Ed Vulliamy

The year 2012 marks the 20th anniversary of the onset of the worst carnage to blight Europe since the reign of the Third Reich - the Bosnian War. The author passionately bears witness to the war's aftermath, the reckoning and lack of it, to reveal the human consequences as well as the trials and traumas of exile or homecoming.

Bosnia : the Reckoning

The War is Dead, Long Live the War

Chronicles the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina and looks at the atrocities of "ethnic cleansing," and explains the conflict's historical background

Understanding Bosnia's War

Seasons in Hell

Wojna umarła, niech żyje wojna. Bośniackie rozrachunki

In the last three years more than 38,000 people have been murdered in Amexica - the area of land that forms the border between the US and Mexico. This is both the busiest and most deadly frontier in the world, studded with guard-posts, infra-red searchlights and heavily armed patrols.Across it unfolds a war that is scarcely reported - a war that's being fought, with thousands dying and millions of lives blighted, so that Europe and America can get high. In Amexica, acclaimed journalist Ed Vulliamy explores his own love-hate relationship with the place and its people, while investigating the causes and consequences of the war and its impact on the everyday life which somehow carries on around it.

War Along the Borderline

Amexica

The harrowing story of the extraordinary terror unfolding along the US-Mexico border, from the Pacific coast to the Gulf of Mexico - Tijuana to Brownsville. Along the way, facets of the crisis - police corruption; the smuggling of people, weapons and drugs back and forth across the border, are illuminated through everyday people and places.

"Part memoir, part reportage, this is a story of music from the frontlines: the testimony of a lifelong passion for music from a decorated war correspondent who hates war and a journalist who follows people and stories around the world. Inspired by Samuel Beckett's line from Happy Days ("What shall we do when even words fail"), the book reflects on the fact that in many stressful and painful situations, when our words fail, we turn to music for expression and comfort, or for rage and pain. It asks questions of what music does for people in situations of extreme physical and psychological violence, what it can do "in times of war, against war, and for peace." It also tells stories of concerts that changed the author's life, concerts at which he was present as a young or a more mature man, at home or abroad, in peace or in war"--

A Life with Music, War, and Peace

Louder Than Bombs

Can music make the world a better place? Can it really 'belong' to anyone? Can the magic, mystery and incertitude of music - of the human brain meeting or making sound - can it stop wars, rehabilitate the broken, unite, educate or inspire? From Jimi Hendrix playing 'Machine Gun' at The Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 to the Bataclan under siege in 2015, Ed Vulliamy has lived the music, met the legends, and asked, when words fail, might we turn to music? There's only one way to find out, and that is to listen...

A Life with Music, War and Peace

When Words Fail

Part memoir, part reportage, Louder Than Bombs is a story of music from the front lines. Ed Vulliamy, a decorated war correspondent and journalist, offers a testimony of his lifelong passion for music. Vulliamy’s reporting has taken him around the world to cover the Bosnian war, the fall of the Berlin Wall and collapse of Communism, the Iraq wars of 1991 and 2003 onward, narco violence in Mexico, and more, places where he confronted stories of violence, suffering, and injustice. Through it all, Vulliamy has turned to music not only as a reprieve but also as a means to understand and express the complicated emotions that follow. Describing the artists, songs, and concerts that most influenced him, Vulliamy brings together the two largest threads of his life—music and war. Louder Than Bombs covers some of the most important musical milestones of the past fifty years, from Jimi Hendrix playing “Machine Gun” at the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 to the Bataclan in Paris under siege in 2015. Vulliamy was present for many of these historic moments, and with him as our guide, we see them afresh, along the way meeting musicians like B. B. King, Graham Nash, Patti Smith, Daniel Barenboim, Gustavo Dudamel, and Bob Dylan. Vulliamy peppers the book with short vignettes—which he dubs 7" singles—recounting some of his happiest memories from a lifetime with music. Whether he’s working as an extra in the Vienna State Opera’s production of Aida, buying blues records in Chicago, or drinking coffee with Joan Baez, music is never far from his mind. As Vulliamy discovers, when horror is unspeakable, when words seem to fail us, we can turn to music for expression and comfort, or for rage and pain. Poignant and sensitively told, Louder Than Bombs is an unforgettable record of a life bursting with music.

Ed Vulliamy

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