In Beyond the Ride: The Radical Timekeeping of Tony Williams, uncover the electrifying life and relentless genius of the drummer who redefined the pulse of modern jazz. From his early days as a prodigy in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood to his meteoric rise alongside Miles Davis at just seventeen, Tony Williams didn’t just play time—he shattered it and rewrote the rules.

Through intimate, unsentimental prose and the voice of a weathered jazz sideman who lived through the scene, this book chronicles Williams’s seismic impact on jazz, fusion, and the wider musical world. Readers are taken deep into the dressing rooms, smoke-filled studios, and volatile tour buses where innovation clashed with ego, addiction, and brilliance. Every chapter dives into a critical phase of his evolution—from the avant-garde experiments with Sam Rivers to the groundbreaking chaos of The Tony Williams Lifetime, from his estranged returns to acoustic jazz to the late-career creative obsessions that never saw daylight.

This isn’t hagiography. It’s an unflinching portrait of a man both haunted and driven by genius. With extensive historical accuracy drawn from liner notes, session logs, bootlegs, and personal recollections, Beyond the Ride captures not just the sound of Tony Williams’s drums—but the mind behind them.

Whether you're a lifelong jazz lover, a drummer chasing the ghosts of the ride cymbal, or a listener drawn to the edges of musical invention, this is the definitive account of one of the most uncompromising figures in 20th-century music.