Tom Kirkham is “a 30-something music obsessive and part-time explorer from North West England,” as well as a musician and songwriter in Silent Alliance, among elsewhere. Most recently, his the author of Pop Life – The Story of a Minor Musical Expedition, which finds Kirkham detailing how, after the deaths of David Bowie and Prince, he ‘learned to love music and life again via an intensive, year-long trawl through the back rooms and bars, concert halls and stadiums of the live gig circuit, searching for transcendence, or at the very least, an unobscured view.” In this episode of Cover to Cover with . . ., Editor-in-Chief Jordan Blum also puts on his music critic hat to talk with Kirkham about his process and motivations for the book, his love for artists like Bowie, Prince, Kate Bush, Steely Dan, coping with anxiety, depression, and the dangers and polarization of modern society, and much more! – Tom Kirkham