Pop Grenade: From Public Enemy to Pussy Riot - Dispatches from Musical Frontlines

An adrenalin-charged trip through some of the cultural flashpoints of the past few decades, Pop Grenade celebrates the power of music as a force for change. Based on first-hand, personal reportage from raves, riots and rebellions, it explores how music has been used as a weapon in struggles for liberation and attempts to create temporary paradises. From Berlin’s anarchic techno scene after the fall of the Wall to outlaw sound systems in wartime Bosnia, from Moscow during the crackdown on Pussy Riot to New York in the militant early years of hip-hop, it tells the extraordinary stories of some of the world’s most audacious musical freedom fighters, disco visionaries and rock’n’roll rebels with a cause.

Matthew Collin has worked as a foreign correspondent for the BBC, Al Jazeera and Agence France-Presse, and as editor for The Big Issue, i-D magazine, the Time Out website and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network. He has written for many newspapers and magazines, including The Guardian, The Observer, The Wall Street Journal, Mixmag, The Wire and Mojo. His other books are Altered State, This is Serbia Calling and The Time of the Rebels.