Colin Larkin

For the footballer, see Colin Larkin (footballer).

Colin Larkin (born 1949) is a British music writer. He founded and was the editor-in-chief of The Encyclopedia of Popular Music.^[1] Along with the ten-volume encyclopedia, Larkin also wrote the book All Time Top 1000 Albums,^[2] and edited the Guinness Who's Who of Jazz,^[3] the Guinness Who's Who of Blues,^[4] and the Virgin Encyclopedia of Heavy Rock.^[5] He has over 650,000 copies in print.^[6]

Colin Larkin
Born	1949 (age 75–76) Dagenham, Essex, England
Occupations	Writer entrepreneur publisher
Website	colinlarkin.com

Early life

Larkin was born in Dagenham, Essex.^[7] He spent much of his early childhood attending the travelling fair where his father, who worked by day as a plumber for the council, moonlighted on the waltzers to make ends meet. It was in the fairground, against a background of Little Richard on the wind-up 78 rpm turntables, that Larkin acquired his passion for the world of popular music.^[8]

Larkin studied at the South East Essex County Technical High School and at the London College of Printing, where he took typography and graphic design.^[7]

Art and publishing

Larkin's company Scorpion Publishing published John Gorman's trilogy of Labour history, Banner Bright,^[9] To Build Jerusalem and Images of Labour.^[10] Music books at this time included Johnny Rogan's Timeless Flight: The Definitive Story of the Byrds^[11] and Bob Dylan, His Unreleased Recordings.^[12][7]

The Encyclopedia of Popular Music

In 1989, Larkin formed Square One Books to create a multi-volume The Encyclopedia of Popular Music, and to publish music-related books. He published additional music biographies including those on Graham Bond, R.E.M., Eric Clapton, the Byrds and Frank Zappa.^[13]

In a pre-internet age, the work required to create an encyclopedia of popular music was considerable. Aided by a team of contributors, a fast-growing library of music magazines, books and the music itself, an eventual 3000 vinyl singles, 3500 vinyl albums, 4500 music biographies and 38,000 CDs,^[14] Larkin began compiling the Encyclopedia.

In 1992, the first edition of The Encyclopedia of Popular Music went into print.^[15] Rolling Stone described the work as "musical history in the making",^{[citation needed]} and The Times called it "a work of almost frightening completeness".^{[citation needed]} Musician Jools Holland called it "without question the most useful reference work on popular music".^{[citation needed]}

Later activities

Square One developed their own in-house software using 4th Dimension.^[16]

Over 50 separate titles followed the creation of the Encyclopedia's database, and in 1997 Larkin sold Square One Books to American data company Muze.^[16] Larkin became full-time editor-in-chief and ran the encyclopedia as a cottage industry, with a team of fewer than ten contributors, who in terms of wordcount were "producing an Agatha Christie novel a month".^[14]

From September 2008, Larkin ceased all involvement with Muze Inc. or any of its related companies following the closure of The Encyclopedia of Popular Music as a stand-alone product and his subsequent redundancy.^{[citation needed]} On 15 April 2009, it was announced that most of the assets of Muze Inc. were purchased by Macrovision.^[17]

In 2008, Larkin launched a new website whose original inspiration had come from the All Time Top 1000 Albums, initially called 1000Greatest.com. This would later change its name to become the multi-media rating site and iPhone app, btoe.com (Best Things On Earth).^{[citation needed]} Larkin closed down this website in August 2018 and re-directed the content to Musopedia.com. He was CEO and editor-in-chief of Musopedia Ltd. The company was dissolved in 2020.^[18]

Larkin wrote the liner notes for the Rolling Stones' curated project Confessin' the Blues.^[19]

In November 2020, Larkin released his latest book, Cover Me – The Vintage Art of Pan Books: 1950-1965. His first non-music book, it was a celebration of the classic Pan Books paperbacks, incorporating full-colour reproductions of over 300 of the original cover artworks.^[20] The book was nominated for the H. R. F. Keating Award in 2021 and reached the shortlist final eight.^[21] A paperback edition was published in May 2022.^[22]

Bibliography

• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Jazz, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Sixties Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Indie And New Wave Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Heavy Metal, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1992.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music (1st Edition, 4 Vols), Guinness Publishing 1992.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music Concise Edition, Guinness Publishing 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Seventies Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Soul Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Blues, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Fifties Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Country Music, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1993.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Stage Musicals, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.
• Larkin, Colin, All Time Top 1000 Albums, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Rap, Dance & Techno, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Film Musicals & Musical Films, Guinness Publishing 1994
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Reggae, Guinness Publishing (UK), 1994.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Jazz (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music (2nd Edition, 6 Vols), Guinness 1995 (UK),
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Indie And New Wave (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing 1995.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Blues (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Guinness Who's Who of Heavy Metal (2nd Edition), Guinness Publishing (UK), 1995.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Concise Edition, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Seventies Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Sixties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Eighties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1997.
• Larkin, Colin, (ed), The Virgin Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 1998, (also published in the US as The Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock. US, 1998)
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Fifties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Indie & New Wave, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of R&B and Soul, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin, The Virgin All-Time Top 1000 Albums (2nd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Country Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Reggae, Virgin Books (UK), 1998.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Stage & Film Musicals, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Heavy Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin, The Virgin All-Time Top 1000 Albums (Pocket Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Dance Music, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Stage & Film Musicals, Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Concise (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 1999.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (3rd Edition, 8 vols). Macmillan (UK/US) 1999
• Larkin, Colin, All-Time Top 1000 Albums (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2000.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Nineties Music, Virgin Books (UK), 2000.
• Larkin, Colin, (ed), The Virgin Illustrated Encyclopedia of Pop & Rock, Virgin Books (UK), 2002, (also published in the US as The Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Pop & Rock. US, 2002).
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of 60s Music,(3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of 50s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of 70s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Concise (4th Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2002.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Virgin Encyclopedia of 80s Music, (3rd Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2003.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz (4th Edition), Virgin Books (UK), 2004.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (4th Edition 10 vols) Oxford University Press (UK/US) 2006.
• Larkin, Colin (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Popular Music: Concise 5th Edition, Omnibus Press 2007.
• Larkin, Colin, Cover Me – The Vintage Art of Pan Books: 1950-1965, Telos Publishing, 2020.