Patti Smith Authors New Memoir | M Train
By Andy Kahn Apr 16, 2015 • 1:32 pm PDT
Iconic punk musician, poet and author Patti Smith will release a new memoir, M Train, on October 6. The follow-up to her National Book Award-winning 2010 memoir Just Kids which detailed her relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, further examines the artist’s life through 18 “stations.” One “station” is the now closed Cafe ‘Ino in New York City’s Greenwich Village neighborhood, the location of the book’s cover image and the spot M Train starts.
M Train is currently available for pre-order and contains black-and-white Polaroid pictures shot by Smith among its 208 pages. Publisher Knopf describes the memoir’s contents like this:
M Train is a journey through eighteen “stations.” It begins in the tiny Greenwich Village café where Smith goes every morning for black coffee, ruminates on the world as it is and the world as it was, and writes in her notebook. We then travel, through prose that shifts fluidly between dreams and reality, past and present, across a landscape of creative aspirations and inspirations: from Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul in Mexico, to a meeting of an Arctic explorer’s society in Berlin; from the ramshackle seaside bungalow in New York’s Far Rockaway that Smith buys just before Hurricane Sandy hits, to the graves of Genet, Plath, Rimbaud, and Mishima. Woven throughout are reflections on the writer’s craft and on artistic creation, alongside signature memories including her life in Michigan with her husband, guitarist Fred Sonic Smith, whose untimely death was an irremediable loss. For it is loss, as well as the consolation we might salvage from it, that lies at the heart of this exquisitely told memoir, one augmented by stunning black-and-white Polaroids taken by Smith herself. M Train is a meditation on endings and on beginnings: a poetic tour de force by one of the most brilliant multiplatform artists at work today.
Patti Smith Tour Dates
5/29 -Barcelona @ Primavera Barcelona
5/30 -Barcelona @Primavera Barcelona
6/1 -Dublin @ The Royal Hospital Kilmainham
6/4 -Porto @ NOS Primavera Sound
6/5 -Porto @ NOS Primavera Sound
6/7 -London @ Field Day
6/8 -Manchester @ O2 Apollo
6/9 -Glasgow @ Royal Concert Hall
6/11 -Bergen @ Bergen Festival
6/12 -Oslo @ Norwegian Wood
6/14 -Roma @ Eutropia Festival
6/16 -Catania @ Villa Bellini
6/18 -Firenze @ Teatro Le Mulina
6/19 -Verona @ “Rumors” Le Illazioni della Voce. Teatro Romano
6/20 -Milano @ Villa Arconati
6/22 -Frankfurt @ Alte Oper
6/23 -Köln @ Tanzbrunnen
6/25 -Werchter @ Rock Werchter Festival
6/26 -Beuningen @ Down the Rabbit Hole
7/12 -Lörrach @ Stimmen Festival
7/13 -München @ Tollwood Festival
7/14 -Wien @ Arena Wien Open Air
7/16 -Singen @ Hohentwiel
7/19 -Bern @ Gurtenfestival
7/21 -Karlsruhe @ Tollhaus
7/22 -Winterbach @ Zeltspektakel Winterbach
7/27 -Collegno (TO) @ Parco della Certosa
7/28 -Gardone Riviera (BS) @ Anfiteatro del Vittoriale
8/2 -Ljubljana @ Krizanke
8/4 -Wels @ Alter Schlachtof
8/5 -Prague @ Archa Theatre
8/7 -Luhmühlen @ A Summer’s Tale
8/8 -Dresden @ Junge Garde
8/9 -Katowice @ Off Festival
8/11 -Berlin @ Tempodrom
8/13 -Copenhagen @ Royal Theatre
8/14 -Copenhagen @ Royal Theatre
8/15 -Göteborg @ Way Out West
8/17 -Reykjavík @ Harpa
10/20 -Paris @ Olympia
10/21 -Paris @ Olympia
M Train is currently available for pre-order and contains black-and-white Polaroid pictures shot by Smith among its 208 pages. Publisher Knopf describes the memoir’s contents like this:
M Train is a journey through eighteen “stations.” It begins in the tiny Greenwich Village café where Smith goes every morning for black coffee, ruminates on the world as it is and the world as it was, and writes in her notebook. We then travel, through prose that shifts fluidly between dreams and reality, past and present, across a landscape of creative aspirations and inspirations: from Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul in Mexico, to a meeting of an Arctic explorer’s society in Berlin; from the ramshackle seaside bungalow in New York’s Far Rockaway that Smith buys just before Hurricane Sandy hits, to the graves of Genet, Plath, Rimbaud, and Mishima. Woven throughout are reflections on the writer’s craft and on artistic creation, alongside signature memories including her life in Michigan with her husband, guitarist Fred Sonic Smith, whose untimely death was an irremediable loss. For it is loss, as well as the consolation we might salvage from it, that lies at the heart of this exquisitely told memoir, one augmented by stunning black-and-white Polaroids taken by Smith herself. M Train is a meditation on endings and on beginnings: a poetic tour de force by one of the most brilliant multiplatform artists at work today.
Patti Smith Tour Dates
5/29 -Barcelona @ Primavera Barcelona
5/30 -Barcelona @Primavera Barcelona
6/1 -Dublin @ The Royal Hospital Kilmainham
6/4 -Porto @ NOS Primavera Sound
6/5 -Porto @ NOS Primavera Sound
6/7 -London @ Field Day
6/8 -Manchester @ O2 Apollo
6/9 -Glasgow @ Royal Concert Hall
6/11 -Bergen @ Bergen Festival
6/12 -Oslo @ Norwegian Wood
6/14 -Roma @ Eutropia Festival
6/16 -Catania @ Villa Bellini
6/18 -Firenze @ Teatro Le Mulina
6/19 -Verona @ “Rumors” Le Illazioni della Voce. Teatro Romano
6/20 -Milano @ Villa Arconati
6/22 -Frankfurt @ Alte Oper
6/23 -Köln @ Tanzbrunnen
6/25 -Werchter @ Rock Werchter Festival
6/26 -Beuningen @ Down the Rabbit Hole
7/12 -Lörrach @ Stimmen Festival
7/13 -München @ Tollwood Festival
7/14 -Wien @ Arena Wien Open Air
7/16 -Singen @ Hohentwiel
7/19 -Bern @ Gurtenfestival
7/21 -Karlsruhe @ Tollhaus
7/22 -Winterbach @ Zeltspektakel Winterbach
7/27 -Collegno (TO) @ Parco della Certosa
7/28 -Gardone Riviera (BS) @ Anfiteatro del Vittoriale
8/2 -Ljubljana @ Krizanke
8/4 -Wels @ Alter Schlachtof
8/5 -Prague @ Archa Theatre
8/7 -Luhmühlen @ A Summer’s Tale
8/8 -Dresden @ Junge Garde
8/9 -Katowice @ Off Festival
8/11 -Berlin @ Tempodrom
8/13 -Copenhagen @ Royal Theatre
8/14 -Copenhagen @ Royal Theatre
8/15 -Göteborg @ Way Out West
8/17 -Reykjavík @ Harpa
10/20 -Paris @ Olympia
10/21 -Paris @ Olympia
