Wayward: Just Another Life to Live -- Vashti's Memoir

In 2022, Vashti Bunyan released a memoir chronicling her remarkable musical and personal journey. Wayward: Just Another Life to Live is not grouped into chapters, perhaps a too-restrictive structure for the free spirit described in these pages. Instead, the book is a stream of vignettes, taking readers on a tour that starts with her family background and ends as she releases what is probably her final album, 2014's Heartleap.

During the intervening years, we accompany Vashti through her encounter with big-time music production in London, her discomfort with the boxes into which that industry wanted to slot her, and her meandering, anachronistic, multi-year horse-and-cart pilgrimage from the big city to the desolation of Scotland's Outer Hebrides. We absorb her impressions of so many characters in her life -- artists, musicians, lovers, Travellers, beloved animals (Bess the cart horse might be the tale's greatest hero). We can nearly hear the heartfelt paeans to nature on her initial album, Just Another Diamond Day ... and feel her musical ambitions draining away as the album reaps few sales or positive reviews.

And then, nearly three decades after its release, having settled into a more traditional life and raised children, Vashti discovers that the few extant copies of Diamond Day have become valuable collector's items. A reissue gains praise in the press and leads to concert tours. Music has reclaimed Vashti.

This book feels like one of Vashti's songs: a layered story, set to its own tempo, flowing mellifluously toward a pleasing culmination. She doesn't attempt to overwhelm her audience with cleverness and sparkling wordplay; she just gently unspools her thoughts and reminiscences. Any fan of Vashti's music will likely find that the insights and histories to be found here will make listening to these songs an even richer experience.