The Slits, Peel Sessions '77
The thing is, I'm much more of a natural Costello fan. I've been listening to his music ever since college where I made mix-tapes of his stuff for people who hadn't heard of him. I was borderline obsessed for a good five years, and to this day can make an argument for Blood and Chocolate being one of the most insightful albums about sex and relationships ever made, despite the really (intentionally?) shitty guitar tone.
I came later to The Slits and, frankly, probably relegated them to "interesting political chicks who couldn't actually play their instruments" during my first listens. I'll cop to that much. My former rockism sins are many.
But reading the books side by side has been interesting. First off, London between 1975 and 1979 or so must have been a hell of a place to exist. The frisson must have been incredible, as was the actual violence and rape and (ahem) anarchy. (Albertine narrowly escaped a gang rape but unfortunately Ari Up, at a mere 15 or 16, wasn't so lucky).
That said, Albertine's memoir is the much more compelling read. It's tighter and more focused for sure, split into pre- and during-Slit years, and then post-Slit years. Albertine is so incredibly honest about failure and feelings of artistic and personal inadequacy it can hurt at times.
And the Costello book is really great as well, but a different beast in general, much more of a baggy, anecdotal monster. There are tons of really bad-good Dad jokes, which I didn't expect but probably should have.
Both books have tons of great pictures though, and both are worth your time.
And as for coming to fully appreciate The Slits, their Peel Sessions do a lot more for me than their actual studio albums, but their jittery cover of "Heard It Through The Grapevine" is still killer. (That was the first thing they ever recorded in a professional studio with an actual engineer.)
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