Gary Graff (born 1960) is an American

music journalist Music journalism (or music criticism) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music, classical music, and traditional music. Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on ...

and

author In legal discourse, an author is the creator of an original work that has been published, whether that work exists in written, graphic, visual, or recorded form. The act of creating such a work is referred to as authorship. Therefore, a sculpt ...

Biography

Originally from

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

, Graff attended

Taylor Allderdice High School Taylor Allderdice High School is a public high school in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The school was established in 1927 and is part of the Pittsburgh Public Schools district. It was named for industrialist and S ...

where he wrote for school newspaper ''The Taylor Allderdice Foreword''. He received his Bachelor of Journalism degree from the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri, United States. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Univers ...

. He wrote for the ''

Detroit Free Press The ''Detroit Free Press'' (commonly referred to as the ''Freep'') is a major daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest local newspaper owned by Gannett (the publisher of ''USA Today''), and is operated by the Detro ...

'' from 1982 until 1995 when there was a strike at the newspaper. Graff refused to cross the picket line and subsequently lost his job. Graff has contributed to publications including ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'', ''

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

, The Cleveland Plain Dealer,'' and ''

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

'', as well as writing a regular columns for '' Guitar World'' Magazine, Ultimate Classic Rock and Consequence. In 2005, Graff published ''The Ties That Bind: Bruce Springsteen A to E to Z''. One reviewer said that the book "comes close to being the definitive study" on

Bruce Springsteen Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen (born September 23, 1949) is an American Rock music, rock singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Nicknamed "the Boss", Springsteen has released 21 studio albums spanning six decades; most of his albums feature th ...

. He is also the founding editor of

MusicHound MusicHound (often stylized as musicHound) was a compiler of genre-specific music guides published in the United States by Visible Ink Press between 1996 and 2002. After publishing eleven album guides, the MusicHound series was sold to London-based ...

's "Essential Album Guide" series, which began with ''MusicHound Rock'' in 1996. Graff is also a frequent contributor to The Drew and Mike Podcast and the Bob & Brian radio show on WHQG in Milwaukee, WI. He now lives in

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

Bibliography

*1996 (rev. 1999): ''MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide'' (Visible Ink Press) *2005: ''The Ties That Bind: Bruce Springsteen A to E to Z'' (Visible Ink Press) *2010: ''Travelin' Man: On the Road and Behind the Scenes with Bob Seger'' (Painted Turtle) *2023: ''Alice Cooper at 75'' (Motorbooks) *2024: ''501 Essential Albums of the '90s: The Music Fan's Definitive Guide'' (Motorbooks)

References

1960 births American music journalists Living people Writers from Detroit Writers from Pittsburgh Journalists from Pittsburgh Detroit Free Press people Taylor Allderdice High School alumni {{US-journalist-1960s-stub