Rare Bird Books today ushers drummer, attorney, and jam-band trailblazer Greg Anton onto the literary main stage with the publication of It’s About Time, a propulsive rock-and-roll mystery that puts the back-room drama of the music business under a bright, unflinching light.
Anton first introduced readers to gifted but socially awkward songwriter Woody Harper in his debut novel, Face the Music, set amid the vibrant street-corner scene of San Francisco in 1975. Back then, Woody scraped by on gigs and idealism, clutching a song that might change his life—if the industry didn’t chew him up first. It’s About Time picks up the beat several years later, just as Woody’s breakout hit vaults him from clubs to arenas and thrusts him into a collision course with fame, addiction, and betrayal.
When superstar crooner Ray Bell—the man who once “borrowed” Woody’s signature tune—launches a lawsuit claiming co-writing credit, the dispute becomes headline fodder and personal Armageddon. A reckless night on tour separates Woody from his infant daughter, and the ensuing spiral forces him to reckon with the cost of uncompromising art. Courtrooms, late-night studios, and hotel-room meltdowns all converge in a finale that asks whether redemption is possible once you’ve mortgaged everything for the perfect song.
Anton writes this saga with rare authority. In 1984, he and guitarist Steve Kimock founded the Bay Area improvisational powerhouse Zero, a group whose exploratory jams helped ignite what would become today’s jam-band movement. Away from the drum kit, Anton earned a law degree and argued landmark medical-marijuana cases while co-writing more than fifty songs—many with legendary Grateful Dead wordsmith Robert Hunter. That twin perspective, equal parts back-stage pass and legal brief, gives It’s About Time its heartbeat and bite.
Early readers are already calling the novel “the most authentic depiction of rock-and-roll’s underbelly since the ’70s,” praising Anton’s ability to capture both the euphoria of a thunderous encore and the quiet desperation of a hotel hallway at 3 a.m. Actor-author Peter Coyote hails the book as “funny, fearless, and heartbreakingly true,” while veteran critic Joel Selvin notes that Anton “writes the music world the way Kerouac wrote the road: wild, lyrical, and brutally honest.”
It’s About Time is available now in hardcover and e-book wherever independent books are sold, as well as through major online retailers. Anton will celebrate the launch with a series of West Coast readings and signings beginning July 31st in San Francisco, and August 15 at Copperfield’s Books in Sausalito; additional info can be found at greganton.net.
