Once A King, Now A Prince:

I cannot tell you everything that belongs in a rock and roll memoir without telling you where I came from, how I grew up, and what led me into the world of music. This page brings those pieces together: the music business years, the life behind the curtain, and the personal road that led me there. For readers looking through the best rock n roll memoirs, firsthand experience is what separates a real insider story from one assembled from research and hindsight. I’ve never claimed to be an author. That’s for others to decide. But I can tell a damn good story… and this is one of them. My name is Ira Blacker, and this is my story inside the rock and roll world. Watch the short video below for a quick look at why Once A King, Now A Prince is not just another rock and roll memoir, but…

Up On The Roof: Where The Music Found Me I started to seriously listen to rock and roll following our family’s move to Glenwood Road in Brooklyn, just down the road from my father’s candy store. I was about 14 and listened every chance I could to WWRL in New York and WNJR in New Jersey, both rhythm and blues stations, with WNJR leaning more toward blues, along with the major New York City stations. Around that time, I also began purchasing records. My earliest recollections include Fats Domino, Shirley and Lee, The Paragons, The Jesters, and Earl Lewis and the Channels. This music, along with much of the doo-wop era, is still what I listen to today, and it became the foundation of my music memoir. One of the chapters in my music memoir is titled “Up On The Roof.” On warm days in New York City, I would…

Thinking back over the years I spent in the music business, there were many strange occasions and weird things happening. In any music business memoir, those are the moments that stay with you. I will add a few here that may provide some laughs, insights, or whatever you take away from this music memoir, which is, in many ways, all about the music business as it really was. HOW TO RUIN A CONCERT: GOOD MATERIAL FOR A MUSIC BUSINESS MEMOIR One of the most awful concert endings took place at C.W. Post College on Long Island, New York. I was able to sign The Doors and had put together their first tour since Jim Morrison died. After he passed in 1971, the remaining members of The Doors were Ray Manzarek (keyboards), Robby Krieger (guitar), and John Densmore (drums), and they remained as a trio with Ray singing lead. They recorded…

If you are looking for the best in music autobiographies with a real backstage pulse, Once A King, Now A Prince was written from inside the machine. I am Ira Blacker, and before the phrase rock and roll history became something people looked back on, I was helping build tours, sign artists, solve problems, and survive the chaos that came with the business. With music autobiographies this one is not written from the audience side of the spotlight. It comes from behind the curtain, where deals were made, tempers flared, egos filled rooms, and one wrong decision could change the course of a career. From Rod Stewart and The Faces to Savoy Brown, The Grease Band, Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Nazareth, Rush, and others, these are stories from a life lived close to the stage, but even closer to the pressure. Once A King, Now A Prince is also more…

Human nature tells us that essentially, we are all the same. That is mostly true as a general rule. But then we have the subclasses within that, and they include people like me, who fall into two basic categories: those seeking celebrity, fame, and fortune, and those who love the music. Those lovers of music mostly cannot play an instrument or sing worth a damn, so rather than stand onstage, they gravitate toward the stage by working inside the music business. Lacking the creative brain to perform, write, or play, many moved into recording, management, agency work, sales, and promotion, except for Barry Richards, who could listen to a record and, better than anyone I ever knew, tell you on the spot whether that record could be a hit. Me, I have a celebrity sister who got all my father’s love and attention, whereas I got a slap in the…

These rock and roll stories come from real experiences inside clubs, agencies, backstage rooms, hotel corridors, and the unpredictable world surrounding the music business during a defining era of rock history. Once A King, Now A Prince brings together the artists, personalities, risks, and personal experiences that shaped both the business and the life happening behind it. Rock And Roll Stories On A DC3 My first ride on an airplane was on a DC3, in the 1950’s, from LaGuardia Airport in Queens, New York, to Boston. I made the trip with my best friend, Steven Duke. We didn’t really see or accomplish much, nor was there anything that warranted writing about in past or future rock and roll stories. We saw the wooden sail ship in the Boston harbor, and we ate at what was purportedly to be the best seafood restaurant on the wharf, having a large bowl each…

Music business stories are rarely as clean as the legends make them sound. Behind the concerts, contracts, tour buses, and backstage passes, there were strange little moments that revealed the business for what it really was: part strategy, part theater, and part human circus. In Once A King, Now A Prince, I tell these music business stories from the inside, not as a fan looking back, but as someone who was there when the room got loud, the deals got delicate, and the personalities became impossible. Some of the best music business stories did not happen under the spotlight at all. They happened in stairwells, dressing rooms, hotel lobbies, restaurants, airports, and backstage corners where people were trying to be seen, trying to matter, or trying to get close to the action. This is where classic rock behind the scenes becomes more than nostalgia. It becomes the truth of how…

The Pain Behind My Memoir About Family I had been aware of this issue for a long time, but what is a long time anyway when you are 83? Let’s just agree on a few decades and leave it at that. Where did they go? Why do I not hear from them? Why do some family members seem to have disappeared as if I had been written out of the script? This memoir about family is not only about who loved me. It is also about who vanished, who stayed silent, and who made me feel, once again, like the kid standing outside the room wondering why no one opened the door. Yes, some are dear to me. They acknowledge my very existence, respond to emails, call me, and are truly integrated into my life and well-being. Those are my second cousins, none of the first, but the second ones….

Let me tell you a story, as it’s what I do at this stage of my life, when I am no longer conquering the music business, but remembering when I did with stories behind the music industry. I’ve never claimed to be an author, but I can tell a damn good story. So, let’s go. Behind The Music Industry And The German Rock Door After the unfortunate loss of Rush due to Ray Daniels’ betrayal, I wanted to reinvent myself. I had always been considered second tier in the English music industry, standing somewhere behind Frank Barcelona, the owner of Premier Talent Agency. That never sat very well with me, especially since my tours were always better and more profitable than his. Savoy Brown, for example, was the first English band to take home a profit on its first American tour. Still, perception can be a stubborn bastard. Frank Barcelona,…

This music industry memoir comes from firsthand experience inside booking agencies, artist management, touring, and the business decisions that shaped careers during a changing era in rock music. Once A King, Now A Prince is not written from the viewpoint of an observer. It comes from someone who worked directly with artists, promoters, venues, and the machinery behind the public image of the music industry. There are phrases that feel less like words and more like a backstage pass, and sex, drugs, and rock and roll is one of them. It still carries the smell of amplifiers warming up, hotel corridors after midnight, dressing rooms with too many people in them, and the heavy thud of a bass line before the first chord has even landed. But in a real music industry memoir, that famous phrase is never the whole story. It became shorthand for a certain kind of rock…

This Is Not Just Another Rock And Roll Book It is a rock and roll memoir, a music industry memoir, and a personal story about what happens behind the curtain when the curtain is on fire. I’ve never claimed to be an author, but I can tell a damn good story. It is with that understanding that I wrote Once A King, Now A Prince, my rock and roll memoir. But it is more than the glitz, fabrication, and standard polish of the usual rock and roll book. It is a book that can smack you right in the face with the truth, the truth you rarely see in rock n roll memoirs. My rock and roll memoir starts at the beginning, as all good books do. I may even have set a world record for the youngest age to start a memoir: 2 years old. It moves through the…

Not Every Backstage Story Becomes A Truthful Book A memoir about music industry life should do more than collect famous names, backstage passes, and stories polished clean enough to look respectable. The real music business was never that neat. It was loud, emotional, ambitious, funny, cruel, and sometimes beautiful in ways that made no sense until years later. That is why a memoir about music industry experience has to come from someone who actually lived inside the storm, not someone standing outside the dressing room trying to imagine the thunder. Once A King, Now A Prince was written from that place. It is not a museum-piece version of rock and roll, and it is not a soft little souvenir from the old days. It is a music memoir about a life shaped by family damage, survival, exile, reinvention, ambition, and the strange salvation that music can offer when nothing else…