The Ballad of Speedball Baby: A Memoir

by Ali Smith

The Ballad of Speedball Baby is the thrilling, extremely funny, and heart-wrenchingly vulnerable story of Ali Smith -- coming of age in '90s New York -- who commits to the messy, exhilarating life of a musician and must survive the slings and arrows society reserves for women who refuse to comply. As an only child reeling from the demolition of her parents' toxic marriage, the New York City underground music scene offers a young Ali a different family of misfits and talented outsiders to belong to. She becomes the bass player for edgy band Speedball Baby, a decision that will take her around the world -- from onstage at the legendary CBGBs to the red-light district of Amsterdam. She's often the only girl in a broken-down tour van, being strip-searched at the Croatian border, chased by lunatics, and navigating the seedy underbelly of a male-dominated music scene full of addiction, violence, and misogyny -- all while keeping her sharp wit and dark humor intact. Rimmed with heavy black eyeliner and smelling faintly of cheap booze, The Ballad of Speedball Baby is a pulse-quickening, unpredictable ride through the '90s music scene -- alternately terrifying, hilarious, and painfully evocative -- as well as a love letter to the power of female solidarity.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Music, Audiobook

332 pages, Hardcover

Published January 16, 2024

About the author

The vibrant style Ali Smith has brought to her writing and photography—featured regularly in The New York Times, The Guardian, and other publications internationally—was forged in New York’s underground music scene where she played bass in the seminal punk / blues / avant-garde band, Speedball Baby. After touring worldwide and recording nine albums, Ali released two books of photography about women’s lives. The first, Laws of the Bandit Queens, led to a feature on OWN, Oprah Winfrey’s television network. The second, Momma Love: How the Mother Half Lives, won a Silver IPPY and an International Book Awards prize, was praised by The New York Times, and Gloria Steinem called it “a gift to moms.” With a passion for telling women’s stories, Ali’s memoir, The Ballad of Speedball Baby, is her literary debut. Learn more at AliSmith.com, @mommaloveAli on Instagram and Ali Smith Photo on FB.

Reviews

[Dee · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars for this 90’s NYC post-punk rock memoir. I’d never heard of this band, but I did get many of the references (Evan Dando! Mike Ness! Basiquat!) Tours, CBGB’s & mosh pits. Parts of it felt very “fever dream” in nature and since it often wasn’t linear, it was hard to follow sometimes. Still, props to any woman in rock & roll.

[Zoe · Rating 5 out of 5]

y'all.... SO ... I have waited almost a month to write about this book. Maybe because I loved it so much, I had to actually read it twice. Yep. Truth.





BUY THIS BOOK! (no affiliate link... just an endorsement)

In the 90s I was a producer for a music TV show of some notoriety. That sounds super pretentious. It is not. I had just returned from filmschool, and an attempt at getting into the biz and came back "home". My best friend was the Executive Producer on the show and I first started out as a camera person and then started to produce segments. It was a BLAST. From programming to segment production to interview segments with some really amazing rock stars... it was a blast.

So.

Imagine my complete surprise when this book came up in a search of available books to read in advance of publication. Speedball Baby wasn't a band I had ever heard of. Ever. And totally would have been a band we would have programmed. I am absolutely gobsmacked that this band, on a major label that we worked with, never pushed them more.

As the saying goes "they could have been contenders".

Ali Smith, the bassist wrote a phenomenal book. I read it entranced in maybe two sittings but defiantly in one weekend. I was transfixed with the tales of being on the road. Being in a band that should have gotten better shrift by their label. This is not a bitter story... but really one of redemption and guts. There are some things that aren't glamour-filled and some that are. There are somethings that aren't gritty but a lot that are. But girl .... this is a story of a time that bands were scooped up and promised a road out of obscurity but not really given proper due and how that effects the people involved.

I loved the honesty. That takes guts. This book is gutty. That is my quote... this book is gutty. Shimmies with guts.

Speedball Baby is just odd enough to be awesome. I have added them as a favorite to my Spotify. I listen to them when I am looking to have a moment to dance around my kitchen and clean. I would have LOVED to have seen them live and program them on our show.

This is a book about the road, rock and roll and the power of art.

The book comes out in January 2024 and it's already on my "to buy" list because the book promises to be peppered with the photography of the author. I have snuck into her instagram and peeked at her portraiture and I am smitten, just like her writing.

In the book she writes about taking a photo at a dumpster. I COULD picture it in my head, just like the rest of what she wrote about. That is the best sign. I want to see that actual photos.

Nothing is spared to the reader's eye. That is such a good sign to me.

I have reread this book twice since I got it a month or so ago. I wanted to make sure that I didn't miss anything. Yep... it was that great to me.

I wanted to wait until the book was closer to publication date to post this because I didn't want it to get lost in the ether of the internet.

So here is my suggestion -

And here are the steps - trust me on this.

1) find a cozy spot with a cup of coffee, tea with whisky or whatever you want to warm you up when you set aside the time to read this book
2) open to the forward - it's by Exene Cervenka of X - if you know you know - and play a couple songs off Los Angeles. THEN... dance around where ever you are for a couple of songs... get your energy up because you are going for a ride.
3) open up your music player of choice and que up Speedball baby.
4) read the first couple of chapters in silence and then get ready to rock at chapter three. Crank it up because the energy of the music matches and is a great soundtrack to the rest of the book.

PS this is what I did on round two and it kicked ass just like this book does.

[Jeltje · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ja kijk ik begon dit boek natuurlijk al met een enigszins teleurgestelde blik omdat het niet geschreven is door mijn favoriete auteur Ali Smith maar door een of andere Amerikaanse punkrock jonge Ali Smith. Toch ben ik niet bij de pakken neer gaan zitten en gaf ik dit boek een kans want ja had toch al m’n zuurverdiende cadeaubon eraan besteed.

Ik ga niet liegen: ik heb me niet stierlijk verveeld, maar het boeide me allemaal gewoon niet zo?? Leuk een verhaal over een band die ik niet ken met een hoge eigendunk en heel veel bier en drugs! Ik heb het laatste deel over de tour in Europa in een stuk uitgelezen en was wel vermakelijk maar god ik heb echt een probleem met hoe deze Ali Smith de red-light-district in Amsterdam neerzet en hoe ze CONSTANT herhaalt dat ze zich goed erover wil voelen maar dat niet doet. Op gegeven moment zoooo irritant pfff kreeg sowieso beetje terf vibes van haar??? Denk dat wij het echt niet met elkaar zouden kunnen vinden. En steeds zeggen dat ze zo bewust is van haar privilege maar echt met een hele vervelende ondertoon! Sommige stukken wel amusant maar ben wel echt heeel blij dat het uit is! Probeert ook veel te hard om grappig te zijn maar slaat daarmee dan de plank helemaal mis.
Nou dat was mijn ongezouten mening maar om op een hoopvolle toon af te sluiten: niet extreem saai, leest lekker door en ze kan wel goed schrijven hoor daar niet van!!! en leuke utrecht mention die had ik niet verwacht

oja en google linkt dit boek automatisch aan favoriete iconische Ali Smith dus t is echt niet volledig mijn eigen vergissing geweest!

[Katrisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not know who Speedball Baby was. I kind of picked this up on accident because I saw the name and thought it was an Ali Smith book (like Ali Smith who wrote the Seasons tetrology), but I really enjoyed the book (even though it was the wrong Ali Smith).
This book has a lot heart. Ali is funny and her vignettes of touring both America and Europe span a wide range from scary to sublime. I liked that this wasn't just a book filled with party/drug stories. I mean, of course there is some of that, but it isn't the focus. I found myself wishing I could see some of the photographs that Ali mentions taking. So basically you don't have to know anything about the band Speedball Baby to enjoy this memoir.

Thank you to Netgalley Blackstone Publishing for an ARC of this book for review.

[Joshua William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fucking rocks! Sorry to swear but it's apt when thgere is so much heart and soul spilling out in so much hilarious prose.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up because I thought this book was written by my fave author—Scotland's Ali Smith—but realized quickly it wasn't. However, it's a memoir written by a punk musician from the 1990's NYC music scene and music history is one of the genres I can't get enough of, so I happily read it anyway. Engagingly written, Smith pulled me in and kept me engrossed the whole time. I loved her stories and recollections. Totally enjoyable read.

[Lizzie Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was soooo good!!!!!!! I loved every minute I read this, and it inspired me to pick up my guitar again!! I love you!

[Amy's Book Cafe · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Ballad of Speedball Baby by Ali Smith is the story of Ali Smith, who was a bass player for a band called Speedball Baby. It's told in a nonlinear way and Ali takes us along on the musical journey which begins with their first tour. We also go back into the author's childhood and see the kind of marriage the parents had, early relationships with boyfriends, how the band hot together etc. There are a lot of interesting anecdotes in the book and we can actually feel what the writer felt when these events were being experienced. The writing is easy to read and the words flow smoothly. It's accessible and well written and if you are a music lover, you can give this one a try. The author also talks about sexism in the music industry as well as society in general. Also there are lot of incidents in which racism and homophobia can be seen. There is also mention of sexual assault and abuse. And there are a lot of drugs. So trigger warnings for all of that. As far as my experience is concerned, I am not the biggest music fan. So i didn’t get a lot of references. In this one, i didn't like the non linear style of writing. It made it difficult to get into the book. Also at times i felt as if the writing is little judgemental but overall I think this one is a case of 'it's not you, it's me'. Even though I didn't have a great experience, if something appeals to you then you should go for it.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the e-arc

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Punk Scene…wild and crazy, right? Not told this way. I struggled with the non linear format. The author segued into different time periods so quickly, that I couldn’t keep up.

She lived “life in fast lane,” to use a cliche and I wish I liked the book more. Better editors would have helped clean the book up.

[shannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I seem to be the only one here who actually does remember speedball baby? I’m pretty sure I saw them
open for blues explosion and heard them on fmu a few times (they were one of those bands who it felt like were always around in New York) and hated them but to be fair I would have been maybe 16 and probably intimidated. I was not nearly as avant- as I thought I was. This is really well written and doesn’t have any unpleasant I’m not a feminist I’m just oneoftheguuuyyyyys disclaimers. Non-linear is not a bad thing, weirdos.

[Hannah Powell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely loved it. I laughed and cried and almost read it in one sitting. I don’t know much about punk or music and I’m not from New York, but I was a young woman in the 90s and it resonated so much. Its the way she writes - the present tense narrative and her style- it makes the reader feel like they’re there, it’s totally absorbing and you’re thrown around with the narrative - the highs/lows/relief/knife-edge anxiety/vulnerability - I wanted to scream ‘NOOOOOO!!!! Don’t do that!!!” at Ron so many times!

[Joshua William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Soooooo good! Deep, vulnerable, powerful, funny as hell. An irresistable window to another life in another time

[Julie Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the memoir of Ali Smith, documenting her years spent as the bass player for New York punk band Speedball Baby as they try and crack the music scene in the 1990s. I had never come across Speedball Baby in my musical youth. Despite the fact that Ali is only three years older than me and these years were the ones when music was fairly central to my life, my tastes at this time were firmly routed in the UK indie scene, favouring the likes of The Stone Roses, Inspiral Carpets, Echo & The Bunnymen, James, Jesus Jones and The Wonder Stuff. Punk was never on my radar, particularly American punk. However, none of this stopped me being captivated and fascinated by Ali’s descriptions of life on the road.

This book is a glorious mixture of narrative, diary entries, song lyrics and photographs which bring Ali’s experiences to vivid life, so you feel like you are travelling the backroads and stomping the gritty stages in dingy clubs along with her. I could feel the rattle of the battered old van through my bones, smell the sweat and the booze and feel the prickle of fear as she faces some extremely dangerous situations. This book pulls no punches and is no glamorous, music industry fairytale. From her formative years surviving the breakdown of her parents’ marriage, living with a single mother and discovering the NYC punk scene, the story contains a lot of jeopardy and angst that is nothing like anything I have experienced or could ever have imagined living through. The contrast in the lives of myself and a girl of a similar age 4,000/ a million miles away are stark and startling.

Of course, this is the main lure of reading memoirs – living vicariously the lives of other people, lives that are so different from our own, and wondering if/how we would deal with being thrown into the same situation. This being said, there are also areas of connection and empathy, when it is only too easy to recall similar situations we have found ourselves in, particularly as women. One anecdote featuring a solo walk along a deserted highway in the midwest raised painfully familiar chills down my spine, and the feeling of being the only woman in the room also rang bells, albeit for me in the boardrooms of corporate law rather than the dressing rooms of edgy punk concerts. When it comes down to it, we can usually find common ground if we care to look, even if it’s only a penchant for black garb and Doc Martens.

An excursion into the unfamiliar and intriguing, written with honesty and an innate sense of beauty and poetry, The Ballad of Speedball Baby is once of the best musical biographies I have ever read and it mattered not a jot that I didn’t know any of the characters involved (other than Evan Dando of The Lemonheads), I was still captivated from beginning to end.

[Brenda Perlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Ballad of Speedball Baby by Ali Smith

“The Los Angeles punk scene, which birthed me in the late ‘70s, was radically different from the NYC scene of the late ‘80s and ‘90s. We were 50 percent female and we never even noticed. We played nice under the sun, where rent and cars and guitars were cheap and easy to play. Drugs and booze were everywhere, there was an innocence and lightness around the edges; until things got dark.

By the time Ali entered the punk/post punk scene, hard core had darkened those edges back to black. It was CBGBs the way you expect it to be: wrecked bathrooms, graffiti, nihilism, violence; all that and sleet and ice and subways, too. And there weren’t that many women in bands.”

Introduction by Exene Cervenka

This is a candid memoir! One I wish I could write but glad I missed out on some of the author’s experiences. Well, that’s easy to say and not 100% true.

Speedball Baby is raw, gritty and spellbinding. Smiths’ prose is sublime and her storytelling is off the charts. The writing is sharp and I couldn’t find a typo, even though I tried! There were paragraphs I wanted to type up and frame. Too many that I lost count but I couldn’t walk away from her or her life. There are moments that I read and re-read to make sure it all registered.

Ali Smith wowed me from start to finish and I related to her inner voice. Very revealing and at the same time, she touches on some the heaviest topics on the day in the life of a rebel with a very good cause. She pulled me in and I devoured what she was willing to share. And the photographs added flavor to this mesmerizing story. They aren’t needed yet appreciated. Very much.

It would be nice to be buds with Exene but I would just as gratefully have Ali as a friend too. She writes one very impressive memoir.

“So when punk and new wave music rode the radio waves into my bedroom at night—and I shaved my head and eyebrows, and painted on heavier, meaner eyebrows, and threw my ballet flats down the garbage chute and replaced them with army boot, and wore black lipstick, and embarrassed you with my presence and made you wonder why I’d killed off your little baby girl—what I was doing was saving my own life, momma. It was this music—made by other misfits and messy girls—that showed me the beauty in my darkness. Suddenly there was a soundtrack of angry guitars and longing, melancholic voices adding meaning to the movie of my life.”

Quote from The Ballad of Speedball Baby by Ali Smith.

[Karen Timko · Rating 5 out of 5]

With lively and urgent prose, echoing the journals of youth, this memoir looks back on a time and a part of a life with crystal-clear and shard-sharp incisiveness and insight. Ali Smith writes with great sensitivity and her photographer's eye for detail, propelling the reader into moments that are both very specific to her life yet familiar.

I was one of the teenage girls in the 1990s that adored Ali Smith. Speedball Baby was my favorite NYC band, and as a Jersey girl planning on living there after high school, I had dreams of being like her.

This memoir has shown me that I kinda was like her, in a way.

I was never seriously in a band, but she and I still somehow share many life experiences -- difficult ones that women generally share when they want to be fearless and live honestly and do things intensely. Experiences that we don't quite understand until later.

I hope Ms Smith continues to write about her life because the ballad of Speedball Baby isn't the only song. This memoir is a gift to girls who continue to need to see that badass chick on the stage, to know what's possible, to know they're not the only ones.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite having a love of punk music, I wasn't as familiar with the NYC scene in the mid-90s, so I missed Speedball Baby. However, I did see this memoir came out this year with Exene Cervanka writing the foreword. I was intrigued, especially because I have a slight (MAJOR) obsession with female bassists. Ali Smith is a good writer -- she whips through stories of the tour, of her family, of her loves. I only wish there was more post-Speedball Baby. She also had a prolific photography career, and she got to shoot a ton of interesting subjects. Maybe she's saving this for another book?

It was a short read that gave you a glimpse into the what it was like in the racist, homophobic, misogynistic world that Ali Smith came of age within. As Exene wrote in her foreword, the early 1980s in LA where girls made up half of the scene was nowhere to be found in 1993.

[LuAnn Billett · Rating 5 out of 5]

A behind the scenes, insider look into the NY punk scene and beyond. It’s not only an inside perspective, but a female perspective. Ali is a strong, smart, woman. However, she digs deep into the highs, lows, fears, and emotions that she experiences in this incredible world of punk music.

Life on New York’s lower east side in the 1990’s, as well as life on the road across the United States and Europe, it’s quite a ride. Man or woman, that life it isn’t for the faint of heart. As a reader you will likely find yourself envious at times, and also feeling fortunate if you never jumped in an old van with a bunch of sweaty dudes for weeks at a time.

It’s a fast read, engaging, and raw. I highly recommend this book.

[Jody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like most reviewers, I’d never heard of Speedball Baby—but I was immediately taken by the premise of a woman in punk going over her memories. Smith’s memoir follows some of the band’s early tours with digressions into her past that complement the tour narrative. I didn’t have an issue with the format the way other reviewers seemed to do. I honestly wished there was more—how did the band end? Are they still friends? Do any of them still perform? It’s excellent as it is, as a small snippet of a life spent chasing meaning, but the dearth of info on the band drives me insane. I want to know more! Highly recommend for fans of 90s punk, NYC street life, and/or touring acts before they’ve hit it big.

[Olivia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Ali Smith was the bassist for a punk band in the 90s called Speedball Baby. I went into this not knowing anything about Speedball Baby or Ali. I was excited to learn more about the punk scene in the 90s. It was really hard for me to get into this one. She tells this in a nonlinear way and it makes it feel like I am reading a brain dump of her life. It would get interested in a story and it would switch to something else.


She has a lot of great and important things to say, but this was a huge jumbled mess.

[Anna Shagalov · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book had me gripped from page one and carried me all the way through the end. Ali Smiths tumultuous journey through childhood and young womanhood in the callous world of 80’s/90’s punk era NYC to find her place among a striving punk band full of characters and the journey that follows is simply mind blowing. Extraordinarily written, you feel like you’re right there with her enduring, surviving and feeling with stage-setting flashbacks that wrap it all together with a black leather bow. This is a must read!! Hands down. Someone’s got to put this on film!!

[Phil Overeem · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book so much I wrote to Ali. It can serve as a review, really!

"That was easily one of the best music memoirs I've ever read! I have been spreading the word enthusiastically to anyone who might possibly want to read it (and some who won't 😂). You put the reader right into the life, always appealing to the senses, and there's so much heart, pain, honesty, joy, surprise, fear, triumph, and enlightenment in it that you can't wait to get to the next page. I especially liked the way you wrote about your friendship with Matt--I'm not sure I've ever read about that kind of relationship between a het man and a het woman on the punk rock road!"

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would have loved this book no matter what. There are lots of shared past experiences, but Ali makes it feel of the moment and important. This book is important and written with vulnerability and strength in equal measure. The cover design is awesome, by the way. Thank you to Ali Smith and Blackstone Publishing. I am grateful for the giveaway and will spread the word.

[Jared Mazzaschi · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really good book! Buy the physical copy if you can because the photos are excellent.

Ali Smith is a really sharp writer and this book is really novel format wise. Within it's hyper-focused subject she relentlessly explores life's big themes. Legacy, longing, transcendence all set in grimy 90's lower east side. Within we get the meat of life! This is an excellent book.

[Gloria · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my first book by Ali Smith and her messaging of both acceptance of others and smashing the patriarchy are so welcome. It actually just left me wanting more. I look forward to learning what happened with the band and the relationship with Matt! Wishing this author well in her future endeavors.

[Sade · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somehow I thought this was a work of fiction - my mistake. The band Speedball Baby came along after my time of being active in the music scene, which is too bad cause it sounds like I probably would've liked them. If you're interested in the BTS of a touring punk band, I'm sure you could do worse than this. It's a fairly quick read that kept me engaged right up til the end.

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

binge listened to this today. i lived a parallel but far less glamorous and successful but very Midwestern (Last Chance, IA) version of her story, and listening to her tour stories brought back mostly awful but now hilarious memories.

I highly recommend the audio version. her reading is dynamic and funny and steeped in pathos. I'm obsessed and excited to binge all of her work.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ah! So good! Such an intense rollicking read. I knew Ali back in NYC and the story she tells us relatable, touchable, and real. Even thought it’s a totally different perspective from a native NYer growing up and into punk, and the basis for this is her band I never knew. I can’t help but fall in love Ali and her humble bad-ass-ness. Yes! I want to join your revolution! Ali’s got a gift with words. Those sentences that are pure magic. Yet, in memoir form it flows, fast and gritty, yet beautiful, She’s telling us a story, linking her roots, the streets, the van, the tour, the journey, the adventure and the celebration of love, art and survival. ❤️❤️❤️

[Uli Vogel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm sure I'm not the only one who spontaneously bought this book because I thought, quite amazed, it was by the famous Scottish writer of the same name. There are even websites that get it wrong. So good I got to know the OTHER Ali Smith and her band.

[Kimberly Swartz · Rating 4 out of 5]

The music is good but different than I thought it would be. I had no clue what the memoir was about but did enjoy it.

[John Kelleher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great. Loved it. Powerful memoir of being the girl in a 90s punk band deep in a mans mans mans world. Really fun read. Totally enjoyed it