For over 50 years, Art Bergmann has been a fixture of Canadian punk rock, one who has kept up the momentum in recent years with last year's Polaris long-listed album Late Stage Empire Dementia and his 2020 appointment to the Order of Canada. His life and career are set to be chronicled in a new book, The Longest Suicide: The Authorized Biography of Art Bergmann, arriving on September 30 via Anvil Press.
According to the publisher's description, the book will cover Bergmann's "days helping to lay the foundation of the Vancouver punk scene with the K-Tels, to his acclaimed solo work in the '80s and '90s, and a late career resurgence that has culminated with being named to the Order of Canada."
The Longest Suicide was written by former Exclaim! editor Jason Schneider. It's Schneider's third book on Canadian music, following Have Not Been the Same: The CanRock Renaissance 1985–1995 (co-written with Michael Barclay and Ian A.D. Jack) and Whispering Pines: The Northern Roots of American Music... from Hank Snow to the Band. The book will also feature a foreword by Michael Turner — one of Bergmann's Vancouver punk contemporaries and the author of Hard Core Logo — and illustrations.
Alongside the biography announcement, Bergmann has released new single "Death of a Siren," in which he mourns his wife Sherri Decembrini, who passed away in March. The swaying, sombre folk rock number finds Bergmann expressing his grief by invoking Leonard Cohen — "There is no crack / That lets in the light / There is no light / To bridge this dark divide" — and the mood is heightened by the stark and still black-and-white visuals of the accompanying music video, directed by Kenneth Locke.
Watch the "Death of a Siren" video below. The Longest Suicide: The Authorized Biography of Art Bergmann is available for pre-order.
According to the publisher's description, the book will cover Bergmann's "days helping to lay the foundation of the Vancouver punk scene with the K-Tels, to his acclaimed solo work in the '80s and '90s, and a late career resurgence that has culminated with being named to the Order of Canada."
The Longest Suicide was written by former Exclaim! editor Jason Schneider. It's Schneider's third book on Canadian music, following Have Not Been the Same: The CanRock Renaissance 1985–1995 (co-written with Michael Barclay and Ian A.D. Jack) and Whispering Pines: The Northern Roots of American Music... from Hank Snow to the Band. The book will also feature a foreword by Michael Turner — one of Bergmann's Vancouver punk contemporaries and the author of Hard Core Logo — and illustrations.
Alongside the biography announcement, Bergmann has released new single "Death of a Siren," in which he mourns his wife Sherri Decembrini, who passed away in March. The swaying, sombre folk rock number finds Bergmann expressing his grief by invoking Leonard Cohen — "There is no crack / That lets in the light / There is no light / To bridge this dark divide" — and the mood is heightened by the stark and still black-and-white visuals of the accompanying music video, directed by Kenneth Locke.
Watch the "Death of a Siren" video below. The Longest Suicide: The Authorized Biography of Art Bergmann is available for pre-order.
