During a long career as a music writer,
studio gopher and musician, Josh Alan Friedman came to know some prominent
singers, songwriters and musicians. Their colorful recollections and insights
are collected in Tell theTruth Until They Bleed. Especially
interesting are the stories told by Dr. John, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller,
Doc Pomus and Mose Allison, musician-songwriters born to a generation when
soulfulness was more common than nowadays and the music business was often a
money-laundering front for the mob. Funny, the criminals back then had more
respect for music than the pipsqueaks who have run the business into the ground
since the ’80s.