{"product_id":"the-closest-thing-to-crazy-my-life-of-musical-adventures-9781785120848b","title":"The Closest Thing to Crazy: My Life of Musical Adventures","description":"\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: bold;\"\u003eNominated for the 2025 Association for Recorded Sound Collections Awards for Excellence in Historical Recorded Sound Research\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDescribed variously as a 'polymath', a 'renaissance man' and 'one of the most colourful characters in the music business', Mike Batt has led an extraordinarily vibrant and challenging life that has been full of both glorious victories and bitter failures.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor better or for worse, he is a man who has always lived life on his own terms. Idiosyncratic but mainstream, complicated but compassionate, steadfastly maverick in spirit but avowedly commercial in outlook. He is a man of great contradictions, but even greater talent.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAfter starting out in the music business as a teenager, Batt shot to fame in the early 1970s for his part in the creation of the Wombles pop group. But this success proved to be just the beginning as he then went on to work with various artists as a songwriter, composer and producer, including Art Garfunkel, George Harrison, Cliff Richard, Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Katie Melua.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFeaturing cameos from some of the biggest stars in the business from Paul McCartney to Prince, \u003cspan style=\"font-style: italic;\"\u003eThe Closest Thing to Crazy\u003c\/span\u003e takes us not only on the rocky (and classical) journey of Mike Batt's life but also on a tour around the inside of his mind.\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: bold;\"\u003e'Fabulously readable' STEPHEN FRY\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Wildly entertaining' \u003cspan style=\"font-style: italic;\"\u003eDAILY EXPRESS\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Rollicking ... ebullient ... Christmas present problems are instantly solved' \u003cspan style=\"font-style: italic;\"\u003eMAIL ON SUNDAY\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Nine Eight Books","offers":[{"title":"Bargain","offer_id":42824213823568,"sku":"9781785120848B","price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0592\/8173\/5760\/files\/9781785120848-l.jpg?v=1785895671","url":"https:\/\/bookoutlet.com\/fr\/products\/the-closest-thing-to-crazy-my-life-of-musical-adventures-9781785120848b","provider":"Book Outlet","version":"1.0","type":"link"}