Roth may refer to:

Places[link]

• Roth (district), in Bavaria
  • Roth, Bavaria, capital of that district
• Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany:
  • Roth an der Our, in the district Bitburg-Prüm
  • Roth bei Prüm, in the district Bitburg-Prüm
  • Roth, Altenkirchen, in the district of Altenkirchen
  • Roth, Bad Kreuznach, in the district of Bad Kreuznach
  • Roth, Rhein-Hunsrück, in the district Rhein-Hunsrück
  • Roth, Rhein-Lahn, in the district Rhein-Lahn-Kreis
• Roth, Moselle, a village in the commune of Hambach, Moselle, France

People[link]

• Roth (surname)
• Roth, formal botanical abbreviation for Albrecht Wilhelm Roth (1757–1834), German physician and botanist
• Gabrielle Roth, pioneer of 5Rhythms dance

Fictional characters[link]

• Cooper Roth, Marvel Comics superhero
• Hyman Roth, fictional character in the film The Godfather Part II

Other uses[link]

• Challenge Roth, a long distance triathlon race
• Daniel Roth (watchmakers), watch making company
• Roth IRA or Roth 401(k), tax advantaged retirement savings accounts in the U.S.
• Roth festival or रोठ in Hindi is a special Thick bread/festival of Jains in India

Acronyms[link]

• Realms of the Haunting, computer game

See also[link]

• Rothe

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

David Lee Roth
David Lee Roth, 2008
Background information
Also known as	Diamond Dave
Born	(1954-10-10) October 10, 1954 (age 57) Bloomington, Indiana, United States
Genres	Hard rock, heavy metal
Occupations	Musician, songwriter, paramedic, producer, author, disc jockey
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, harmonica, synthesizer
Years active	1969–present
Labels	Warner Bros., Interscope, Magna Carta, CMH
Associated acts	The David Lee Roth Band, Van Halen
Website	www.davidleeroth.com

David Lee Roth (born October 10, 1954)^[1] is an American rock vocalist, songwriter, actor, author, and former radio personality. Roth is one of few vocalists with a larger than 4 octave range in full voice (from G1 to G♯5).^[2]

Roth is best known as the original and current lead singer of the Southern California-based hard rock outfit Van Halen. After departing Van Halen in 1985 Roth first enjoyed a successful career as a solo artist, which originated while still a member of that band and yielded several RIAA-certified Gold and Platinum records.^[3] After more than two decades apart, Roth rejoined Van Halen in 2006 for a North American tour that became the most successful in the band's history^[4] and one of the highest grossing of that year.^[5] Roth has remained the lead singer of Van Halen since his 2006 return and has recently completed recording new material with the band for their first album together since 1984.^[6]

Early life[link]

Roth was born on October 10, 1954, in Bloomington, Indiana. He is the son of ophthalmologist Nathan Roth and Sibyl Roth and the brother of Allison and Lisa Roth. Dr. Nathan Roth was a renowned eye surgeon, who made millions via his practice and in real estate. Dr. Roth was even featured on the TV show, "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous", in 1984. On that program, Dr. Roth claims that he was Van Halen's first manager helping the group obtain gigs in the early days. Nathan owned a 14,000-square-foot home in Pasadena named "Rothwood" and a chateau named "Bradbury". He was a writer, an actor, and a surgeon.

David's paternal and maternal grandparents emigrated from Azores Islands, Portugal, and Russia to New Castle, Indiana. David is half-Jewish on his Father's side.^[7] He was raised in the Jewish religion. Many members of his family were surgeons: Roth has an uncle, Dave, who is a neurosurgeon; an uncle, Marty, who is an orthopedic surgeon; and a grandfather who was a surgeon.^[8] Roth's uncle, Manny Roth, is an influential New York City nightclub owner and entertainment entrepreneur who built and owned the New York establishment Cafe Wha? in the early 1960s, where the likes of Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix were performing and hanging out. Seven-year-old David Lee got his first taste of, and desire for, show business from the inside by hanging out at Cafe Wha?, as mentioned in his book "Crazy from the Heat" numerous times. His uncle would be one of David's first guests on his short-lived radio show on New York's 92.3 Free-FM.

After living in both Bloomington, Indiana, and Swampscott, Massachusetts, Roth moved to Pasadena, California, in his teens. Roth stated he bounced around a number of schools and spent three years going to a psychiatrist. He eventually attended a ranch for troubled teens where he cared for a horse to build a sense of responsibility.^[9] He was educated at The Webb Schools in Claremont, California and John Muir High School in Pasadena. He later attended Pasadena City College where he met the Van Halen brothers, Eddie and Alex, although he did not graduate. During this period, Roth worked as a hospital orderly.^[8]

With Van Halen: 1972–1985, 1996, 2001[link]

By the time Roth was in his late teens, he was singing solo as well as with a group called the Red Ball Jets. Another Los Angeles area group, Mammoth (featuring Alex Van Halen on drums and Edward Van Halen singing and playing lead guitar), occasionally rented the Red Ball Jets' PA system. Roth would eventually be invited to join Mammoth as lead singer, an invitation he quickly accepted. In 1974, the band was informed that another act was already using the name Mammoth, and, at Roth's urging, they opted to rename themselves Van Halen.^[10]

Performing both original songs and established tunes, Van Halen eventually gained local success, becoming a regular feature at the Starwood Club, the West Coast's portal to fame. It was during their four-month stint there that they were first discovered. In 1976, Gene Simmons took note of the band (in particular Eddie Van Halen, who Simmons secretly hoped to recruit for his own band, KISS) and assisted them in producing their first demo tape.^[11] Although featuring many of the songs that would be included on their future debut album, the tape did little to garner them any major label attention at the time. In early 1977, Warner Brothers' Ted Templeman came to the Starwood, heard the group, and immediately signed them to a contract with his label.^[10] During this period Roth's stage persona was heavily influenced by that of Black Oak Arkansas vocalist Jim "Dandy" Mangrum.

Released in 1978, the band's first album, Van Halen, earned the band significant national attention. The album was a smashing success, with more than twelve million copies sold, and the original Van Halen went on to release five more successful albums over the next seven years. Roth is often credited with promoting Van Halen's image as the quintessential rock band, one devoted to a lifestyle described by David Fricke in Rolling Stone as "a nonstop booze-and-babes party train." Despite this wild image, Roth earned applause for his abilities as a lyricist and singer. Roth's clever lyrics worked in harmony with the music composed by Edward Van Halen to create the band's trademark tunes, tunes that helped transform Van Halen, in Fricke's words, into "the monster rock action squad that ruled the charts and the airwaves for seven years."^[10]

In early 1985, while still a member of Van Halen, Roth released "Crazy From the Heat", a popular solo EP of off-beat standards. Singles for "California Girls" and "Just a Gigolo/I Ain't Got Nobody" succeeded largely due to their innovative music videos (produced by Jerry Kramer and co-produced by Glenn Goodwin and Bobby Diebold), which featured ridiculous characters created by Roth and his Creative Chief Director, Pete Angelus, who'd previously directed Van Halen's Roth-era videos.

On April 1, 1985, Roth and Van Halen parted ways. In his 1998 autobiography, Crazy From the Heat, Roth characterized Van Halen's music just before his 1985 departure as "morose". Roth wished to record an album quickly, tour, and then shoot a movie, (for which he hoped Van Halen would record the soundtrack. The film, entitled Crazy From The Heat, was budgeted at $20 million by CBS Studios; however, the project folded after the consolidation of CBS Studios.) ^[10]

In June 1996, Roth reunited with Van Halen for a brief time and to great public fanfare. He recorded two new songs for Van Halen's Best of Vol. 1 album, "Can't Get This Stuff No More" and "Me Wise Magic." After an infamous appearance on September 5, 1996, at the MTV Video Music Awards during which Roth and Eddie Van Halen reportedly threatened each other,^[12] Roth was passed over for Van Halen's new lead vocalist job in favor of Gary Cherone. In 2012, Cherone confirmed the longtime rumor that he had already been chosen as Van Halen's new singer long before the MTV incident, connoting that Van Halen used Roth to create public interest in the Best Of Vol. 1 hits collection.^[13] '"Me Wise Magic," Van Halen's virtuosic display of psychedlia-influenced rock with Roth on vocals became a #1 Billboard Mainstream Rock hit in 1996.

In 2001, rumors swirled that Roth and the members of Van Halen had recorded several new songs together and were in the process of attempting yet another reunion. Roth later confirmed this, but nothing became of the music. A box set was also rumored, but never materialized. Instead, Warner Bros. issued remastered versions of all six early Van Halen studio albums.

Solo career: 1985–2003[link]

In late 1985, Roth assembled a backing band, consisting of guitar virtuoso Steve Vai, bassist Billy Sheehan, and drummer Gregg Bissonette. With veteran Van Halen producer Ted Templeman handling the production, Roth released his debut full-length solo album, Eat 'Em and Smile in July 1986. The album saw Roth return to hard rock music, and met with huge commercial and critical success, charting at #4 on the Billboard Top 200.^[14]

In January 1988, Roth released Skyscraper, a more experimental recording featuring the hit single "Just Like Paradise." Skyscraper was co-produced by Roth and Steve Vai and was certified Platinum (1 million in sales). At the time of its release, Skyscraper peaked at #6 on the Billboard album chart. Soon after Skyscraper's release, Billy Sheehan left Roth's band due to musical differences.^[15] He was replaced in time for the album's support tour with bassist Matt Bissonette.^[16] The tour was a major production featuring, at various points, Roth surfing above the audience on a surfboard suspended on wires, and in a boxing ring. Both parts of the stage show were featured in the "Just Like Paradise" music video.^[17] The show also featured the band in a calypso segment playing Caribbean steel drums and in an unplugged segment where the band performed acoustic covers of some rock and roll classics.^[18]

Following the tour for Skyscraper, Steve Vai left the band to pursue a solo career and record and tour with Whitesnake. Roth replaced him with guitar virtuoso Jason Becker to record his third solo LP, A Little Ain't Enough. A more mainstream hard rock album produced by Bob Rock, A Little Ain't Enough achieved RIAA gold status. Shortly before the support tour for the album, Becker was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease, which rendered him unable to perform. Roth replaced Becker with guitarist Joe Holmes for the tour. The emergence of grunge had altered musical tastes at the time and the tour did not do as well financially as its predecessors, marking the last solo arena tour for Roth.

In April 1993, Roth was arrested in New York City's Washington Square Park for buying what he described as "$10 worth of Jamaican bunk reefer" from an undercover police officer. The arrest made headlines^[19] and became a late-night television punch-line. When asked by Howard Stern whether the bust was a publicity stunt, Roth said, "Howard, in New York City this small of a bust is a $35 traffic citation. It literally says 'Buick, Chevy, Other'. Your dog poops on the sidewalk, it's $50. If I was looking for publicity, I would have pooped on the sidewalk."

In March 1994, Roth released Your Filthy Little Mouth, a more musically-eclectic album produced by Nile Rodgers.^[20] The album failed to achieve positive critical or commercial success, proving to be Roth's first solo effort not to reach Gold or Platinum status. The support tour found Roth playing considerably smaller venues than where he had played previously. Although out of print for over ten years prior, Your Filthy Little Mouth saw a remastered re-release in 2007.

In 1995, Roth returned with an adult lounge act, performing largely in Las Vegas casinos, with a brass band that featured Nile Rodgers, Edgar Winter, and members of the Miami Sound Machine. It also featured several exotic dancers, who in Roth's words were "so sweet, I bet they shit sugar!"^[21]

By the late 1990s, Roth trained as an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) and worked as one for some time.^[22] He occasionally told stories about his experiences as an EMT on his radio show.

In 1997, Roth wrote a well-received memoir, entitled Crazy From the Heat, which landed on The New York Times Bestseller's List. The 359-page book was whittled down from over 1,200 pages of monologues, which were recorded and transcribed by a Princeton University graduate who followed Roth around for almost a year. The book received mostly positive critical reaction and spent time on the New York Times Bestseller list.

In 1998, Roth released a final album of self-penned solo material entitled DLR Band. The album featured a popular song, "Slam Dunk," which, like a majority of the album, was co-written by rising guitar hero and longtime David Lee Roth fan, John 5. The album was considered a return to form for Roth by critics.

In 2002, The "Song for Song: The Heavyweight Champions of Rock and Roll Tour" paired Roth with his musical nemesis Sammy Hagar, and proceeded to revive the careers of both former Van Halen frontmen. Despite the monetary success and publicity generated by the tour, Roth's future with Van Halen seemed uncertain. "Yankee Rose" appeared in the 2002 videogame Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock, while generally, Roth became more visible than he'd been in years, e.g. appearing on commercials for MTV with Justin Timberlake.

In 2003, Roth released his final solo album called Diamond Dave, which included one last self-penned John 5 collaboration.

In 2004, Roth appeared on the very popular TV series The Sopranos as a poker-playing guest of Tony Soprano. Regarding this, Roth was quoted on his website as saying, "Mom says I'm going to look like Lee Marvin in 10 years whether I'm in movies or not, so I might as well get after it!"

On July 4 2004, Roth performed with the world renowned Boston Pops Orchestra at Boston's annual Pops Goes the Fourth celebration. The performance was witnessed by over 100,000 people live in Boston, and by millions more on U.S. television.

The David Lee Roth Show: 2005[link]

David Lee Roth was tapped to replace his friend, Howard Stern, on terrestrial radio, following Stern's decision to align himself with SIRIUS Satellite radio. Roth's show lasted for four months, and ended in a lawsuit. During the course of David Lee Roth's radio show, he maintained a relationship with Howard Stern News Department reporter Steve Langford. Roth and Langford met frequently after shows, with Langford bringing tape back to Howard of Roth's complaints towards WXRK's management. Issues included Roth's firing, the missing podcast, and his show being cut off early. Langford and Roth met last on Roth's final day, April 21, 2006, Roth performed the Rolling Stones song "You Can't Always Get What You Want" for Howard and discussed an impending lawsuit against CBS.

Return to Van Halen: 2007–present[link]

On January 24, 2007, after much anticipation, Billboard.com reported that David Lee Roth would rejoin Van Halen for a 40-date arena and amphitheater tour in Summer 2007.^[23] This report, among many others, was confirmed with an official press release posted on the official Van Halen website on Feb. 2, 2007.

On Feb. 2, 2007 The Official Van Halen Web Site released information that David Lee Roth had rejoined the band along with current members Alex, Eddie, along with Eddie and Valerie Bertinelli's teenage son, Wolfgang Van Halen. Michael Anthony, Van Halen's original bass player, played the summer 2004 tour with Sammy Hagar under a 'hired gun' contract. On March 8 the official Van Halen website posted a letter from Eddie Van Halen stating that Ed was entering rehab and that the tour with Roth had been indefinitely postponed.

In March 2007 five members of Van Halen, the four original members and Sammy Hagar were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The Van Halen brothers did not attend due to Eddie's condition. Roth was to perform with the band Velvet Revolver; however, conflict with the band caused his part to be canceled. Roth subsequently did not attend the induction, leaving only Michael Anthony and Sammy Hagar to represent Van Halen. Both Anthony and Hagar thanked Roth publicly for his contribution to the band during the awards acceptance. David Lee Roth did not attend the ceremony and the event was considered yet another public embarrassment for the band.^[24]

The conflict was rumored to be based on song selection. Roth wanted to perform "Jump", the band's highest charting song, but Velvet Revolver would only agree to play "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" or "You Really Got Me". When it was finally agreed upon that Paul Shaffer would perform "Jump", Roth claimed that there was no longer enough time to rehearse and opted not to attend the ceremony.

On G4's show Code Monkeys, Dave is shown giving an inspirational speech to keep the others from taking up jobs at Bellecovision and asks "Would David Lee Roth leave Van Halen?" The show takes place in the 1980s.

On August 13, 2007, 6 months after the initial reunion tour was postponed, it was finally confirmed by Van Halen with Roth at a press conference in Los Angeles that they would start the tour back up again and schedule it starting in September 2007. At that conference, Eddie Van Halen stated that he and Roth were "like brothers" now. Calling Van Halen a "real band", both Edward and Roth spoke of the possibility of further worldwide touring and a new album in mind for the future.

On June 5, 2008, Van Halen announced that the 2007–2008 tour with Roth grossed more than $93 million, a record for the rock band. Van Halen played to nearly one million people during 74 arena shows throughout the United States and Canada, beginning September 27, 2007 in Charlotte, N.C. and wrapping June 3, 2008 in Quebec City, QC for the 400th anniversary of the city.

In December 2011, Van Halen announced a 2012 tour with David Lee Roth.^[25]

The new Roth-fronted Van Halen album A Different Kind of Truth was released on February 7, 2012. A tour commenced in February 2012.

Solo band members[link]

Guitars[link]

• Brian Young and Toshi Hiketa (2006)
• Toshi Hiketa (2003–2005)
• Brian Young (2002–2003)
• Bart Walsh (1999, 2001)
• Mike Hartman and John Lowery (1998)
• Steve Hunter (1997)
• Terry Kilgore (1994)
• Terry Kilgore and Rocket Ritchotte (1993–1994)
• Joe Holmes and Steve Hunter (1991–1992)
• Jason Becker and Steve Hunter (1990–1991)
• Steve Vai (1985–1989)
• Peter Lewis (1990–1991)
• Electric Moccasin

Bass[link]

• Todd Jensen (1990–1991, 1999–2000, 2004–2006)
• James LoMenzo (2001–2004)
• B'urbon Bob (1998)
• John Regan (1994)
• James Hunting (1993–1994)
• Matt Bissonette (1988–1990)
• Billy Sheehan (1985–1988)

Drums[link]

• Jimmy DeGrasso (2006)
• Ray Luzier (1997–2000, 2001–2005)
• Ron Wikso (1993–1994)
• Gregg Bissonette (1985–1992)

Keyboards[link]

• Marcus Margand II (2000–2001)
• Patrick Howard I (1998–1999)
• Richard Hilton (1994–1995)
• Brett Tuggle (1988–1994, 1997)
• Jesse Harms (1986)

Discography[link]

Albums with Van Halen

• Van Halen (1978)
• Van Halen II (1979)
• Women and Children First (1980)
• Fair Warning (1981)
• Diver Down (1982)
• 1984 (1984)
• A Different Kind of Truth (2012)

Studio albums/EPs

• Crazy from the Heat EP (1985)
• Eat 'Em and Smile (1986)
• Sonrisa Salvaje (1986) Spanish version of Eat 'Em and Smile
• Skyscraper (1988)
• A Little Ain't Enough (1991)
• Your Filthy Little Mouth (1994)
• DLR Band (1998)
• Diamond Dave (2003)

Other appearances

• Strummin' with the Devil: The Southern Side of Van Halen – vocals on "Jump" and "Jamie's Cryin'" (2006)

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• David Lee Roth (1997). Crazy From the Heat. ISBN 0-7868-6339-0

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: David Lee Roth

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: David Lee Roth

• Official website
• David Lee Roth Army
• Official Van Halen website
• Van Halen News Desk

To comply with Wikipedia's lead section guidelines, the introduction of this article may need to be rewritten. Please discuss this issue on the talk page and read the layout guide to make sure the section will be inclusive of all essential details. (April 2012)

Asher Roth
Background information
Birth name	Asher Paul Roth
Born	(1985-08-11) August 11, 1985 (age 26)
Origin	Morrisville, Pennsylvania, US
Genres	Hip hop
Occupations	Rapper
Years active	2005-present
Labels	Schoolboy, SRC, Def Jam
Associated acts	Nottz Raw, All City Chess Club
Website	asherrothmusic.com

Asher Paul Roth (born August 11, 1985) is an American rapper from Morrisville, Pennsylvania. Roth is signed to Schoolboy Records, SRC, and Def Jam.

Early life[link]

Asher Roth was born and raised in Morrisville, Pennsylvania, a small town about 20 miles northeast of Philadelphia.^[1][2] His mother, Elizabeth (née McConnell), is a yoga instructor, and his father, David Roth, is the executive director of a design firm.^[3][4][5][6] His mother has Scottish ancestry and his paternal grandfather was Jewish.^[7][8] Roth does not consider himself Jewish, although his name often leads people to believe he is.^[9] He attended Pennsbury High School. Growing up, Roth was exposed to little hip hop in his family, with his parents preferring "The Temptations, Earth, Wind & Fire ... Bruce Springsteen and Dire Straits."^[10] According to Roth:

The first CD I ever bought was Dave Matthews Band's Crash ...That is how suburban I am...I finally got into hip hop in '98 when I heard the Annie sample with Jay-Z....When I wrote my 'A Milli' freestyle, that was me listening to 10 years of hip hop and not relating to it at all. Like, Damn I don’t sell coke. Damn, I don’t have cars or 25-inch rims. I don't have guns. I finally got to a point where I had the confidence to do this thing myself, and I was making music for me. And it turns out, a lot of people feel the same way I do.^[11]

Asher has also stated that:

Hip-hop has always been very influential in the ‘burbs, [but] it’s just a matter of where we could relate to it. You find a lot of kids that are really confused. You look at them and they’re dressed out of character. They don’t look right. I figured out, I don’t have to dress this way, but I can still love hip-hop.^[12]

After graduating high school, Roth entered West Chester University and became an Elementary Education major, while continuing to record verses over other people's beats. During sophomore year, Roth posted some of his verses on his MySpace page and sent a Friend Request to Scooter Braun, an Atlanta-based promoter and former VP of Marketing for Jermaine Dupri's So So Def. One week after speaking to Braun, Roth flew down to Atlanta and was immediately signed by Braun, who subsequently became his manager.^[10]

Asher Roth cites Jay-Z and Eminem among his influences in hip hop, mostly by Jay-Z's "Hard Knock Life".^[13]

Roth's lyrics characteristically center around what have been called "middle-class minutiae, some also consider them to be a joke."^[11] Roth's song "I Love College" is about partying after a visit to Penn State, but includes fatuous lyrics such as "I can get pizza a dollar a slice"^[11] that have been identified as "far from threatening".

Music career[link]

After linking up with Braun, Roth moved to Atlanta to pursue a hip-hop career full-time. As industry buzz grew, Roth was courted by a number of labels, including SRC, Def Jam, Warner Bros. Records and Atlantic Records.^[14] Roth would eventually sign a joint venture between Braun's Schoolboy Music and Steve Rifkind, chairman of SRC/Universal Records. On June 13, 2008, Roth put out his first professional release, the Don Cannon and DJ Drama-helmed The Greenhouse Effect mixtape, via the Internet. This resulted in Roth being the second white rapper to be featured on Drama and Cannon’s Gangsta Grillz series.

[edit] 2009: Asleep in the Bread Aisle

Roth started recording a full album in late 2008. It was completed in 2009. The first single was "I Love College" which received many hits across North America. His second single was "Lark on my Go-Kart". After the two singles were released, Roth's studio album Asleep in the Bread Aisle was released on April 20, 2009. He supported his album with a nationwide tour with B.o.B. and Kid Cudi. Asher also joined Blink-182 in the second half of their reunion tour in the fall of 2009.

Roth was featured on the cover of XXL magazine’s annual Top 10 Freshmen: Hip-Hop’s Class ’09 issue.

[edit] 2010-present: The Rawth EP and Is This Too Orange?

After finishing touring in 2009 and releasing a second mixtape, Seared Foie Gras with Quince and Cranberry,^[15] Roth began working on his second studio album. From his friend Boyder's YouTube page, he has been seen working with producers Pharrell Williams and Nottz Raw. While working with Nottz, the two of them decided to collaborate on a project together, due to having a number of records rejected by the label due to sampling & copyright issues.^[16] The end result was an eight track EP, solely produced by Nottz, entitled The Rawth EP. The EP, which features appearances from Colin Munroe, D.A. (of Chester French), Rhymefest and Kardinal Offishall, was released December 27, 2010.^[17] Roth released and promoted "G.R.I.N.D (Get Ready It's a New Day)", the first single off of his upcoming second album, by traveling to different radio stations around the country. Roth revealed four tracks on his upcoming album in a XXL article. One features Game, one is produced by Swizz Beatz and another is titled "Run it Back".^[10] On May 25, it was announced that Roth's second studio album would no longer be called The Spaghetti Tree.^[18] His song with Akon titled "Last Man Standing" is featured on the soundtrack for the videogame Madden NFL 12. In an interview with Rikki Martinez of Power 106 he announced he will be releasing a mixtape titled Pabst & Jazz and revealed the title of his upcoming second album, Is This Too Orange?.^[19] On November 11th, 2011 he released the first offering off Pabst & Jazz, a song titled "Common Knowledge". In November 2011, Roth signed to Def Jam Recordings after several years been signed to SRC Records.

Personal life[link]

Asher Roth is open about his use of cannabis. As stated in an interview conducted and filmed by DJ Vlad, Roth stated his views about the legalization of marijuana and the use of cigarettes:

Cigarettes don't do anything for you except kill you ... I honestly don't believe [marijuana] is the gateway drug, because I use it and I've never done anything else ... I'm trying to be open about my "pot smoking" ...^[20]

Discography[link]

Studio albums[link]

• Asleep in the Bread Aisle (2009)
• Is This Too Orange? (2012)

Mixtapes[link]

• The GreenHouse Effect (2008)
• Seared Foie Gras with Quince and Cranberry (2010)
• Pabst & Jazz (2011)

EPs[link]

• Just Listen (2005)
• The Rawth EP (With Nottz) (2010)

Awards[link]

• MTV Video Music Awards
  • Best New Artist ("I Love College") [Nominated]
  • Best Hip Hop Video ("I Love College") [Nominated]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Office page at Facebook

Philip Milton Roth (born March 19, 1933^[1]) is an American novelist. He gained fame with the 1959 novella Goodbye, Columbus, an irreverent and humorous portrait of Jewish-American life that earned him the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction.^[2][3] In 1969 he became a major celebrity with the publication of the controversial Portnoy's Complaint, the humorous and sexually explicit psychoanalytical monologue of "a lust-ridden, mother-addicted young Jewish bachelor", filled with "intimate, shameful detail, and coarse, abusive language".^[3][4]

Roth has been one of the most honored authors of his generation: his books have twice been awarded the National Book Award, twice the National Book Critics Circle award, and three times the PEN/Faulkner Award. He received a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel, American Pastoral, which featured one of his best-known characters, Nathan Zuckerman, the subject of many other of Roth's novels. His 2001 novel The Human Stain, another Zuckerman novel, was awarded the United Kingdom's WH Smith Literary Award for the best book of the year. His fiction, set frequently in Newark, New Jersey, is known for its intensely autobiographical character, for philosophically and formally blurring the distinction between reality and fiction, for its "supple, ingenious style" and for its provocative explorations of Jewish and American identity.^[5]

Life[link]

Philip Roth grew up in the Weequahic neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey, as the second child of first-generation American parents, Jews of Galician descent, and graduated from Newark's Weequahic High School in 1950.^[6] Roth attended Bucknell University, earning a degree in English. He pursued graduate studies at the University of Chicago, where he received an M.A. in English literature in 1955 and worked briefly as an instructor in the university's writing program. Roth taught creative writing at the University of Iowa and Princeton University. He continued his academic career at the University of Pennsylvania, where he taught comparative literature before retiring from teaching in 1991.

While at Chicago, Roth met the novelist Saul Bellow, as well as Margaret Martinson, who became his first wife. Their separation in 1963, along with Martinson's death in a car crash in 1968, left a lasting mark on Roth's literary output. Specifically, Martinson was the inspiration for female characters in several of Roth's novels, including Lucy Nelson in When She Was Good, and Maureen Tarnopol in My Life As a Man.^[7] Between the end of his studies and the publication of his first book in 1959, Roth served two years in the United States Army and then wrote short fiction and criticism for various magazines, including movie reviews for The New Republic. Events in Roth's personal life have occasionally been the subject of media scrutiny. According to his pseudo-confessional novel Operation Shylock (1993), Roth suffered a nervous breakdown in the late 1980s. In 1990, he married his long-time companion, English actress Claire Bloom. In 1994 they separated, and in 1996 Bloom published a memoir, Leaving a Doll's House, which described the couple's marriage in detail, much of which was unflattering to Roth. Certain aspects of I Married a Communist have been regarded by critics as veiled rebuttals to accusations put forth in Bloom's memoir.

Career[link]

Roth's first book, Goodbye, Columbus, a novella and five short stories, won the National Book Award in 1960, and afterwards he published two novels, Letting Go and When She Was Good. However, it was not until the publication of his third novel, Portnoy's Complaint, in 1969 that Roth enjoyed widespread commercial and critical success. During the 1970s Roth experimented in various modes, from the political satire Our Gang to the Kafkaesque The Breast. By the end of the decade Roth had created his alter ego Nathan Zuckerman. In a series of highly self-referential novels and novellas that followed between 1979 and 1986, Zuckerman appeared as either the main character or an interlocutor.

Sabbath's Theater (1995) may have Roth's most lecherous protagonist, Mickey Sabbath, a disgraced former puppeteer; it won his second National Book Award.^[8] In complete contrast American Pastoral (1997), the first volume of his so-called second Zuckerman trilogy, focuses on the life of virtuous Newark athletics star Swede Levov and the tragedy that befalls him when his teenage daughter transforms into a domestic terrorist during the late 1960s; it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.^[9] I Married a Communist (1998) focuses on the McCarthy era. Allegedly inspired by the life of the writer Anatole Broyard, The Human Stain examines identity politics in 1990s America. The Dying Animal (2001) is a short novel about eros and death that revisits literary professor David Kepesh, protagonist of two 1970s works, The Breast and The Professor of Desire. In The Plot Against America (2004), Roth imagines an alternate American history in which Charles Lindbergh, aviator hero and isolationist, is elected U.S. president in 1940, and the U.S. negotiates an understanding with Hitler's Nazi Germany and embarks on its own program of anti-Semitism.

Roth's novel Everyman, a meditation on illness, aging, desire, and death, was published in May 2006. For Everyman Roth won his third PEN/Faulkner Award, making him the only person so honored. Exit Ghost, which again features Nathan Zuckerman, was released in October 2007. According to the book's publisher, it is the last Zuckerman novel.^[10] Indignation, Roth's 29th book, was published on September 16, 2008. Set in 1951, during the Korean War, it follows Marcus Messner's departure from Newark to Ohio's Winesburg College, where he begins his sophomore year. In 2009, Roth's 30th book The Humbling was published, which told the story of the last performances of Simon Axler, a celebrated stage actor. Roth’s 31st book, Nemesis, was published on October 5, 2010. According to the book's notes, Nemesis is the final in a series of four "short novels," which also included Everyman, Indignation and The Humbling.

In October 2009, during an interview with Tina Brown of The Daily Beast website to promote The Humbling, Roth considered the future of literature and its place in society, stating his belief that within 25 years the reading of novels will be regarded as a "cultic" activity:

I was being optimistic about 25 years really. I think it's going to be cultic. I think always people will be reading them but it will be a small group of people. Maybe more people than now read Latin poetry, but somewhere in that range... To read a novel requires a certain amount of concentration, focus, devotion to the reading. If you read a novel in more than two weeks you don't read the novel really. So I think that kind of concentration and focus and attentiveness is hard to come by — it's hard to find huge numbers of people, large numbers of people, significant numbers of people, who have those qualities[.]^[11]

When asked his opinion on the emergence of digital books and e-books as possibly replacing printed copy, Roth was equally negative and downbeat about the prospect:

The book can't compete with the screen. It couldn't compete [in the] beginning with the movie screen. It couldn't compete with the television screen, and it can't compete with the computer screen... Now we have all those screens, so against all those screens a book couldn't measure up.^[12]

This interview is not the first time that Roth has expressed pessimism over the future of the novel and its significance in recent years. Talking to the Observer's Robert McCrum in 2001, he said that "I'm not good at finding 'encouraging' features in American culture. I doubt that aesthetic literacy has much of a future here."^[11]

Influences and themes[link]

Much of Roth's fiction revolves around semi-autobiographical themes, while self-consciously and playfully addressing the perils of establishing connections between the author Philip Roth and his fictional lives and voices,^{[citation needed]} including narrators and protagonists such as David Kepesh and Nathan Zuckerman or even the character "Philip Roth", of which there are two in Operation Shylock. In Roth's fiction, the question of authorship^{[citation needed]} is intertwined with the theme of the idealistic,^{[citation needed]} secular Jewish-American son who attempts to distance himself from Jewish customs and traditions, and from what he perceives as the at times suffocating influence of parents, rabbis, and other community leaders. Jewish sons such as most infamously Alexander Portnoy and later Nathan Zuckerman rebel by denouncing Judaism, while at the same time remaining attached to a sense of Jewish identity.^{[citation needed]} Roth's fiction has been described by critics as pervaded by "a kind of alienation that is enlivened and exacerbated by what binds it".^[13]

Roth's first work, Goodbye, Columbus, for his irreverent humor of the life of middle-class Jewish Americans, was controversial among reviewers, which were highly polarized in their judgments;^[3] a reviewer criticized it as infused with a sense of self-loathing. In response, Roth, in his 1963 essay "Writing About Jews" (collected in Reading Myself and Others), maintained that he wanted to explore the conflict between the call to Jewish solidarity and his desire to be free to question the values and morals of middle-class Jewish Americans uncertain of their identities in an era of cultural assimilation and upward social mobility:

The cry "Watch out for the goyim!" at times seems more the expression of an unconscious wish than of a warning: Oh that they were out there, so that we could be together here! A rumor of persecution, a taste of exile, might even bring with it the old world of feelings and habits — something to replace the new world of social accessibility and moral indifference, the world which tempts all our promiscuous instincts, and where one cannot always figure out what a Jew is that a Christian is not.^[14]

In Roth's fiction, the exploration of "promiscuous instincts" within the context of Jewish-American lives, mainly from a male viewpoint, plays an important role. In the words of critic Hermione Lee:

Philip Roth's fiction strains to shed the burden of Jewish traditions and proscriptions. … The liberated Jewish consciousness, let loose into the disintegration of the American Dream, finds itself deracinated and homeless. American society and politics, by the late sixties, are a grotesque travesty of what Jewish immigrants had traveled towards: liberty, peace, security, a decent liberal democracy.^[15]

While Roth's fiction has strong autobiographical influences, it has also incorporated social commentary and political satire, most obviously in Our Gang and Operation Shylock. Since the 1990s, Roth's fiction has often combined autobiographical elements with retrospective dramatizations of postwar American life. Roth has described American Pastoral and the two following novels as a loosely connected "American trilogy". All these novels deal with aspects of the postwar era against the backdrop of the nostalgically remembered Jewish-American childhood of Nathan Zuckerman, in which the experience of life on the American home front during the Second World War features prominently.^{[citation needed]}

In much of Roth's fiction, the 1940s, comprising Roth's and Zuckerman's childhood, mark a high point of American idealism and social cohesion. A more satirical treatment of the patriotism and idealism of the war years is evident in Roth's more comic novels, such as Portnoy's Complaint and Sabbath's Theater. In The Plot Against America, the alternate history of the war years dramatizes the prevalence of anti-Semitism and racism in America during the war years, despite the promotion of increasingly influential anti-racist ideals in wartime. Nonetheless, the 1940s, and the New Deal era of the 1930s that preceded it, are portrayed in much of Roth's recent fiction as a heroic phase in American history. A sense of frustration with social and political developments in the US since the 1940s is palpable in the American trilogy and Exit Ghost, but had already been present in Roth's earlier works that contained political and social satire, such as Our Gang and The Great American Novel. Writing about the latter novel, Hermione Lee points to the sense of disillusionment with "the American Dream" in Roth's fiction: "The mythic words on which Roth's generation was brought up — winning, patriotism, gamesmanship — are desanctified; greed, fear, racism, and political ambition are disclosed as the motive forces behind the 'all-American ideals'."^[15]

Awards and honors[link]

Two of Roth's works have won the National Book Award for Fiction; four others were finalists. Two have won National Book Critics Circle awards; again, another five were finalists. He has also won three PEN/Faulkner Awards (Operation Shylock, The Human Stain, and Everyman) and a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel, American Pastoral.^[9] In 2001, The Human Stain was awarded the United Kingdom's WH Smith Literary Award for the best book of the year. In 2002, he was awarded the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters^[16] Literary critic Harold Bloom has named him as one of the four major American novelists still at work, along with Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, and Cormac McCarthy.^[17] His 2004 novel The Plot Against America won the Sidewise Award for Alternate History in 2005 as well as the Society of American Historians’ James Fenimore Cooper Prize. Roth was also awarded the United Kingdom's WH Smith Literary Award for the best book of the year, an award Roth has received twice.^[18] He was honored in his hometown in October 2005 when then-mayor Sharpe James presided over the unveiling of a street sign in Roth's name on the corner of Summit and Keer Avenues where Roth lived for much of his childhood, a setting prominent in The Plot Against America. A plaque on the house where the Roths lived was also unveiled. In May 2006, he was given the PEN/Nabokov Award, and in 2007 he was awarded the PEN/Faulkner award for Everyman, making him the award's only three-time winner. In April 2007, he was chosen as the recipient of the first PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction.^[19]

The May 21, 2006 issue of The New York Times Book Review announced the results of a letter that was sent to what the publication described as "a couple of hundred prominent writers, critics, editors and other literary sages, asking them to please identify 'the single best work of American fiction published in the last 25 years.'" Six of Roth's novels were in the 22 selected: American Pastoral, The Counterlife, Operation Shylock, Sabbath's Theater, The Human Stain, and The Plot Against America.^[20] The accompanying essay, written by critic A.O. Scott, stated, "If we had asked for the single best writer of fiction of the past 25 years, [Roth] would have won."^[21]

In May 2011, Roth was awarded the Man Booker International Prize for lifetime achievement in fiction on the world stage, the fourth winner of the biennial prize.^[22] One of the judges, Carmen Callil, a publisher of the feminist Virago house, withdrew in protest, referring to Roth's work as "Emperor's clothes". She said "he goes on and on and on about the same subject in almost every single book. It's as though he's sitting on your face and you can't breathe ... I don’t rate him as a writer at all ..." Observers quickly noted that Callil had a conflict of interest, having published a book by Claire Bloom which had criticized Roth.^[23] In response, one of the two other Booker judges, Rick Gekoski, remarked: "In 1959 he writes Goodbye, Columbus and it's a masterpiece, magnificent. Fifty-one years later he's 78 years old and he writes Nemesis and it is so wonderful, such a terrific novel ... Tell me one other writer who 50 years apart writes masterpieces ... If you look at the trajectory of the average novel writer, there is a learning period, then a period of high achievement, then the talent runs out and in middle age they start slowly to decline. People say why aren't Martin [Amis] and Julian [Barnes] getting on the Booker prize shortlist, but that's what happens in middle age. Philip Roth, though, gets better and better in middle age. In the 1990s he was almost incapable of not writing a masterpiece – The Human Stain, The Plot Against America, I Married a Communist. He was 65–70 years old, what the hell's he doing writing that well?"^[24]

Films[link]

Four of Philip Roth's novels and short stories have been made into films: Goodbye, Columbus; Portnoy's Complaint; The Human Stain; and The Dying Animal which was made into the movie Elegy.

Bibliography[link]

Zuckerman novels[link]

• The Ghost Writer (1979)
• Zuckerman Unbound (1981)
• The Anatomy Lesson (1983)
• The Prague Orgy (1985)

(The above four books are collected as Zuckerman Bound)

• The Counterlife (1986)
• American Pastoral (1997)
• I Married a Communist (1998)
• The Human Stain (2000)
• Exit Ghost (2007)

Roth novels[link]

• Deception: A Novel (1990)
• Operation Shylock: A Confession (1993)
• The Plot Against America (2004)

Kepesh novels[link]

• The Breast (1972)
• The Professor of Desire (1977)
• The Dying Animal (2001)

Other novels[link]

• Goodbye, Columbus (1959)
• Letting Go (1962)
• When She Was Good (1967)
• Portnoy's Complaint (1969)
• Our Gang (1971)
• The Great American Novel (1973)
• My Life As a Man (1974)
• Sabbath's Theater (1995)

Short Novels[link]

• Everyman (2006)
• Indignation (2008)
• The Humbling (2009)
• Nemesis (2010)

Nonfiction[link]

• The Facts: A Novelist's Autobiography (1988)
• Patrimony: A True Story (1991)

Collections[link]

• Reading Myself and Others (1976)
• A Philip Roth Reader (1980, revised edition 1993)
• Shop Talk (2001)

Library of America Editions[link]

Edited by Ross Miller

• Novels and Stories 1959–1962 (2005) ISBN 978-1-931082-79-2
• Novels 1967–1972 (2005) ISBN 978-1-931082-80-8
• Novels 1973–1977 (2006) ISBN 978-1-931082-96-9
• Zuckerman Bound: A Trilogy and Epilogue 1979–1985 (2007) ISBN 978-1-59853-011-7
• Novels and Other Narratives 1986–1991 (2008) ISBN 978-1-59853-030-8
• Novels 1993–1995 (2010) ISBN 978-1-59853-078-0
• The American Trilogy 1997–2000 (2011) ISBN 978-1-59853-103-9

List of awards[link]

• 1960 National Book Award for Goodbye, Columbus^[2]
• 1975 National Book Award finalist for My Life As A Man
• 1978 NBCCA finalist for The Professor Of Desire
• 1980 Pulitzer Prize finalist for The Ghost Writer^[9]
• 1980 National Book Award finalist for The Ghost Writer
• 1980 NBCCA finalist for The Ghost Writer
• 1984 National Book Award finalist for The Anatomy Lesson
• 1984 NBCCA finalist for The Anatomy Lesson
• 1986 National Book Critics Circle Award (NBCCA) for The Counterlife
• 1986 National Book Award finalist for The Counterlife
• 1991 National Book Critics Circle Award for Patrimony
• 1994 PEN/Faulkner Award for Operation Shylock
• 1994 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Operation Shylock^[9]
• 1995 National Book Award for Sabbath's Theater^[8]
• 1994 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Sabbath's Theater^[9]
• 1998 Pulitzer Prize for American Pastoral^[9]
• 1998 NBCCA finalist for American Pastoral
• 1998 Ambassador Book Award of the English-Speaking Union for I Married a Communist
• 1998 National Medal of Arts
• 2000 Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger (France) for American Pastoral
• 2001 Franz Kafka Prize
• 2001 PEN/Faulkner Award for The Human Stain
• 2001 Gold Medal In Fiction from The American Academy of Arts and Letters
• 2001 WH Smith Literary Award for The Human Stain
• 2002 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from the National Book Foundation^[16]
• 2002 Prix Médicis Étranger (France) for The Human Stain
• 2003 Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Harvard University
• 2005 NBCCA finalist for The Plot Against America
• 2005 Sidewise Award for Alternate History for The Plot Against America
• 2005 James Fenimore Cooper Prize for Best Historical Fiction for The Plot Against America
• 2006 PEN/Nabokov Award for lifetime achievement
• 2007 PEN/Faulkner Award for Everyman
• 2007 PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction
• 2010 Paris Review's Hadada Prize
• 2011 Man Booker International Prize^[22]

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Brauner, David (1969) Getting in Your Retaliation First: Narrative Strategies in Portnoy's Complaint in Royal, Derek Parker (2005) Philip Roth: new perspectives on an American author, chapter 3
• Greenberg, Robert (Winter 1997). "Trangression in the Fiction of Philip Roth". Twentieth Century Literature (Hofstra University) 43 (4): 487. DOI:10.2307/441747. JSTOR 441747. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0403/is_n4_v43/ai_20614549. 
• Saxton, Martha (1974) Philip Roth Talks about His Own Work Literary Guild June 1974, n.2. Also published in Philip Roth, George John Searles (1992) Conversations with Philip Roth p. 78

Further reading and literary criticism[link]

• Bloom, Harold and Welsch, Gabe, eds., Modern Critical Interpretations of Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint, Chelsea House, 2003.
• Bloom, Harold, ed., Modern Critical Views of Philip Roth, Chelsea House, New York, 2003.
• Cooper, Alan, Philip Roth and the Jews (SUNY Series in Modern Jewish Literature and Culture), SUNY Press, Albany, NY, 1996.
• „Defender of the faith” by Philip Roth
• Kinzel, Till, Die Tragödie und Komödie des amerikanischen Lebens. Eine Studie zu Zuckermans Amerika in Philip Roths Amerika-Trilogie (American Studies Monograph Series), Heidelberg: Winter, 2006.
• Milowitz, Steven, Philip Roth Considered: The Concentrationary Universe of the American Writer, Routledge, New York, 2000.
• Morley, Catherine, The Quest for Epic in Contemporary American Literature, Routledge, New York, 2008.
• Parrish, Timothy, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Philip Roth, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007.
• Podhoretz, Norman, "The Adventures of Philip Roth," Commentary (October 1998), reprinted as "Philip Roth, Then and Now" in The Norman Podhoretz Reader, 2004.
• Posnock, Ross, Philip Roth's Rude Truth: The Art of Immaturity, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 2006.
• Royal, Derek Parker, Philip Roth: New Perspectives on an American Author, Praeger Publishers, Santa Barbara, CA, 2005.
• Safer, Elaine B., Mocking the Age: The Later Novels of Philip Roth (SUNY Series in Modern Jewish Literature and Culture), SUNY Press, Albany, NY, 2006.
• Searles, George J., ed., Conversations With Philip Roth, University of Mississippi Press, Jackson, Mississippi, 1992.
• Searles, George J., The Fiction of Philip Roth and John Updike, Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, Illinois, 1984.
• Shostak, Debra B., Philip Roth: Countertexts, Counterlives, University of South Carolina Press, Columbia, SC, 2004.
• Simic, Charles, "The Nicest Boy in the World," The New York Review of Books, Vol. LV, No. October 15, 9 2008.
• Swirski, Peter, "It Can't Happen Here, or Politics, Emotions, and Philip Roth's The Plot Against America." American Utopia and Social Engineering in Literature, Social Thought, and Political History. New York, Routledge, 2011.
• Wöltje, Wiebke-Maria, My finger on the pulse of the nation. Intellektuelle Protagonisten im Romanwerk Philip Roths (Mosaic, 26), Trier: WVT, 2006.

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Philip Roth

Informational[link]

• Literary Encyclopedia biography
• The Philip Roth Society
• Philip Roth looks back on a legendary career, and forward to his final act
• Works by Philip Roth on Open Library at the Internet Archive

Interviews[link]

• Hermione Lee (Fall 1984). "Philip Roth, The Art of Fiction No. 84". The Paris Review. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2957/the-art-of-fiction-no-84-philip-roth. 
• Roth interview – from NPR's "Fresh Air", September 2005
• Roth interview – from The Guardian, December 2005
• Roth interview – from Open Source
• Roth interview – from Der Spiegel, February 2008
• Roth interview – from the London Times, October 17, 2009
• Roth interview – from CBC's Writers and Company. Aired 2009-11-01