Drake's fluid and uncontrived style of writing, always with a sense of humor and wit, isn’t nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake; it’s a vivid reminder that life’s richest moments often happen when we step, boldly, beyond the map.
John Drake is a painter, a poet, and a hopeless romantic - and a restless soul who has roamed the far corners of the earth, gathering tales as rich and varied as the landscapes he’s traversed. While anyone who came of age in the 1970s or 80s could fill a night with stories, Drake’s recollections shimmer with a rare intensity, standing apart in their color, candor, and sheer unpredictability.
For decades, Drake lived at the intersection of art and adventure. His memoirs are not just chronicles of personal history—they are exuberant journeys through the golden years of rock and roll, brimming with raucous escapades and unforgettable characters. From the bustling streets of 1960s London to the charged energy of America in 2001, his work invites readers to step into a world both intimate and expansive. His first memoir, 'The Laughing Man' offers the opening act, while 'Stories From The Big Apple and Beyond' picks up the rhythm in 1976, carrying readers through the next chapter of a life lived without hesitation.
The stories take us from the Bi-Centennial of 1976 in New York up till the tragic event of 9/11. Drake captures the nitty - gritty feel of the “Big Apple” of the “downtown life”- remnants of Bob Dylan’s days and left over’s from the Beat Generation, which has now disappeared forever. Working in the film business for this period in time, Drake’s book gives us a look into the world of film. Starting as an electrician he works later as a gaffer, then a cinematographer and eventually finds himself directing commercials for a living. As in his other book, his wanderlust takes the reader back to India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Bali and many other places - some for work and other times for the sheer adventure of travel, still trying to keep the freewheeling, fun - loving abandonment of the sixties and seventies alive.The photographs and poems all help to capture the feel of over two and a half decades of the seventies and eighties when the world seemed a saner and more hospitable place to live.
"People ask me why I decided to write a book and like a lot of authors, I say the book wrote itself," Drake stated. "For me it was a time for reflection and introspection as time was getting on and I was not getting any younger, so I decided that I already had a book written from diaries and logs, words that I had scribbled down in notebooks over the years from my travels and experiences. I had a box of notebooks, so one day I decided that I should gather all these pieces of prose and poetry and harvest them into a book. In that respect all I had to do was to assemble the pieces into a coherent story, a story about my life. It became a history book of my life which we call a memoir, an appreciation of life itself."
Readers and reviewers have praised Stories From The Big Apple. One said, "A fascinating read in which the author John Drake takes us from the mundane normality of suburban Britain to the ridiculous, dizzy days of 70’s and 80’s New York and beyond. Starting out as a junior in the movie business and progressing to Cinematographer, the author leads us through the thrills and spills of those times with yarns overflowing with his personal flavour of charm and wit. His loves, travels and irony (interspersed with poignant poetry), left me yearning for those times once again. Hard to believe so much could be crammed into a single lifetime! It made me ponder just how hollow our lives have become and what great adventures pass us by. John, certainly took life by the horns and went for it."
John Drake is available for media interviews and can be reached using the information below or by email at artfuldrake51@gmail.com. Stories From The Big Apple is available in e-book and print formats at Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Stories-Big-Apple-John-Drake-ebook/dp/B09JTQJVGT/ref=sr_1_1?. More information is available at his website at http://www.johndrakegallery.com.
About John Drake:
John Drake was born in London in the 1950s. He started his career in a photographic darkroom and went on to become a photographer in London. After much traveling throughout Europe and India he found himself in New York, after taking a freighter from England to Jamaica (these adventures can be found in his first memoir called THE LAUGHING MAN).
After settling in Manhattan (The Big Apple) he began a new career in the film business, and after a few years was working as a Director of Photography on feature films and commercials. In 1987 John moved to California where he worked as a director/cameraman for various companies in the United States and Europe.
Around 1998 he found a new love in painting, and after a couple of gallery openings of his work now has over 600 paintings to his name. In the same year he had a photo exhibit of his still photographs on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles.
In 1999 John moved to Vancouver to continue working in film, but still keeps a place in Santa Monica. In 2004, he went to India to shoot a Bollywood film called 'My Faraway Bride'.
He still continues his nomadic gypsy lifestyle and lives in Mexico for half of the year, coming and going between Mexico, California and Vancouver.
In 2016, he compiled this memoir, “Stories From The Big Apple And Beyond” from writings and diaries from his life in Manhattan and Woodstock during the Seventies and Eighties and also stories of his adventures traveling once again through India and South-East Asia. The story ends on 9/11 when there, in New York for a job, John witnesses the attack on the World Trade Towers.
Contact:
John Drake
artfuldrake51@gmail.com
http://www.johndrakegallery.com
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