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Brown on Brown: The Autobiography of Jim E. Brown, Vol 1: The Early Years
Meet Jim E. Brown, Manchester's hottest up and coming poet and singer/songwriter. His autobiography "Brown on Brown" is a no-holds barred romp through the streets of East Didsbury to the hills of Chorlton-cum-Hardy....and everywhere in between. Jim E. spills the beans on East Didsbury, his alcoholic years at his favorite pub Ye Olde Cock, his love of Gushers candies, his Father's Pus-filled soars and much more!
49 pages, Paperback
Published March 19, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 11, 2025
When one hears a great virtuoso, one invariably says: It's the notes he's not playing. Even so is it with legendary Mancunian songwriter Jim E. Brown, an iconoclast and pop sensation whose life story inspires us by all that it leaves untold, unwritten, and uninterpreted.
Born a single day before 9/11 in the inbred backwater that is East Didsbury, Manchester, Jim E. Brown is a 19-year-old tour de force. He continues to write penetrating lyrics, set to entirely unreproducable instrumentation, in defiance of a lifelong battle with alcoholism (since the age of 5) and the damning effects of other degenerative conditions. His words, like those of the prophets who came before him, remind us of the vileness that we typify by our very existence:
"I'm a disgusting swine; I drink too much wine.
I'm a disgusting pig; my stomach's too big.
...
I reek of vomit and always have.
I'm a lesion; I'm a scab."
Elsewhere he is more recondite, something like the troubadours or Goliards, relying on the artifice of a "cover" to express things that would otherwise be too difficult for the listener:
"You got me wrapped around your finger...
Do you have to let it linger?"
Then there are those verses pinched straight from a rhyming dictionary, themselves a clever metaphor for the hackneyed usages that most "songwriters" resort to merely to make a profit:
"It's anything but bucolic
To be an obese alcoholic."
If anything in life is certain, it's that nothing will ever diminish the impact Jim will have had on the music industry, on contemporary politics, and on Western thought. Time and again the artist reassures us: "My name is Jim E. Brown!" And his voice is the voice of one crying out in the wilderness.
Listen, if you would be numbered among the blessed.
Born a single day before 9/11 in the inbred backwater that is East Didsbury, Manchester, Jim E. Brown is a 19-year-old tour de force. He continues to write penetrating lyrics, set to entirely unreproducable instrumentation, in defiance of a lifelong battle with alcoholism (since the age of 5) and the damning effects of other degenerative conditions. His words, like those of the prophets who came before him, remind us of the vileness that we typify by our very existence:
"I'm a disgusting swine; I drink too much wine.
I'm a disgusting pig; my stomach's too big.
...
I reek of vomit and always have.
I'm a lesion; I'm a scab."
Elsewhere he is more recondite, something like the troubadours or Goliards, relying on the artifice of a "cover" to express things that would otherwise be too difficult for the listener:
"You got me wrapped around your finger...
Do you have to let it linger?"
Then there are those verses pinched straight from a rhyming dictionary, themselves a clever metaphor for the hackneyed usages that most "songwriters" resort to merely to make a profit:
"It's anything but bucolic
To be an obese alcoholic."
If anything in life is certain, it's that nothing will ever diminish the impact Jim will have had on the music industry, on contemporary politics, and on Western thought. Time and again the artist reassures us: "My name is Jim E. Brown!" And his voice is the voice of one crying out in the wilderness.
Listen, if you would be numbered among the blessed.
January 5, 2026
Just learned about Jim E Brown through a playlist on Perfectly Imperfect this year. I am delighted.
March 21, 2025
Brown on Brown, the Autobiography of Jim E. Brown was an arresting read for the following reasons:
Its concision: Brown on Brown is fewer than 50 pages with little filler. It may be easy to point to extended travel itineraries or repetitious phraseology and deride them as padding, but that would be ignoring their utility as rhetorical devices. The former? A grounding sense of place – it is obvious that Didsbury and the greater Manchester area were instrumental in sculpting the young Brown, and the specificity of his descriptions provides context to the international reader and evokes the integrity of these haunts and journeys on the author’s development. It is not surprising that Manchester, with its legacy of kitchen-sink curation, incubated a genius whose brilliance is glimpsed in the mundane. Additionally, it is useful fodder for the Jim E. Brown megafan, as they plot their pilgrimages to Didsbury and beyond. The latter emphasizes the themes and lessons that were central to Brown’s early life, and lends the work a poetic, rhythmic quality. The airy spacing left ample time to “read between the lines” and meditate on certain passages before proceeding.
Its focus: This correlates with the above point—the work does not fall victim to the self-adulatory bloat running rife in the musician autobiography genre. There is no contrived effort to construct an overwrought narrative throughline. No, the events depicted in Brown on Brown speak for themselves, and their recurrence is a testament to a sort of cosmic circularity and kismet that so often seems to antecede the brightest stars. It makes Brown’s growing influence feel inevitable, but tempers his current runaway success with clots of nuance and grief. The reader begins to grasp the mental deluge that churns Brown’s productivity and fuels his thirst both figurative and literal. However, its brevity left me hungry for more, and I keenly await my opportunity to read the subsequent books.
Its accessibility: The large print, substantial surface area, wide margins and penchant for capital letters meant this book was very easy to read in the dim light of the local pub after several drinks. It would not surprise me that, as a person that has several degenerative conditions, Brown might be sensitive to the needs of the disabled community. This is never mentioned explicitly as one of Brown’s priorities, but it is a benefit that this reader appreciated.
Brown writes with a certain naivete and simplicity that, much like his other efforts both musical and literary, speaks to intrinsic talent. It’s captivating. I highly endorse this book if you are in search of an inspirational read.
Its concision: Brown on Brown is fewer than 50 pages with little filler. It may be easy to point to extended travel itineraries or repetitious phraseology and deride them as padding, but that would be ignoring their utility as rhetorical devices. The former? A grounding sense of place – it is obvious that Didsbury and the greater Manchester area were instrumental in sculpting the young Brown, and the specificity of his descriptions provides context to the international reader and evokes the integrity of these haunts and journeys on the author’s development. It is not surprising that Manchester, with its legacy of kitchen-sink curation, incubated a genius whose brilliance is glimpsed in the mundane. Additionally, it is useful fodder for the Jim E. Brown megafan, as they plot their pilgrimages to Didsbury and beyond. The latter emphasizes the themes and lessons that were central to Brown’s early life, and lends the work a poetic, rhythmic quality. The airy spacing left ample time to “read between the lines” and meditate on certain passages before proceeding.
Its focus: This correlates with the above point—the work does not fall victim to the self-adulatory bloat running rife in the musician autobiography genre. There is no contrived effort to construct an overwrought narrative throughline. No, the events depicted in Brown on Brown speak for themselves, and their recurrence is a testament to a sort of cosmic circularity and kismet that so often seems to antecede the brightest stars. It makes Brown’s growing influence feel inevitable, but tempers his current runaway success with clots of nuance and grief. The reader begins to grasp the mental deluge that churns Brown’s productivity and fuels his thirst both figurative and literal. However, its brevity left me hungry for more, and I keenly await my opportunity to read the subsequent books.
Its accessibility: The large print, substantial surface area, wide margins and penchant for capital letters meant this book was very easy to read in the dim light of the local pub after several drinks. It would not surprise me that, as a person that has several degenerative conditions, Brown might be sensitive to the needs of the disabled community. This is never mentioned explicitly as one of Brown’s priorities, but it is a benefit that this reader appreciated.
Brown writes with a certain naivete and simplicity that, much like his other efforts both musical and literary, speaks to intrinsic talent. It’s captivating. I highly endorse this book if you are in search of an inspirational read.
October 18, 2023
Great Book
February 27, 2025
Jim E is the voice of his generation. The Brown on Brown series will become a Penguin Classic similar to Morrissey’s autobiography.
May 30, 2025
It was a book I read performatively on the train.
August 10, 2025
It has the hottest sex scene i have ever read.
September 5, 2025
A really powerful autobiography into such a talented and young artist, I know Jim E Brown will reach the heights of all the greats
November 17, 2025
Jim E. is an absolute legend - poet, artist, alcoholic, and all around degenerate. Can’t wait to dive into volumes 2 and 3. Not for the faint of heart.
December 2, 2025
Yeah quite nice that
August 19, 2023
Gross, repetitive, some typos intentional and others likely not, one of the great books, and it’s barely a book at that. Technically a book, because it’s pages with a front and back cover. Funny, too.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews