Nik Cohn with Ben Ratliff on ‘Corner Boy’ (New York)
October 27, 7:30 PM ET • New York, NY: 92nd Street Y | 1395 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10128
Join ZE Books at the 92nd Street Y for the New York launch of Corner Boy: Loiterings New and Old, the definitive collection of music writing, memoir, and reportage from Nik Cohn. Cohn will be joined in conversation by the book’s editor, the critic Ben Ratliff.
Before rock criticism had rules, Nik Cohn was already breaking them. Corner Boy gathers Cohn’s nonfiction from the 1960s to the present into a single, riotous self-portrait, moving from Derry to London, New York, and New Orleans, and writing about pop stars and boxers, club kids and hustlers, painters, prophets, disco dancers, drag queens, lowlifes, nobodies, and the half-mythic figures who live at the edge of the action.
The book draws from across Cohn’s career, including Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom, his ground-breaking 1968 history of pop music; The Heart of the World, a soul-biography of Broadway; and Triksta, the saga of his misadventures in the New Orleans rap scene. Complete with full-color images drawn from Muriel, his ever-evolving sixty-year photo collage, Corner Boy is the definitive record of a life spent bearing witness.
About the Author
Nik Cohn grew up in Derry, Northern Ireland; covered “Swinging London” in the 1960s; was a contributing editor at New York magazine in the ’70s, focusing on street cultures and pop life; lived and wrote in New Orleans, Paris, Shelter Island and, most recently, the Hudson Valley.
About the Editor
Ben Ratliff is the author of books including Run the Song: Writing About Running About Listening and Coltrane: The Story of a Sound. A former music critic for The New York Times, he lives in New York City and teaches at New York University.
About the Venue
92NY (the 92nd Street Y, New York) has been a center of cultural and civic life in New York since 1874, presenting concerts, talks, readings, and classes on the Upper East Side. Its Unterberg Poetry Center, founded in 1939, is among the country’s longest-running literary reading series. 92ny.org
“The best writer about pop music . . . an inspiration.” —Jarvis Cocker, BBC Radio 6 Music
The definitive, lavishly illustrated collection of music writing, memoir, and reportage from the redoubtable Nik Cohn.
Release: Oct 6, 2026
Hardcover ISBN: 9798988670148 • 400 pages
UK release: Nov 19, 2026 • UK Price: £25