XTC: Song Stories[1998] – Neville Farmer with XTC, based on his extensive interviews with the band and seemingly everyone connected with the production of their work. It includes coverage of their recent Apple Venus and Wasp Star albums, and the departure of Dave Gregory from the group.
Elvis Costello: God’s Comic [1989] – David Gouldstone. Album and song analysis, based on the author’s exegetical reading of EC’s lyrics and music, and in that order of priority, with musical analysis perhaps getting a bit of a short-shrift, but it’s in his lyrics that EC distinguishes himself anyway. NOT INTERVIEW-BASED, but thoughtful and well-written. Covers everything up to and including Spike. With any luck, there’s a revised edition covering more of his discography, or another stab at it by a different author. Good luck!
I’ve read Mark Hertsgaard’s A Day in the Life about The Beatles, and I liked it fine, although many fans recommend another text or two as the most-deserving reads. Offers a nicely balanced analysis of the music and lyrics of the greatest pop/rock band of all time.
Are you a particular fan of Talking Heads? I enjoyed Talking Heads [1986 – so it only runs up to “Little Creatures,” and that’s probably just as well] by “Jerome Davis” [a pseudonym], even though it eschewed systematic analysis for a breezily journalistic account of the evolution of the band within its musical scene[s]. Surely superceded in every way by the recently published book on the band by, IIRC, David Bowman, who is (or used to be, anyway) a contributor to Salon. One of the millions of books I keep intending to get around to checking out – you know how it goes.