Thurs. March 20

Dean Wareham - singer-songwriter-guitarist - has had a spectacularly successful career if you can define career as a "cult success." That happened with his first Boston-based trio, Galaxie 500, and later with the more rockin' - still hypnotic - Luna. That New York band lasted 15 years, and never put on a show I saw that was less than compelling. Drawing from the minimalism of the Velvet Underground, Luna built trance-like songs, spiked with shards of edgy guitar leads. After the music ended, Wareham decided to set down in print what he'd lived for a couple of decades. The result is "Black Postcards: A Rock & Roll Romance," which as the publisher notes, includes both the "bitter pills and self-inflicted wounds" as well as the rock 'n' roll high life. Wareham also was around - in the midst - of the music as "alternative" and "indie" music lost its already amorphous shape and definition. Wareham comes back to town to read from his book and talk at Brookline Booksmith Thursday March 20 at 7 p.m. Free.

279 Harvard St., Brookline, 617-5660-6660 www.brooklinebooksmith.com