Robert was born in England in 1958. Educated at St Oswald's College in Shropshire he studied mathematics and physics.
In 1975 Robert attended a Led Zeppelin concert appearance in London which began a life-long obsession with the band and their music. That same year he briefly worked as a member of the road crew for the rock band Scorpions.
He moved to Canada in 1978 and took over the operational management of a chain of eleven English pubs. In 1981 he would establish the most popular night club in Canada, The Orient Express. In 1982 Robert co-produced an outdoor concert in Canada which attracted over 20,000 people. Later that year he was asked to fill a vacancy at Toronto's prestigious George Brown College which he did under contract for a year; teaching management.
In 1983 he moved into music management. Robert helped some of the artists who played at his club to get worldwide recording contracts. Moving from management into production, he assisted in the recording of several popular albums and worked at Musicland Studios in Munich Germany, Metalworks in Toronto, as well as Sunset Sound and United Western in Los Angeles. In 1984 Robert turned his love of Led Zeppelin into the first of a long string of books about the band. He quickly established a reputation as one of the world's leading experts on the subject. He followed this success with books on other artists which interested him, including the archetypal British space-rock group Hawkwind. This led to a continuing friendship and business relationship with Hawkwind and their science-fiction guru, world-famous author, Michael Moorcock.
In 1987 Robert opened his own record label, Griffin Music, which by 1992 would be voted best independent label in America by several major US newspapers. Over the next few years Griffin Music would release many classic rock acts' back-catalogs, notably, the BBC In Concert series, Anderson - Bruford - Wakeman and Howe, Motorhead, Thin Lizzy, Mike Oldfield, Olivia Newton-John, Hawkwind, Nazareth, David Bowie, and many other household names.
By 1995 Robert sold his interest in Griffin Music and briefly dabbled in the merchandising business where he acquired a coveted license from Lucasfilm to manufacture Star Wars memorabilia. Later that year he incorporated his private publishing company, Collector's Guide Publishing, and went into full-time publishing. Building on the success of his Led Zeppelin books Robert began to sign up authors and subsequently published and edited dozens of books on many aspects of pop culture including music, collectibles and movies. These books have won accolades from around the world and have sold in at least 80 countries.
In 1998 Robert was invited by his brother, Richard, to attend a celebration in honor of the crew of Apollo 7. During that event Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin asked Robert to publish a book to honor his fellow astronauts and to commemorate man's first voyage to the moon. Working with advice from his friend, noted space-author, Andrew Chaikin, he launched a space book imprint.
In partnership with his brother, Robert has subsequently worked with almost every surviving Apollo astronaut on his acclaimed book series "The NASA Mission Reports". Robert's space series has included contributions by Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Tom Hanks, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, David Brin, Ron Howard, Senator Harrison Schmitt, Eugene Cernan, Wally Schirra, Dave Scott, Walt Cunningham, Dr Marc Garneau, Eileen Collins, Bonnie Dunbar and many more astronauts and space scientists. Robert created the first ever Virtual-Reality digital panoramas from the Apollo lunar photography and his acclaimed film Apollo 11 - Moonwalk was the first time that the mission of Apollo 11 was shown from multiple camera angles simultaneously.
Robert has appeared on dozens of radio and television programs in Canada, the USA and England as an expert on, not only music, but also space exploration. His books have been discussed on CNN, the CBC, the BBC and CBS 60 Minutes.
In 2001 Robert's company co-sponsored a party at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles to honor Sir Arthur C. Clarke, in attendance were movie directors James Cameron and Oliver Stone, actors Patrick Stewart, Bill Paxton and Morgan Freeman, astronauts Buzz Aldrin, Jim Lovell and Robert Crippen as well as many other celebrities from different walks of life. A film about the history of science fiction and space exploration, directed and created by Robert, was one of the evening's highlights.
Today - CG Publishing, through its imprint Apogee Books, is the world's number one publisher of Space books; creating an average of one new space book a month. CG Publishing has garnered contracts to document aspects of space history from both NASA and the Russian space corporation Energia. Robert works regularly with many of the world's leading space advocacy groups including The National Space Society, The Space Frontier Foundation, The Mars Society, The X-Prize Foundation, The British Interplanetary Society, The Planetary Society, Space Day and many more. Through revenues generated from the sale of their books Robert and Richard have donated funds to an asteroid impact research project called The Watch, which led to Apogee Books sponsoring a U.S. Senate round-table on the subject of catastrophic impacts. The round-table raised political awareness on the subject and assisted in more long-term funding for asteroid research.
In 2008 Robert continues to work closely with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and spends his time editing and writing. Never far from his love for music, he occasionally writes for music magazines while CG Publishing continues to publish award winning music books, including a newly revised edition of Robert's The Making of Led Zeppelin IV. In November of 2007 the IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature honored Robert and his brother Richard by naming a main belt asteroid "4252 Godwin". He is an advocate of the Space Frontier Foundation and is currently Space Curator at the Toronto Aerospace Museum
Robert is currently writing a book on the crossover between popular culture and space exploration. He lives in Canada with his wife and two children. |