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Paused in Cosmic Reflection: The definitive, fully illustrated story of The Chemical Brothers
A ROUGH TRADE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023
Paused in Cosmic Reflection is the definitive story of The Chemical Brothers. Told in the voices of Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons, with contributions from friends and collaborators, it is fully illustrated with 30 years of mind-bending visuals.
Paused in Cosmic Reflection is the definitive story of The Chemical Brothers. Told in the voices of Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons, with contributions from friends and collaborators, it is fully illustrated with 30 years of mind-bending visuals.
- GenresMusicNonfictionBiography
329 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 26, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
May 11, 2026
This is an oral history of The Chemical Brothers. It’s mostly sourced from fifteen months worth of conversations that the author had with the Brothers, but there’s also some input from a few other people in their orbit (mainly the folks who oversee their stage shows, and their longtime studio engineer) as well as with a few musicians who guested on their songs over the years and some music video directors. You would think that with input from that many people, collected over such a long stretch of time, and covering a thirty year career, that this book would have tons to say about The Chemical Brothers, and yet not much of anything is said at all. In that way it’s frequently a frustrating read. There are a lot of lovely photographs though, which I guess counts for something.
The first half or so of the book covers the Brothers meeting, their initial years working together, and then the creation of their first two albums. So about five years or so. The second half of the book covers the next TWENTY FIVE YEARS. It’s very rushed. Some albums are barely talked about at all. My favorite Chemical Brothers album, Come With Us, gets like three pages total, all of which are focused on the song Star Guitar, and most of those three pages are just Michel Gondry talking about trains, combined with pictures of a bunch of the trains from Star Guitar’s video.
You might think “ok that second half sounds too rushed to be very informative, but half the book is about just two albums, that must be one hell of a deep dive” and to that I say “wrong, dummy.” This is a shockingly uninformative book. I read three hundred plus pages about The Chemical Brothers. It’s reasonable to assume that I now know more about them than the average Joe. And yet I have no idea what one of The Chemical Brothers even does. At one point somebody who isn’t a Chemical Brother says something like “well Tom writes and arranges and records all the music, and Ed just has really good taste.” Sorry, what? What does that mean in the real world where people do actual things to create and perform actual music? Why does Tom, the largest Chemical Brother, not simply eat Ed, the other Chemical Brother? I almost wish that I’d never read that remark about Ed because all it meant was that anytime discussion turned to songwriting or working in the studio my radar would immediately go up looking for either quotes by Ed or stories about him contributing to the music in some way and lo and behold, they’re simply never there.
Now you might be saying to yourself “geez, he’s really hitting this Ed Simons thing hard” and you’re right I am. Imagine reading a book about the Beatles that’s so uninformative that you come out the other side of it going “wait which one was the drummer again?” That’s this book with literally half of The Chemical Brothers.
These guys keep talk about song writing, production, performance, and collaboration with other artists on the most surface level possible. There’s barely any gear or instrument talk. They also don’t want to discuss their personal lives at all, which leads to this very strange thing where you’ve got a book about two world traveling DJs who literally named their act The Drug Guys but who aren’t talking about taking any drugs, having any sex or breaking any laws. This is a book about rockstars. Where’s the sleaze, boys? There’s no depth here when the guys are talking about the nuts and bolts of their jobs, and there’s no heart at all when they’re talking about the extraordinary lives that their jobs have allowed them to live. They’re certainly within their rights to keep things so buttoned up and private but then at that point it’s like ok well why are you writing a book about yourselves then?
On the plus side I’ll say that visually this book is a delight. It’s full of hundreds and hundreds of photos, and while way too many of them are just generic publicity shots, the photos taken from their live shows are frequently spectacular, sometimes even beautiful.
I’ll also say, as a positive, that despite my complaining about Michel Gondry up above that the interviews with The Chemical Brothers’ video directors are the best parts of the book. The freelance directors featured here are just generally more willing to talk frankly and in depth about their experiences than anyone else hanging around the band, or the band themselves.
Maybe it’s me, not them. Like I’m just expecting way too much from what’s clearly meant to be a book length puff piece. Nevertheless, two stars (and that’s mostly thanks to presentation) because why did they even bother? Some great photos though. Definitely splurge and get the print version if you’re looking at reading this one.
The first half or so of the book covers the Brothers meeting, their initial years working together, and then the creation of their first two albums. So about five years or so. The second half of the book covers the next TWENTY FIVE YEARS. It’s very rushed. Some albums are barely talked about at all. My favorite Chemical Brothers album, Come With Us, gets like three pages total, all of which are focused on the song Star Guitar, and most of those three pages are just Michel Gondry talking about trains, combined with pictures of a bunch of the trains from Star Guitar’s video.
You might think “ok that second half sounds too rushed to be very informative, but half the book is about just two albums, that must be one hell of a deep dive” and to that I say “wrong, dummy.” This is a shockingly uninformative book. I read three hundred plus pages about The Chemical Brothers. It’s reasonable to assume that I now know more about them than the average Joe. And yet I have no idea what one of The Chemical Brothers even does. At one point somebody who isn’t a Chemical Brother says something like “well Tom writes and arranges and records all the music, and Ed just has really good taste.” Sorry, what? What does that mean in the real world where people do actual things to create and perform actual music? Why does Tom, the largest Chemical Brother, not simply eat Ed, the other Chemical Brother? I almost wish that I’d never read that remark about Ed because all it meant was that anytime discussion turned to songwriting or working in the studio my radar would immediately go up looking for either quotes by Ed or stories about him contributing to the music in some way and lo and behold, they’re simply never there.
Now you might be saying to yourself “geez, he’s really hitting this Ed Simons thing hard” and you’re right I am. Imagine reading a book about the Beatles that’s so uninformative that you come out the other side of it going “wait which one was the drummer again?” That’s this book with literally half of The Chemical Brothers.
These guys keep talk about song writing, production, performance, and collaboration with other artists on the most surface level possible. There’s barely any gear or instrument talk. They also don’t want to discuss their personal lives at all, which leads to this very strange thing where you’ve got a book about two world traveling DJs who literally named their act The Drug Guys but who aren’t talking about taking any drugs, having any sex or breaking any laws. This is a book about rockstars. Where’s the sleaze, boys? There’s no depth here when the guys are talking about the nuts and bolts of their jobs, and there’s no heart at all when they’re talking about the extraordinary lives that their jobs have allowed them to live. They’re certainly within their rights to keep things so buttoned up and private but then at that point it’s like ok well why are you writing a book about yourselves then?
On the plus side I’ll say that visually this book is a delight. It’s full of hundreds and hundreds of photos, and while way too many of them are just generic publicity shots, the photos taken from their live shows are frequently spectacular, sometimes even beautiful.
I’ll also say, as a positive, that despite my complaining about Michel Gondry up above that the interviews with The Chemical Brothers’ video directors are the best parts of the book. The freelance directors featured here are just generally more willing to talk frankly and in depth about their experiences than anyone else hanging around the band, or the band themselves.
Maybe it’s me, not them. Like I’m just expecting way too much from what’s clearly meant to be a book length puff piece. Nevertheless, two stars (and that’s mostly thanks to presentation) because why did they even bother? Some great photos though. Definitely splurge and get the print version if you’re looking at reading this one.
December 30, 2023
As someone who prefers the early four albums, this book does a great job of capturing that era of The Chemical Brothers career. The early days are described really well and we learn how some of those tracks and collaborations were made. Although I’m less interested in the albums between Surrender and Hanna, I was slightly disappointed that the second half of the book really skips over the latter part of their career and has a greater focus on the visuals from their live shows and album artwork instead (although that’s interesting still).
I would have loved to hear more about their Battle Weapon bsides, or how the instruments they used changed with each album. They do talk about dusting off old synths on more recent albums, but further details aren’t revealed.
This book is worth a look for the visuals alone, and anyone interested in the early albums will be happy. Maybe their more recent work speaks for itself? Or there wasn’t much to say? But there’s definitely room for an expanded edition in the future, perhaps after the next album arrives.
I would have loved to hear more about their Battle Weapon bsides, or how the instruments they used changed with each album. They do talk about dusting off old synths on more recent albums, but further details aren’t revealed.
This book is worth a look for the visuals alone, and anyone interested in the early albums will be happy. Maybe their more recent work speaks for itself? Or there wasn’t much to say? But there’s definitely room for an expanded edition in the future, perhaps after the next album arrives.
June 12, 2024
Everything a Chemical brothers fan could want is all in this book. A visual treat
August 14, 2024
Reflections and lessons learned/the content of this book made me feel…
That this excellent digital music output still requires a lot of work! But when a passion like this is present, why not - the classic fans of music making music through a love for it all… and a great one for anyone with an interest in the tech side too
That this excellent digital music output still requires a lot of work! But when a passion like this is present, why not - the classic fans of music making music through a love for it all… and a great one for anyone with an interest in the tech side too
January 10, 2024
A belter. A really great definitive story of the chemical brothers. Needs to be read with music to hand as you get some really in depth discussions on how some of their tunes were written and some great insights from collaborators. Cracking book, smashed this in a few days.
August 19, 2024
Ok so I’m gonna gonna do that, it’s decided.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews