Loud: A Life in Rock ‘n’ Roll by the World’s First Female Roadie

‘Music had become my talisman … Once alone and in my bed, I could turn up my little radio and be carried away … This world of music gave me hope … I saw it as a destination, something bigger than the options shown to me so far.’

At just 15, Tana Douglas ran away to the circus that was rock ‘n’ roll in the 1970s, taking a job with a young and upcoming band called AC/DC. While still a teenager she headed to the UK and later the US to work for a who’s who of bands and artists. Life on the road was exhilarating, hard work, occasionally surreal but never dull, particularly when you were the only woman in the road crew and the #metoo movement was still 40 years away.

Whether wrangling Iggy Pop across Europe, climbing trusses while seven months pregnant, drinking shots of JD with Bon Scott backstage at Wembley or donning a tailor-made suit to do lights for Elton at Windsor Castle, Tana did it all.