'OK, we'll give you a chance.' I wrote, like, 25 pages and they loved it. They loved my writing and they said, 'Yeah, Sebastian, you can write it all on your own!' That was extremely important to me and like a milestone. I said, 'I can? Wow!' It meant a lot to me, so I'm taking it very seriously and I don't plan on writing just one book over the course of my life. I'd like to write more than one. I love Henry Rollins' books! His books are amazing, like 'Black Coffee Blues' and 'Get In The Van'. He's just a great writer and I love the way he writes. I used to write on my web site all the time and now I'm just kinda taking it off the Internet and putting it into the pages of the book. That's what I'm trying to do."

Speaking to Billboard.com in 2012, Bach admitted that writing his autobiography seemed "like such an overwhelming project," but expressed confidence that he had the goods to make the project work.

"Oh, my story is insanely insane," he said. "I think I could do a hell of a book. I could make the dirt look clean if I wanted to. Or it could also be a photo book of all the early SKID ROW pictures that chicks from the Internet cannot get enough of, the pinups and stuff. Every time I put one of those on my web site, the Internet shuts down. I'd want to write it by myself; I look at Duff McKagan's book, Dee Snider's — they wrote those by themselves and they're amazing book. The main thing is it has to blow me away before I release it. It has to give me goose bumps or I won't put it out."

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