Alex Hortis
Jukebox Empire is part family journey, part mob story, as Rabinovitch vividly retraces his uncle’s life of crime from Canada to Chicago to Cuba. The personal story of Wolfe Rabin helps illuminate misunderstood aspects of organized crime in the twentieth century. A delightfully entertaining story of jukeboxes, money laundering, and stolen bonds.
BNN Breaking
In a remarkable blend of investigative journalism and familial curiosity, Emmy and Gemini Award-winning journalist David Rabinovitch presents Jukebox Empire: The Mob and the Dark Side of the American Dream, a book that unravels the tangled facets of his Uncle Wolfe’s life…. This narrative provides readers with a vibrant picture of the nuances of a time long gone, seen through the eyes of an ordinary man caught in extraordinary circumstances.
Gary Jenkins
When David investigated his uncle’s exploits, the result filled gaps in our knowledge of the history of organized crime, popular culture, the music industry, 20th century history and politics, and the Cuban Revolution. A unique combination of family memoir and investigative journalism.
Scott M. Deitche
Jukebox Empire is the engrossing story of William Rabin, a key figure in the development of the jukebox industry in America who rubbed shoulders with major Mafioso from the US and Canada. Author David Rabinovitch, the nephew of William Rabin, weaves together a compelling story of family and crime that even touches on key events of US history in the 1950s and 60s. Rabin was a character who, before this book, was missing from the US Mafia historical timeline, but is here rightfully placed in the canon as one of the many key figures in the story of organized crime in the 20th century.
Jeffrey Sussman
This is a brilliant depiction, in evocative prose, of the corrupt juke box industry as controlled by the mob. Anyone interested in how the mob can launder money through a seemingly innocent American past time should read Jukebox Empire.
Peter Edwards
It reads like a novel but the characters and events described by David Rabinovitch are real and chilling. Fans of The Untouchables and Godfather II will thank me for recommending Jukebox Empire.
David Kertzer
A fast-paced, colorful romp through a slice of the twentieth century American underworld, Jukebox Empire has a cinematic quality, not surprising given its filmmaker author. A chilling tale of the path leading a talented son of Jewish immigrant parents in a remote town in Manitoba to the heights and depths of the American mob.
Antonio Nicaso
It is a compelling book from beginning to end. David Rabinovitch takes us into the dark meanders of the American underworld and tells the story of a man who, thanks to jukeboxes, managed to create an empire. It is an eye-opening, informative, and fascinating book. Jukebox Empire is must-read.
Fred Fuchs
What a fantastic story. It has everything: action, incredible characters, suspense, humor. Can't wait to see the movie.
Winnipeg Free Press
It’s a scandalous, entertaining and worthwhile read – not to mention Rabinovitch’s brilliant research into the history of music distribution.
Joe Saltzman
David Rabinovitch has taken a family secret and turned it into an exciting, fast-moving story about his father’s brother, William “Wolfe” Rabin, who was “raised in an immigrant Jewish family in a remote Canadian prairie town and who became a jukebox tycoon, a crony of gangsters, and the mastermind behind an audacious and complex international money-laundering scheme.” Rabinovitch has molded this personal family history into a riveting chronicle that is part organized crime, part money laundering, and part jukebox history. Jukebox Empire is a tour-de-force account of the Mob’s growing infiltration into legitimate American industry and how it affected one man who was obsessed with power and money at all costs.
Library Journal
09/01/2023
Award-winning filmmaker Rabinovitch, who has an investigative-journalism background, looked into his own family's history and learned that his uncle Wolfe Rabin was involved in the jukebox empire, in which it was easy to falsify how many songs were actually sold. This book, full of research, shows that the Mafia understood that and tapped into it as a way to evade taxes as well, and Rabin worked with them in this money-laundering business. The author writes the book in a diary format, which some readers may find, after numerous pages of this structure, unengaging. He describes how the jukebox was invented and how it became a staple throughout the United States but devotes most of the book's pages to the story of the famous robbery—the FBI called it the biggest of its kind at the time—in which millions of dollars in bonds were stolen. There was a trial of all involved. All but Wolfe Rabin were acquitted, and the book shows what led to his taking the fall. VERDICT A well-researched book whose structure might not hold some readers' attention.—Michael Sawyer
