See Moby up close at Book Soup

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There will not be approximately 100,000 people between you and Moby. There might be 50 or even 500, but whatever it is, the number will be manageable.

That is, if you head to Book Soup on Monday to get ‘Moby: Destroyed.’ Come 7 p.m., Moby will be ready to sign copies of the book and his latest album, ‘Destroyed,’ but no other memorabilia. He won’t be posing for photos but doesn’t mind if you take them. The book ‘Moby: Destroyed’ is full of photos that he’s taken on the road -- empty hallways, full stadiums, cities lit up at night.

‘I hope somehow in these pictures,’ Moby writes, ‘I’m able to convey the mundanity of touring, juxtaposed with those moments of the strange and/or sublime. One minute on tour you’re by yourself in a soulless airport, the next minute you’re flying over the most beautiful landscapes on the planet. One minute on tour you’re by yourself in a soulless backstage area, the next minute you’re on stage pouring your heart out to 75,000 people. Touring is all contrasts and strangeness, and that’s what I’m trying to convey in these pictures.’

Moby was born Richard Melville Hall. The ‘Melville’ is for Herman Melville, who was thought to have been his great-great-great-granduncle. His stagename came, of course, from ‘Moby-Dick,’ Melville’s great novel. He could have picked something else by Melville, but ‘Moby’ sounds better than ‘Typee,’ ‘Omoo’ or ‘Bartelby.’

Recently Moby restored and moved into a grand old Hollywood home, but he spent most of the summer on tour in Europe. He returns to L.A. for the Book Soup book signing -- and he just might be at the opening of the gallery show of his photographs in Culver City on Saturday night.

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-- Carolyn Kellogg