BOOKS ABOUT ROCK 'N' ROLL MUSIC:

The following bibliography is not exhaustive (especially in the areas of reference books and biographies) though there has been a strenuous effort to cover most of the major and most recent works of criticism, both popular and academic. Suggestions, offerings, and annotations are welcome and should be sent to Dennis McDaniel at dmcdaniel@email.stvincent.edu

You may browse randomly through this book list, or you may click on the categories given below.

BIBLIOGRAPHIES OF ROCK CRITICISM

ENCYLOPEDIAS

DISCOGRAPHIES and RECORD GUIDES

FACTS AND TRIVIA

SELECTED BIOGRAPHIES

HISTORIES--Rock, Punk, and Metal

POPULAR CRITICISM: Anthologies

POPULAR CRITICISM: Single Authors

ACADEMIC CRITICISM: Anthologies

ACADEMIC CRITICISM: Single Authors

WOMEN and GENDER-Histories and Criticism

BLUES, R&B, AND RAP-History and Criticism

PERIODICALS

Cooper, B. Lee. "Examining a Decade of Rock Bibliographies, 1970-1979." JEMFQ 16.62 (Summer, 1981):

Cooper, B. Lee, and Wayne Haney. Rock Music in American Popular Culture: Rock & Roll Resources. Haworth, 1995.

Gatten, Jeffrey N. Rock Music Scholarship: An Interdisciplinary Bibliography. Greenwood(Music Reference Collection Series), 1995.

Hanel, Ed. The Essential Guide to Rock Books. London: Omnibus, 1983.

Includes pictures of book covers.

Hoffmann, Frank W. The Literature Of Rock, 1954-1978. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1981. 0810813718

___. The Literature of Rock, II, 1979-1983 : with additional material for the period 1954-1978. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1986. ISBN: 0810818213

___. The Literature of Rock, III, 1984-1990: with additional material for the period 1954-83. Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1995.

This book and its predecessors are bibliographies of sources on rock from the beginning, covering those articles written during the periods listed on the book. The years cover the dates of the articles, though the artists covered go back to the beginnings. The main bibliographies are organized on the basis of movements in rock, and then is subdivided by band.

Horn, David. The Literature of American Music in Books and Folk Music Collections: a Fully Annotated Bibliography. Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1988.

Music Index (1949-- )

Reports most recent books and articles on rock.

The Newsletter of the Institute for Studies in American Music.

Mentions important books on rock and popular music, and volume 15:1 (November 1985) contains a review of rock criticism by J. Rockwell.

Popular Music Periodicals Index. Tudor, Dean, and Andrew Armitage, eds. Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1975.

Popular Music Since 1955: A Critical Guide to the Literature. Taylor, Paul, ed. Boston: G.K. Hall, 1985.

Includes a bibliography of the literature of rock.

Rock Yearbook (published annually since 1981) NY: St. Martin's.

A cummulative index to articles in RS, organized by the various sections of the magazine, including master indexes of subjects and authors.

The Rolling Stone Index : Twenty-Five Years Of Popular Culture, 1967-1991. Jeffrey N. Gatten, compiler. Ann Arbor, MI : Popular Culture, Ink., 1993.

Indexes all of the articles and reviews published in Rolling Stone.

The Rolling Stones : an Annotated Bibliography Dimmick, Mary Laverne. Rev. and enl. ed. Pittsburgh : University of Pittsburgh Press, 1979

Sandahl, Linda J. Rock Films: A Viewer's Guide To Three Decades Of Musicals, Concerts, Documentaries And Soundtracks 1955-1986. New York, N.Y.: Facts on File Publications, c1987.

Taylor, Paul. Popular Music Since 1955: a Critical Guide to the Literature. London: Mansell, 1985.

Fairly exhaustive annotated bibliography, nicely categorized for ease of use. Emphasis on British publications, many of which are hard to obtain. Excellent glossary.

Wissolik, Richard. Bob Dylan: Poet and Singer. Greensburg: Eadmer Press, 1992.

Bibliography of articles and books by and about Dylan, including a bibliography on the folk revival of the fifties/sixties.

Hellander, Brock. The Rock Who's Who. NY: Schirmer, 1982.

Rees, Dafydd & Luke Crampton. Rock Movers & Shakers. Santa Barbara, Calif. : ABC-CLIO, 1991.

Bonds, Ray. The Harmony Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock. NY: Harmony, 1982.

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.

"Popular Music-Rock and Roll" by Andrew Lamb and Charles Hamm gives a concise account of the rise of rock and its forms.

Hale, Mark. Headbangers : The Worldwide Megabook of Heavy Metal Bands. Ann Arbor, MI : Popular Culture, 1993.

Hardy, Phil, and Dave Laing. Encyclopedia of Rock. New York : Schirmer Books, 1988, c1987.

None other than the venerable Simon Frith gives this the nod as an essential reference tool.

Heatley, Michael. The Ultimate Encyclopedia of rock : the World's Most Comprehensive Illustrated Rock Reference 1st U.S. ed. New York, N.Y. : HarperPerennial, 1993 0062732471

The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Black Music. NY: Harmony, 1982.

Logan, Nick. The Illustrated Encyclopedia Of Rock Salamander, c1982

Pareles, Jon, and Patty Romanowski, eds. The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia Of Rock & Roll 1st ed. New York, N.Y. : Rolling Stone Press/Summit Books, c1983

Roxon, Lillian. Lillian Roxon's Rock Encyclopedia . Grosset & Dunlap, 1978.

Shaw, Arnold. Dictionary of American Pop/Rock. New York, N.Y. : Schirmer Books ; London : Collier Macmillan,c1982.

Stambler, Irwin. The Encyclopedia Of Pop, Rock & Soul Rev. ed. New York : St. Martin's Press, 1989.

Bibliography of Discographies. New York, Bowker, 1983.

Volume 3, Popular Music, contains an extensive list of discographies.

Christgau, Robert. Christgau's Record Guide: the 80's. NY: Da Capo, 1994.

A collection of his "Consumer Guide" pieces from The Village Voice. One does not read this consumer guide to aid album purchases--Christgau's purely subjective rating system, as well as the obscurity of many of the records he reviews, defeat such utility. One reads Christgau to enjoy his erudition, his insight, his cranky--though nontraditional--moralism, and his distinctive ability, through allusion and linguistic dexterity, to speak volumes in a single paragraph. Christgau "reads" records as someone reads a character in a novel, and his reviews often sound like character analyses: Christgau often weighs artists' images, attitudes, and politics more heavily than their music. Christgau's Seventies Consumer Guide is also available from Da Capo.

George, B. and Martha Defoe. International New Wave Discography. NY: One Ten Records, 1982.

Joynson, Vernon. The Acid Trip: A Complete Guide to Psychedelic Music. Babylon Books, 1984.

Kocandrle, Mirek. The History Of Rock And Roll : A Selective Discography Boston : G.K. Hall, c1988.

The Rolling Stone Album Guide : Completely New Reviews : Anthony DeCurtis and James Henke with Holly George-Warren ;reviewers, Mark Coleman ... [et al.]. 3rd ed. New York : Random House, 1992.

If the reviewers aren't worth reading, then the reviews aren't either.

The Rolling Stone Record Guide : Reviews And Ratings Of Almost 10,000 Currently Available Rock, Pop, Soul, Country, Blues Jazz, And Gospel Albums Eds. Dave Marsh, with John Swenson. New York : Random House, 1979.

Scaeffer, John. New Sounds: A Listener's Guide to New Music. NY: Harper and Row, 1987.

A guide to contemporary avant-garde and avant-garde derivatives, with too much new age and not enough electronic. Chapters, divided by subgenre, consist of intro article followed by discography of artists with brief descriptions of the record. Much credit given to Fripp, Zappa, Eno.

[The New] Trouser Press Record Guide. Ed. Ira Robbins. NY: Scribners, 1985.

Even Christgau admits that he was inspired by Robbins's reviews.

Trouser Press Guide to New Wave Records. Ed. Ira Robbins. NY: Scribners, 1983.

Trouser Press Guide to 90's Rock. Ed. Ira Robbins. NY: Scribners, 1997 (A Fireside Book)

Actually, the fifth edition of the Trouser Press Record Guide. Entries arranged by artist, with listings of albums followed by assessment of the artist' s work in the nineties. Unlike Christgau, the focus is on alt rock only, and various writers contribute. Great blasts at Rusted Root and its ilk

Bacon, Tony. Rock Hardware : The Instruments, Equipment, and Technology of Rock . New York : Harmony Books, 1981.

Botts, Linda, Loose Talk: The Book of Quotes from the Pages of Rolling Stones Magazine. NY: Quick Fox Press, 1980.

Gillett, Charlie. Rock Almanac : Top 20 Singles, 1955-73, And Top 20 Albums, 1964/New York : Doubleday, 1976.

Macken, Bob, et al. The Rock Music Source Book. NY: Anchor, 1980.

Marsh, Dave. The Book of Rock 'n' Roll Lists

A fairly interesting array of lists, created by both critics, rock stars, and others, of ratings and so forth; among the more pertinent categories are best and worst rock books, critics.

Nite, Norm N. Rock On Almanac : The First Four Decades Of Rock 'n' Roll : A Chronology HarperPerennial, 1992.

Interesting reference, aimed at a general audience.

Whitburn, Joel. Billboard Top 1000 Singles, 1955-1987 : The 1000 Biggest Hits of the Rock Era. Milwaukee, WI : H. Leonard Books, c1988.

Excellent reference work that maintains all of the charts from number one back. Gives you a good idea how bad the collective musical taste is because so many of the greats have very many hit singles. Though, by examining public tastes through the music that it purchases, rather than that which is critically acclaimed, one can get a clearer picture of why this country is so screwed up.

Abate, Anna. Lou Reed: The Life, the Poems, and the Music of a Hero of American Rock. Milan: Savelli Editori, 1980.

Albertoli, Carlo. The Velvet Underground. Rome: Redazione, 1993.

Amburn, Ellis. Dark Star--The Roy Orbison Story. NY: Carol, 1990.

Azzerad, Michael. Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana. NY: Doubleday, 1993.

Bockris, Victor. Transformer: the Lou Reed Story. NY: Simon and Schuster, 1994.

Good bio of Lou and the scene, with a strong bib and good pictures. Bangs is an oft quoted source who Bockris calls Lou's greatest champion.

___ and Gerard Malanga. Uptight: The Velvet Undeground Story. London: Omnibus, 1983.

Bowie, Angela, with Patrick Carr. Backstage Passes: Life on the Wild Side with David Bowie. NY: Putnam, 1993.

Bromberg, Craig. The Wicked Ways Of Malcolm Mclaren Perennial Library, c1989. ML429.M36 B7 1989

Clapton, Diana. Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground. London: Bobcat, 1987.

Davis, Stephen. Hammer of the Gods: The Led Zeppelin Saga. NY: Ballantine, 1985.

Doggett, Peter. Growing Up in Public. London: Omnibus, 1991.

Garcia, Jerry, Jann Wenner, and Charles Reich. Garcia. San Fran: Straight Arrow.

Goldman, Albert. Elvis . New York : Avon, 1982.

___. The Lives Of John Lennon Bantam, 1988

Flanagan, Bill. Written in My Soul: Conversations with Rock's Great Songwriters. Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1987.

Guralnick, Peter. Feel Like Going Home : Portraits In Blues & Rock 'n' Roll. New York: Vintage Books, 1981.

___. Last Train To Memphis : The Rise Of Elvis Presley. Boston : Little, Brown, and Co., 1994.

Emphasizes Elvis's early years before the army and Hollywood.

___. Lost Highway : Journeys & Arrivals Of American Musicians. New York : Vintage Books, 1982.

Portraits of various blues and country stars. Reviewed by Bangs in PRCD, in both notes and finished form.

___. Searching For Robert Johnson. New York : Dutton, c1989.

Hellander, Brock. The Rock Who's Who. NY: Schirmer, 1982.

Hopkins, Jerry. Bowie. NY: Macmillan, 1985

___. Elvis

Pretty definitive, says Guralnick

___. No One Here Gets Out Alive. Warner Books, c1980.

"Definitive" biography of Morrison and the Doors, though its hard to tell whether Jerry Hopkins is legit or just a hack making money off of dead people.

Kostek, M.C. The Velvet Underground Handbook. London: Black Spring, 1992.

Lahr, John, and Robert Palmer. Baby, That Was Rock 'n Roll : The Legendary Leiber And Stoller. New York : Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978.

Lydon, John. Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs--The Authorized Biography of Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols. NY: St. Martin's, 1994

Fashioned as an oral history of British punk, but mostly Lydon taking the chance to revise the accounts that discredited him. Still valuable, with Lydon's narration complemented by interviews with other participants.

Marsh, Dave. Glory Days. (Springstein bio)

___. Pastures of Plenty

A Woody Guthrie tribute

___. Rock and Roll Confidential. NY: Pantheon, 1985.

Martin, George. All You Need Is Ears. NY: St. Martin's, 1979.

Matlock, Glen, with Peter Silverton. I Was a Teenage Sex Pistol. London: Faber and Faber, 1990.

Norman, Philip. The Road Goes On Forever. NY: Fireside, 1982.

Intimate portraits of rock, pop, and country superstars. Will Stubbs likes it, so it couldn't be all bad.

___. Shout!: The Beatles in Their Generation.

Palmer, Robert. The Rolling Stones. Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1983.

Pike, Jeff. The Death of Rock 'n' Roll: Untimely Demises, Morbid Preoccupations, and Premature Forecasts of Doom in Pop Music. Boston: Faber and Faber, 1993

An odd combination of obituaries and commentary, the commentary mostly having to do with the death(s) of rock, death rock, and the theme of death in rock. Useful for information on obscure musicians.

The Rolling Stone Interviews : Talking With The Legends Of Rock & Roll, 1967-1980 / by the Editors of Rolling Stone ;introd. by Ben Fong-Torres ; edited by Peter Herbst. New York : St. Martin's, 1981.

Includes interviews with Dylan, Lennon, Richards, Garcia, Berry, and many others.

Stevenson, Ray. The Sex Pistols File. London: Omnibus, 1978.

Reed, Lou. Between Thought and Expression: Selected Lyrics of Lou Reed. NY: Hyperion, 1991.

Reed, Lou. Lou Reed: Words and Music. NY: Warner, 1991.

Ribowsky, Mark. He's a Rebel (Phil Spector). NY: Dutton, 1989.

Ritz, David and Ray Charles. Brother Ray.

___. Divided Soul: The Life of Marvin Gaye.

Rock, Mick. Ziggy Stardust: Bowie 1972/1973. NY: St Martin's, 1984.

Thompson, Dave. Beyond the Velvet Underground. London: Omnibus, 1989.

Tobler, John, ed. Who's Who In Rock & Roll . New York: Crescent Books, c1991.

Tosches, Nick. Hellfire: The Jerry Lee Lewis Story. NY: Delacorte, 1982.

___. The Unsung Heroes of Rock and Roll. NY: Scribners, 1984.

Two page biographies of rock precursors.

Young, James. Songs They Never Play on the Radio: Nico, the Last Bohemian. London: Bloomsbury, 1993.

Wexler, Jerry, and David Ritz. Rhythm and the Blues: A Life in American Music. NY: Knopf, 1993.

Interesting biography of the active years of Jerry Wexler, with plenty of pictures.

Who's Who In Rock. New York : Facts on File, c1981.

Wiener, Jon. Come Together: John Lennon and His Time. NY: Random House, 1984.

Zappa, Frank, with Peter Occhiogrosso. The Real Frank Zappa Book. NY: Poseidon, 1989.

Arnold, Gina. Route 666: On the Road to Nirvana. NY: St. Martin's, 1993.

Quirky, illustrated chronicle of 80's underground music and its culmination in Nirvana--pre suicide.

Azzerad, Micheal, and Charles Peterson. Screaming Life: A Chronicle of the Seattle Music Scene. NY: Harper-Collins, 1995.

Belz, Carl. The Story Of Rock. Oxford University Press, 1969.

Satisfactory early history of early rock n roll up to 1968. Includes a detailed selected discography.

Booth, Stanley. Rythm Oil: A Journey Through the Music of the American South. NY: Pantheon, 1991.

Anthology of Booth's essays on blues, soul, r&b, southern rock, and those who emulated the sound. Great essay on Keith Richards

Cantwell, Robert. When We Were Good: The Folk Revival. Cambridge: Harvard, 1997.

Chapple, Steve, and Reebee Garofalo. Rock and Roll is Here to Pay: The History and Politics of the Music Industry. Chicago: Nelson Hall, 1977.

Cohen, Sara. Rock Culture In Liverpool : Popular Music In The Making Oxford : Clarendon Press ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1991.

British Lefty analysis of the topic

Cohn, Nik. Awopbopalooboplopbamboom. London: Paladin, 1970.

Though somewhat dated, this is an a very well written critical history of rock's first decade. Especially good are the first two chapters on rock's preshistory. Now out of print.

___. Rock from the beginning. New York, Stein and Day [1969]

Coon, Caroline, 1988 : The New Wave Punk Rock Explosion. London: Orbach and Chambers ; New York : Hawthorn Books, 1977.

Coupe, Stuart. The New Rock'n'roll St. Martin's Press, 1983.

A history of punk and new wave.

DeRogatis, Jim. Kaleidoscope Eyes: Psychedelic Rock from the '60's to the '90's. Secaucus: Carol, 1996.

Dickstein, Morris. "The Age of Rock Revisited." The Gates of Eden. NY: Basic, 1977.

An overview of the rock of the sixties, connected with his cultural (old sense of the word) study of the sixties. This is pretty weak--it pretends to be definitive but its hardly strong on rock. This book's value comes in its discussion of the less popular cultural products, like literature and texts that shaped the sixties liberal and revolutionary ideololgy.

Draper, Robert. Rolling Stone Magazine: The Uncensored History. 1st Harper Perennial ed. New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 1991.

A linear history of the magazine, not all of it complimentary--Wenner scene as one who is truer to the buck than to journalistic integrity. Good facts, pictures of Rock Critics.

Ennis, Philip H. The Seventh Stream : The Emergence Of Rock n Roll in American Popular Music. Middletown, Conn.] : Wesleyan University Press ; Hanover, NH :University Press of New England, c1992.

Escot, Colin, and Martin Hawkins. Sun Records: The Brief History of the Legendary Record Label. NY: Quick Fox, 1980.

Garofalo, Reebee. Rockin' Out: Popular Music in the U.S.A. NY: Allyn and Bacon, 1998.

Sociologically oriented history of pop music, with emphasis on the rock era. Good information on the business end, but some of the opinions--those who criticized disco in the seventies were exhibiting thinly veiled racism--are dumb.

Gillett, Charlie. Making Tracks; Atlantic Records And The Growth Of A Multi-Billion-Dollar Industry. New York, E. P. Dutton [1974]

___. The Sound Of The City : The Rise Of Rock And Roll New York : Pantheon Books, c1984. Rev: Da Capo, 1996.

Considered by many to be the definitive history of rock. First published in 1972 but updated at least twice; still its emphasis is history up to 1971. Gillet's specialty is the roots of rock.

Gleason, Ralph J. The Jefferson Airplane and the San Francisco sound New York : Ballantine Books, [1969]

Helped to define the acid rock agenda of people living in temperate climates doing lots of drugs while listening to music with friends. Gleason was the esteemed columnist at large for RS until his death. Always came off as the cool old man.

Gordon, Robert. It Came From Memphis. Boston : Faber and Faber, c1995.

A history of Memphis music, but especially the lesser known rock of the sixties, with plentiful discussion of Chilton and others.

Grossman, Loyd. A Social History of Rock Music : From The Greasers To Glitter Rock. New York : McKay, 1976.

Interesting introduction discuss sociological and cultural factors that created the rock context, but ensuing history lacks sociological edge and seems aimed at non fans. It establishes some interesting premises but doesnt follow through in the specifics.

Henry, Tricia. Break All Rules! Punk Rock and the Making of a Style. (Studies in the Fine Arts: The Avant Garde, No. 68) Ann Arbor: UMI, 1989.

Fascinating, illustrated history of punk and punk style, informative and insightful if written in dissertation style. Delineates between American underground and British punk, tracing both back to VU and NY scene. Great articles on Punk and Sniffin' Glue, including reprints. Includes sheet music for "Anarchy in the UK" and "God Save the Queen" and a strong bibliography.

Heylin, Clinton. From the Velvets to the Voidoids: a Pre-Punk History for a Post-Punk World. London: Penguin, 1993.

___. Long Live Rock 'N' Roll: The Transmission of the Beat, 1961-1991. Macmillan, 1997.

London, Herbert Ira. Closing the Circle : A Cultural History Of The Rock Revolution Chicago : Nelson-Hall, c1984.

Marsh, Dave. Louie Louie: The History and Mythology of the World's Most Famous Rock'n' Roll Song; Including the Full Details of Its Torture and Persecution at the Hands of the Kingsmen, J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, and a Cast of Millions; and Introducing, for the First Time Anywhere, the Actual Dirty Lyrics. NY: Hyperion, 1993.

Not much more need be said. Has a cool discography of every version of the song.

McNeil, Legs, and John Holstrom, eds. Please Kill Me: An Uncensored Oral History of Punk 1996.

With a decidedly NY perspective, this book provides a lurid, gossipy history of punk, giving special emphasis to NY roots, Detroit scene. Many juicy facts both on performers but also on the roots of punk style. Patti Smith and Mapplethorpe are credited with created torn shirt, goofy hair look, and Warhol's production of Pork credited with creating the androgynous glitter style.

Nite, Norm. A Tale of Two Cities : Memphis Rock and New Orleans Roll. Brooklyn: CUNY, 1979.

Palmer, Robert. Rock & Roll: An Unruly History. NY: Harmony, 1995.

Companion to the PBS Series, notable more for photography..

Passman, Arnold. The Deejays. NY: Macmillan, 1971.

Deals mostly with prerock and drive time giants. Includes Rege Cordic and Jazzbeau Collins

___. The Rock Revolution. London: Crowell-Collier, 1969.

A well-written history of rock up to 1968, with lots of pictures, a glossary, and a discography. Organized by artists and movements.

Rimmer, Dave. Like Punk Never Happened: Culture Club and the New Pop

Sandler, Ellen. Trips: Rock Life in the Sixties. NY: Scribners, 1973.

Hip, for the sixties, this is a history of sixties rock culture from the hippy viewpoint. Includes an interesting "Taxonomy" of rock bands.

Scheuerer, T. "The Age of Rock." American Popular Music, vol. 2. Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green U Popular Press, 1994.

Shaw, Arnold. Honkers and Shouters: The Golden Years of Rhythm and Blues.

Shepard, Sam. The Rolling Thunder Logbook. NY: Viking, 1977.

Sklar, Rick. Rocking America : An Insider's Story : How The All-Hit Radio Stations Took Over St. Martin's Press, 1984

Smith, Joe and Mitchell Fink, ed. Off the Record: An Oral History of Popular Music. NY: Warner, 1988.

Spans the century with remarks from Artie Shaw to Bono. Includes producers and songwriters.

Szatmary, David P. Rockin' In Time : A Social History Of Rock And Roll. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : Prentice-Hall, 1987.

T aylor, Derek. It Was Twenty Years Ago Today. New York : Simon & Schuster, 1987.

A retrospective on the summer of love and other such hippie good times by a rock biz insider. Seems to be geared more toward riding on a nostalgia wave than providing interesting history.

Tobler, John, and Pete Frame. 25 Years of Rock. Optimum, 1980.

Ward, Ed Geoffrey Stokes, Ken Tucker. Rock of Ages : The Rolling Stone History Of Rock & Roll. intro Jann S. Wenner. New York : Rolling Stone Press : Summit Books, 1986.

A chronological history, divided into the fifties (Ward), the sixties (Stokes) and the seventies and beyond (Tucker). Sections comprise a number of short historical essays.

Whitcomb, Ian. After the Ball: Pop Music from Rag to Rock. NY: Simon and Schuster, 1972.

An informal but interesting history of popular music, emphasizing pre-rock and and british pop and rock. Includes chronicle of his own music career.

___. Rock Odyssey: A Musician's Chronicle of the Sixties. Garden City: Dolphin, 1983.

Chronicle of one-hit wonder Whitcomb's travels through California of the sixties, making the scene at all the important happenings.

DeCurtis, Anthony, et al, eds. The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock and Roll. (fully revised and updated) NY: Random House, 1992.

Great combination of rare photography and great rock writers: not alinear history, but an anthology of essays on selected topics, with great discographies of each topic or artist. Best include Guralnick on Elvis, Bangs on bubblegum, Marcus on Anarchy in the UK, and Willis on Joplin.

Eisen, Jonathan. The Age of Rock: Sounds of the American Cultural Revolution. NY: Random House, 1969.

Anthology of essay on rock and rock culture, featuring Hentoff on Dylan, Richard Poirier on the Beatles, Meltzer, Landau, Kempton (Sally and Murray), Didion on Morrison.

Fong-Torres, Ben. What's That Sound? Readings in Contemporary Music. NY: Anchor, 1976.

___, ed. The Rolling Stone Rock n' Roll Reader. NY: Bantam Books, 1974.

Anthology of reviews and columns.

Heylin, Clinton, ed. The Penguin Book Of Rock & Roll Writing. ; illus. Ray Lowry. N.Y. : Viking, 1992.

Compendius anthology, with essays divided into chapters that are chronologically arranged. Could work as a text; has Marcus, Bangs, Meltzer, Kaye, others.

Kelly, Karen, and Evelyn McDonnell. Stars Don't Stand Still in the Sky: Music and Myth. NY: NYU P, 1999.

Actually an anthology that includes popular and academic criticism by Willis, Reynolds, McRobbie, Weinstein, and others.

Marcus, Greil, ed. Stranded: Rock 'n' Roll for a Desert Island. NY: Knopf, 1979.

Marcus gathers a bunch of critics together to state the album that has the most significance to them. Includes Bangs's essay on Astral Weeks and Willis's on The Velvet Underground.

Marsh, Dave, et al., eds. The First Rock & Roll Confidential Report: Inside the Real World of Rock & Roll. NY: Pantheon, 1985.

Compilation of articles from short-lived little magazine of criticism. Most stuff written by Marsh and other eds, but other top critics contribute. Fairly tame, even reactionary in places.

___. Mekons United. Quarterstick Records, 1996.

Scheurer, Timothy E. . American Popular Music : Readings From The Popular Press Bowling Green, OH : Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1989.

Stokes, Geoffrey. The Village Voice Anthology (1956-1980): Twenty-Five Years of Writing from the Village Voice. NY: Morrow, 1982.

Includes articles from many great critics, including Willis, Christgau, and others.

Williams, Paul. Outlaw Blues: a Book of Rock Music. NY: Pocket Books, 1970.

Reprints of articles from Crawdaddy.

Arnold, Gina. Kiss This: Punk in the Present Tense. NY: St. Martin's, 1997.

___. Route 666: On the Road to Nirvana. NY: St.Martin's, 1993.

Bangs, Lester. Blondie. NY: Delilah, 1980.

___. Psychotic Reactions And Carburetor Dung, Ed. Greil Marcus. New York : Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1987.

An anthology of album reviews and longer pieces published primarily in Creem and The Village Voice. Bangs earned his reputation as rock criticism's one-true-genius by replicating in his prose the sheer anarchic fun that he found at the heart of rock and roll. Because Bangs died in 1981, the writings comment primarily on rock's second generation (1964--1976); nonetheless, Bangs' spontaneity, eclecticism, grotesque imagery, and passion for rock's chaotic edge recommend him to all students of rock and the avant-garde.

Carducci, Joe. Rock and the Pop Narcotic. Revised Edition. Los Angeles: 2.13.61. 1995.

Former SST records exec sounds off on a number of issues in this confrontational overview of the alternative rock spectrum. Takes special aim at canonical rock critics. Especially interested distinguishing between pop and rock. Good stylist, but counters liberal mainstream with his own right-wing extremism.

Christgau, Robert. Any Old Way You Choose It: Rock and Other Pop Music, 1967-73. Baltimore: Penguin, 1973.

If nothing else, interesting for its panning of the Monterrey Festival, calling the Hendrix performance "terrible" and summarily dismissing Jimi and Otis for pandering to a white audience. Not nearly as good as his "Consumer Guides".

___. Grown Up All Wrong: 75 Great Rock and Pop Artists from Vaudeville to Techno. Cambridge: Harvard, 1998.

Cutler, Chris. File Under Popular. London: November, 1985.

Flippo, Chet. Everybody Was Kung-Fu Dancing: Chronicles of the Lionized and the Notorious. NY: St. Martin's, 1991.

Gilmore, Mikal. Night Beat: A Shadow History of Rock & Roll. NY: Doubleday, 1998.

Collection of essays on the major figures of Rock, Soul, and Jazz from various popular magazines and newspapers. The wide range of characters covered lend to the "history" tag.

Goldman, Albert. Freakshow; the rocksoulbluesjazzsickjewblackhumorsexpoppsych gig and other scenes from the counter-cultuer. New York, Atheneum, 1971.

___. Sound Bites. NY: Turtle Bay, 1992.

An anthology with several good articles on soul and R&B

Goldstein, Richard. Goldstein's Greatest Hits; A Book Mostly About Rock 'n' Roll. Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall [1970]

___. The Poetry of Rock.

Not terribly impressive in a brief scan, this book pursues the seemingly dubious goal of looking at rock lyrics as "literature" in the traditional sense.

___. Reporting the Counterculture. Winchester, MA: Unwin Hyman, 1989.

Kent, Nick. The Dark Stuff: Selected Writings on Rock Music, 1972-95. NY: Da Capo, 1995.

Essays from New Music Express and elsewhere, surprisingly thin on punk, for which he is closely associated (Sid Vicious hit him with a bicycle chain during a gig in which Vicious was only a fan. Kent rewards Vicious with a scathing diatribe that ends with the words, with regard to Sid and Nancy, "Let them rot."

Landau, Jon. It's Too Late to Stop Now: A Rock and Roll Journal. San Francisco: Straight Arrow. 1972.

An anthology of Landau's reviews from Crawdaddy and Rolling Stone. Mostly record reviews, but some columns appear. Organized by "White Rock," "Black Rock," and "Confessions of a Rock Critic."

Loder, Kurt. Bat Chain Puller : Rock And Roll In The Age Of Celebrity. New York : St. Martin's Press, 1990.

Collection of articles, essays, reviews, and interviews from Rolling Stone--weak tea.

Marcus, Greil. Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of Cultural Obsession. NY: Doubleday, 1991.

A history and appraisal of the cultural phenomena of Elvis worship, taking up where the "Fanfare" section of "Presliad" in Mystery Train left off.

___. In the Fascist Bathroom: Writings on Punk: 1977-1992. NY: Penguin, 1993.

___. Invisible Republic: Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes. NY: Holt, 1997.

Though unread, previews suggest that this is a sequel of sorts to Mystery Train, constructing an image of America from the music and the setting from which it is made.

___. Lipstick Traces: The Secret History of the Twentieth Century. Cambridge: Harvard. 1989.

An effort to trace the apocalyptic message and style of the Sex Pistols to the Situationist movement, Dada, and ultimately, Medieval Heresy. Written in an idiosyncratic style worthy of its content.

___. Mystery Train: Images Of America In Rock 'n' Roll Music. New York : E. P. Dutton, 1975.

Marcus's book sees rock as a pure product of America that, as William Carlos Williams said of all such products, goes crazy. In the careers of Robert Johnson, Harmonica Frank Floyd, The Band, Sly Stone, Randy Newman, and Elvis Presley, Marcus reveals the myths, superstitions, and existential tensions that we find in quintessentially American literature and politics. Marcus's dynamic prose and idiosyncratic sense of historical narrative make this fascinating, though challenging, reading. A lengthy "Notes and Discographies" section provides excellent histories of artists and their work.

___. Ranters and Crowd Pleasers: Punk in Pop Music, 1977-92. NY: Doubleday, 1993.

A collection of Marcus's writings about punk from New West, Rolling Stone, The Village Voice, and others. What he "left out of Lipstick Traces--the music. Begins with an essay on Let it Bleed, proclaiming it the punk album that ended the sixties.

___. Rock 'n' Roll Will Stand. Boston: Beacon, 1969.

Anthology of early essays by Marcus and some Berkeley companions, none of which are of note.

Meltzer, R. The Aesthetics of Rock New Foreword by Meltzer and New Introduction by G. Marcus. NY: Da Capo, 1987.

Noted as the first book of its type, this virtually incoherent, numbingly allusive yet erudite masters thesis examines rock music in terms of contemporary aesthetic philosophy, though the inconsistent tone, ranging from stiff academicism to his more well known primitivism, raises questions about the book's sincerity, or opens it to deconstructive orgies..

___. Gulcher; Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism In America (1649-1980). San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books, 1972.

Murray, Charles Shaar. Crosstown Traffic: Jimi Hendrix and the Rock and Roll Revolution. NY: St. Martins, 1989.

An excellent examination of Hendrix within the culture, history, and music of his time. Murray is a fine stylist with incisive analyses of race and gender as well as blues, jazz, soul, and rock traditions.

___. Shots from the Hip. London: Penguin, 1991.

Peellaert Guy, and Nik Cohn. Rock Dreams. New York, Popular Library [1974, c1973]

A book of surrealistic portraits of rock stars by Peellaert, with textual accompaniment by Cohn.

Reynolds, Simon. Blissed Out. London: Serpent's Tail, 1990.

Collection of essays and reviews on 80's rock and rap from bright, erudite contributor to Melody Maker. Reynolds is probably the primary source on techno, noise, electronica

Santoro, Gene. Dancing in Your Head: Jazz, Blues, Rock, and Beyond. NY: Oxford, 1994.

Collection of reviews and essays from Nation popular music columnist. Topics covered include Beck, Miles, VU, Clapton, Grateful Dead, Sun Ra, Public Enemy. Excellent historical insights, facts on Beck, "Vaudeville Rock", the Last Poets, Eno.

Savage, Jon. England's Dreaming : Anarchy, Sex Pistols, Punk Rock, And Beyond. New York : St. Martin's Press, 1992.

Narrative of the rise of British Punk from American garage and glitter, and especially from the aesthetico-political program of McClaren. Follows Sex Pistols on an almost daily basis until their demise. Great discography.

Sinclair, John. Music and Politics. NY: World, 1971.

Tough to find and out of print, this book must be an interesting curio, at least, written by the anarchic activist and mentor of the MC5.

Somma, Robert. No One Waved Goodbye: A Casualty Report on Rock and Roll. London: Charisma Books, 1973.

Stallings, Penny, Rock and Roll Confidential. Boston: Little, Brown, 1984.

Tosches, Nick. Country. NY: Dell, 1977.

DeCurtis. Anthony ed. Present Tense : Rock & Roll And Culture. Durham : Duke University Press, 1992.

Frith, Simon, and Andrew Goodwin, eds. On Record: Rock, Pop, and the Written Word. NY: Pantheon, 1990.

Collection of theory based essays on rock and pop. Includes essays by Frith, Barthes, Marcus, and covers cultural studies, feminism, and post-modernism.

___, ___, and Lawrence Grossberg, eds. Sound and Vision: The Music Video Reader. NY: Routledge, 1993.

___, and Tony Bennett and Lawrence Grossberg, eds. Rock and Popular Music: Politics, Policies, Institutions. London: Routledge, 1993.

Rose, Tricia, and Andrew Ross, eds. Microphone Fiends: Youth Music and Youth Culture. London: Routlege, 1994.

Collection of original essays and interviews, best known scholars and performers.

Swiss, Thomas, John Sloop, and Andrew Herman, eds. Mapping the Beat: Popular Music and Contemporary Theory. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1997

Collection of essays that, using examples from contemporary music and MTV, situate pop music in cultural studies. Essays on MC5, rock covers, noise, scholarship

Attali, Jacques. Noise: The Political Economy of Music. (Theory and History of Literature, Vol. 16) Trans. Brian Massumi. Foreword by Frederick Jameson. Minneapolis: Minnesota, 1985.

Marxist, post-structuralist reading of the transformation of sound into commodity; primarily focused on classical, rock is commented on in several places.

Baker-White, Robert. "Crowds, Audiences, and the 'Liturgy of Irreverence': Rethinking the Altamont Concert as Participatory Theater. SiPC 14.2 (1992): 37-49.

Bindas, Kenneth. America's Musical Pulse: Popular Music in Twentieth Century Society. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1992.

Brown, Charles T. The Art Of Rock And Roll. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : Prentice-Hall, c1983.

Rock and roll's music theory, written for novices. Fascinating discussion of elements of music applied to rock and roll, designed to improve listening skills.

Brake, Mike. The Sociology of Youth Culture and Youth Subcultures: Sex and Drugs and Rock 'n' Roll. London: Routledge, 1980.

Important cultural materialist examination of subcultures, punk and otherwise, but not primarily about rock.

Cohen, Stanley. Folk Devils and Moral Panics: The Creation of the Mods and Rockers. NY: St. Martins, 1980.

Cooper, B. Lee. Popular Music Perspectives : Ideas, Themes, And Patterns In Contemporary Lyrics , Bowling Green, Ohio : Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1991.

Groups and analyzes songs on the basis of shared themes, like Education, Railroads, Death, Telephones, Answer songs and sequels, etc.

Corbett, John, Extended Play: Sounding Off from John Cage to Dr. Funkenstein. Durham: Duke, 1994.

Selection of essay and interviews addressing the status of recorded music in postmodern culture; the politics of self-censorship, experimentation, and alternativism in the music industry; and the use of metaphors of space and madness in the work of African American musicians.

Curtis, Jim. Rock Eras : Interpretations Of Music And Society, 1954-1984 , Bowling Green, Ohio : Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1987.

Applies historicist and sociological principles to the study of rock and roll. The first two chapters are the most interesting.

Dannen, Fredric. Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business. NY: Ballentine, 1976.

Duncan, Robert. The Noise. NY: Ticknor and Fields, 1984.

___. "Rock & Roll Culture." SAQ 90 (Fall 1991): 4.

Denisoff, Serge. Inside MTV. New Brunswick: Transaction, 1988.

___. Risky Business: Rock in Film. Transaction, 1991.

___. Tarnished Gold: The Record Industry Revisited. Transaction, 1976.

Denselow, Robert. When the Music's Over: The Story of Political Pop. London: Faber and Faber, 1989.

Durant, Alan. Conditions Of Music Albany : State University of New York Press, c1984.

Very difficult musicological study, with only a bit on rock.

Eliot, Marc. Rockonomics : The Money Behind The Music New York : Watts, 1989.

Fowlie, Wallace. Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet. Durham: Duke, 1994.

Fowlie, to whom Morrison wrote to thank him for translating Rimbaud, traces and links Morisson's work with Rimbaud's.

Frith, Simon. Music for Pleasure: Essays in the Sociology of Pop. Routledge, 1988.

Frith is a British sociologist and a noted rock critic. Here, he examines production, consumption, and representation in rock music from a cultural materialist perspective that focuses not on individual artists, but on the social and economic processes of which artists and their work are both products and producers.

___. The Sociology Of Rock Constable, 1978.

___. Performing Rites: On the Value of Popular Music. Cambridge: Harvard, 1996.

___. Sound Effects : Youth, Leisure, And The Politics Of Rock'n Roll. NY: Pantheon Books, c1981

This is the American edition of "Sociology," focusing on the sociological and political factors in the production, consumption, and reception of rock. Foreword acknowledges Bangs, Marcus, RSIHRR, Meltzer, and Willis as top rock critics.

___. and Howard Horne. Art Into Pop. NY: Methuen, 1987.

Goodall, H. Lloyd. Living in the Rock N Roll Mystery : Reading Context, Self, and Others as Clues. Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press, 1991.

Hall, Stuart, and Tony Jefferson. Resistance Through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Postwar Britain. London: Hutchinson, 1976.

Not primarily about rock, but a key sociological study

Hamm, Charles. Music in the New World. NY: Norton, 1983.

According to Pattison, the standard text on music in America. A narrative of the growth and development of music in America. Topics include, Native American music, Colonial music, Slave music, Foster, Marches, Classical, Tin Pan alley, Jazz, Hillbilly and Country, Avant-Garde, Rock. Hamm is a renaissance scholar.

___. Putting Popular Music in Its Place. London: Cambridge, 1995.

Collection of essays on cultural, political analyses of artists from Dvorak to Elvis.

Harris, James F. Philosophy at 33 1/3 rpm : Themes Of Classic Rock. Chicago : Open Court, 1993.

Argues that classic rock should be taken seriously as an art form, laying the groundwork for a heightened appreciation by exhibiting philosophical themes in songs, including friendship, community, social and sexual alienation, the death of god, immediate gratification, individual autonomy, the corruption of the state, and the end of the present age.

Hebdige, Dick. Cut 'n Mix. NY: Methuen, 1987.

___. Subculture: the Meaning of Style. London: Routledge, 1991.

This is a seminal study on youth style as an expression of revolt and identity. Great cultural analysis of Teddy boys, Skinheads, hippies, rude boys, and especially punks. Clothing, hairstyles, and musical tastes are given excellent analysis; especially good is the discussion of the white use of black music.

Herman, Gary. Rock and Roll Babylon. London: Plexus, 1982.

Hitchcock, H. Wiley. Music in the United States. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1969.

A history of popular music in America.

Laing, Dave. One Chord Wonders : Power And Meaning In Punk Rock. Philadelphia : Open University Press, 1985.

Levene, Lawrence. Highbrow/Lowbrow: the Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America. Cambridge: Harvard. 1988.

Lomax, Alan. Folk Song Style And Culture. New Brunswick, N.J. : Transaction Books, 1978.

Middleton, Richard. Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press, 1990.

Moore, Allan. Rock: The Primary Text; Developing a Musicology of Rock. Buckingham: Open University Press, 1993.

Scholarly musicalogical analysis

Nehring, Neil. Popular Music, Gender, and Postmodernism: Anger is an Energy. London: Sage, 1997.

A rebuttal to academic postmodernism, this book emphasizes that emotion and reason are mutually interdependent.

Negus, Keith. Producing Pop : Culture and Conflict in the Popular Music Industry London ; New York : E. Arnold, 1992.

Pattison, Robert. The Triumph of Vulgarity : Rock Music in the Mirror of Romanticism. New York : Oxford University Press, 1987.

Fascinating and very literary study of rock as the logical manifestation of romantic ideology of free creativity, best realized through its vulgar pantheism. Excellent bibliography.

Peterson, Richard. "Why 1955? Explaining the Advent of Rock Music." Popular Music 9 (1990): 97-116.

Podell, Janet , ed. Rock Music in America . New York : H.W. Wilson Co., 1986.

A "Reference Shelf book."

Pratt, Ray. Rhythm and Resistance: Explorations of Political Uses of Popular Music. NY: Praeger, 1990.

Examines folk music and other more explicitly political forms.

Reitinger, Douglas. "Paint It Black: Rock Music and Vietnam War Film." JA Cult 15.3 (Fall 1992) 53-9.

Roof, Wade. A Generation of Seekers: The Spiritual Journeys of the Baby Boom Generation. San Francisco, Harper-Collins, 1993.

Rosenberg, Neil, ed. Transforming Tradition: Folk Music Revivals Examined. Champaign: Illinois, 1993.

Ryback, Timothy W. Rock Around the Bloc : a History of Rock Music in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. New York : Oxford University Press, 1990.

Seay, Davin, with Mary Neely. Stairway to Heaven: The Spiritual Roots of Rock 'n' Roll. NY: Ballantine, 1986.

Shank, Barry. Dissonant Identities: Rock and Roll Scene in Austin, Texas. Hanover, NH: UP of New England, 1994.

Sociological analysis of the Austin scene.

Shepherd, John. Music as Social Text. Cambridge: Polity, 1991.

Street, John. Rebel Rock: The Politics of Popular Music. NY: Blackwell, 1986.

Van der Merwee, Peter. Origins of the Popular Style: Antecedents of Twentieth -century Popular Music. NY: Oxford, 1992.

Walser, Robert. Running with the Devil : Power, Gender, and Madness in Heavy Metal Music. Hanover, NH : University Press of New England, 1993.

A defense of heavy metal music from a seemingly leftist, sociological view, arguing how the music empowers unfortunate white boys, but either ignores or rationalizes the sexist, fascistic tendencies.

Watson, Ben. Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play. London: Quartet, 1994.

Weinstein, Deena. Heavy Metal: A Cultural Sociology. NY: Lexington, 1991.

A cultural studies reading of heavy metal--looks like a doctoral dissertation, but readable and well researched, with some informative appendices

Whiteley, Sheila, The Space Between The Notes : Rock And The Counter-Culture London ; New York : Routledge, 1992.

Whitmer, Peter. Aquarius Revisited: Seven Who Created the Sixties Counterculture That Changed America. NY: Macmillan, 1987.

Willis, Paul. Profane Culture. London: Routledge, 1987.

Wojcik, Daniel. Punk and Neo-Tribal Body Art. Jackson: UMiss, 1995.

Balfour, Victoria. Rock Wives. Morrow, 1986.

Burchill, Julie and Tony Parsons. "The Boy Looked at Johnny": The Obituary of Rock and Roll. Winchester MA: Faber and Faber, 1978.

Betrock, Alan. Girl Groups: The Story of a Sound. NY: Delilah, 1982.

Buffwack, Mary A. and Robert K. Oermann. Finding Her Voice: The Saga of Women in Country Music. Crown, 1993.

Evans, Liz. Women, Sex, and Rock 'n' Roll: In Their Own Words. Routledge, 1994.

Gaar, Gillian. She's a Rebel: The History of Women in Rock and Roll. Seattle: Seal Press, 1992.

Covers women in rock from 50's blueswomen to about 1990. Chapters include 50's, Girl Groups, 60's women, female protest, 70's diversity, punk, post-punk, video, and "future" stars, such Vega O'Connor, Latifah, Galas

Gourse, Leslie. Madame Jazz: Contempary Women Instrumentalists. NY: Oxford, 1995

Juno, Andrea. Angry Women of Rock Volume One. Juno Books, 1996.

Kaplan, Ann E. Rocking Around the Clock: Music Television, Postmodernism, and Consumer Culture. NY: Methuen, 1987.

Karlen, Neal. Babes in Toyland: The Making and Selling of a Rock and Roll Band. NY: Times Books, 1994

An inside look at the marketing of the Riot Grrrl band.

Lewis, Lisa A. Gender Politics And MTV : Voicing The Difference. Philadelphia : Temple University Press, 1990.

McClary, Susan. Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality. Minnesota, 1995.

McDonnell, Evelyn, and Ann Powers. Rock, She Wrote. NY: Delta, 1995.

A great anthology of female rock writers, including hooks on Madonna and Coon on the Pistols. However, the collection is poorly edited: the groupings seem arbitrary and overlapping, and no page numbers are given in the TOC--what could they have been thinking?

O'Brien, Karen. Hymn to Her: Women Musicians Talk. London: Virago, 1995.

O'Brien, Lucy. She Bop: The Definitive History of Women in Rock, Pop, and Soul. Viking/Penguin, 1996.

A "hands on" history of women in rock, adding a feminist perspective, with an abundance of interviews. Traces stages of women's progress from ragtime to the present. Chapters cover early jazz and blues, 50's pop, Motown and Spector, punk, Singer-Songwriters, Madonna, Disco, Rap and Reggae, World Music, Protest Pop. Includes a discography and a bibliography.

O'Dair, Barbara, ed. Trouble Girls: The Rolling Stone Book of Women in Rock. NY: Random House, 1997.

Modeled after the RSIHRR, this is a collection of essays by various authors on major female artists. Most are fairly biographical, with discographies and a good bibliography included.

Raphael, Amy. Grrrls: Viva Rock Divas. St. Martin's, 1995.

Reynolds, Simon and Joy Press. The Sex Revolts: Gender, Rebellion, and Rock 'n' Roll. Cambridge: Harvard, 1995.

Pursues a thesis concerning rock's incorporation and subversion of sex/gender systems.

Roberts, Robin. Ladies First: Women in Music Videos. Jackson: Mississippi UP, 1996.

A series of essays that analyze vids from the perspective of feminism and postmodernism. Chapters include Feminism, PM, and Music videos; Humor; the Construction of Sexuality; Beavis and Butthead; fem country videos; Rap; Queen Latifah.

Schwichtenberg, Cathy, ed. The Madonna Connection: Representational Politics, Subcultural Identities, and Cultural Theory. Westview, 1992.

Smith, Richard. Seduced and Abandoned: Essays on Gay Men and Popular Music. Casell, 1996.

Chapters on Nirvana, Village People, cock rock, The Kinks, REM, Queen

Steward, Sue, and Sheryll Garratt. Signed, Sealed, and Delivered: True Life Stories of Women in Pop Music. Boston: South End Press, 1984.

Whiteley, Sheila, ed. Sexing the Groove: Popular Music and Gender. London: Routledge, 1997.

A collection of essays on the construction of gender in music and the construction of music around gender. Articles on Jagger, Springstein, kd laing, grrrls, videos, digital erotics.

Willis, Ellen. Beginning to See the Light : Sex, Hope, And Rock-And-Roll 2nd ed. Hanover, NH : Wesleyan University Press : University Press of New England, 1992. : 0819562556 (pbk.)

Excellent collection of essays on rock, feminism, and culture. Willis's thesis is that though exploitative, the capitalist system has produced a popular culture that can release us from capitalist oppression, at least in spirit, and that can sow the seeds for revolution--liberation is a key theme, as is the latent sexism in the cultural revolution. Essential.

___. No More Nice Girls : Countercultural Essays. University Press of New England 1992

BLUES, R&B, AND RAP-History and Criticism

(see also the Biography section)

Adler, B. Rap: Portraits and Lyrics of a Generation of Black Rockers. NY: St. Martin's, 1991.

Baker, Houston. Blues, Ideology, and Afro-American Literature. Chicago: U of Chi P, 1984.

Applies deconstruction to both blues and rap.

Bane, Michael. White Boys Singin' the Blues: The Black Roots of White Rock. NY: Penguin, 1982.

Interesting focus on the race issue in rock. Contextualizes well, and not blandly academic in its approach.

Barlow, William. "Looking Up at Down": The Emergence of Blues Culture.

Bernard-Donals, Michael. "Jazz, Rock 'n' Roll, Rap, and Politics." JPC 28.2 (Fall 1994): 127-138.

Boot, Adrian. Bob Marley: Songs of Freedom. NY: Viking, 1995.

Cashmore, E.E. The Rastafarians. London: Minority Rights Group, 1984.

Chambers, Iain, Urban Rhythms. NY: St. Martin's, 1985.

Costello, Mark, and David Wallace. Signifying Rappers: Rap and Race in the Urban Present. NY: Ecco, 1989.

Davis, Angela Y. Blues Legacies and Black Feminism: Getrude "Ma" Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday. NY: Pantheon, 1998.

Sees the roots of the blues as life sustaining vehicle for a nalternative black working class consciousness, and women singers as proto-feminists.

Davis, Sharon. Motown: The History. Guiness, 1988.

Davis, Stephen. Bob Marley. 2nd. ed. Rochester: Schenkman, 1990.

The White alternative, this takes a less imaginative, more concise response to Marley and his meaning.

___. Reggae Bloodlines: In Search of the Music and Culture of Jamaica. NY: Da Capo, 1992.

Large illustrated exploration of rasta culture. Places Marcus Garvey at the fountainhead.

Dent, Gina, ed. Black Popular Culture. Seattle: Bay Press, 1992.

Early, Gerard. One Nation Under a Groove: Motown and American Culture. Hopewell, NJ: Ecco, 1995.

A nonfiction narrative of the rise and growth of Motown as a black owned business making music for white america, using the principle of mass production learned from the car factories.

Epstein, Dena J. Sinful Tunes and Spirituals: Black Folk Music to the Civil War. Urbana: U of ILL P, 1977.

Fernando, S.H. The New Beats: Exploring the Music, Culture, and Attitudes of Hip-Hop. NY: Anchor, 1994.

The story of rap and hip-hop, told affectionately by one involved. One critic puts it on a par with Palmer, Guralnick, and Spelman.

Floyd, Samuel. The Power of Black Music: Interpreting Its History From Africa to the United States. NY: Oxford, 1995

Illuminates the centuries old linkage between African music, myth, and ritual and the evolution of African-American popular music; traces jazz, mainly, to slave songs and ring shouts, talking drum, etc. Little to nothing on R&B, soul, hiphop. Maintains position of a jungian cultural memory which exists unconsciously in every performer of African descent.

Garon, Paul. Blues and the Poetic Spirit. NY: Da Capo, 1975.

George, Nelson. Buppies, B-Boys, Baps &Bohos. NY: HarperCollins, 1992.

An anthology of essays and criticisms, with several articles on rap and hip-hop

___. The Death of Soul

___, et al, eds. Fresh: Hip Hop Don't Stop. NY: Random House, 1985.

___, Where Did Our Love Go?: The Rise and Fall of Motown Records. NY: St. Martin's, 1985.

Gonzales, Michael and Havelock Nelson. Bring the Noise: A Guide to Rap Music and Hip-Hop Culture. NY: Harmony, 1991.

Guralnick, Peter. The Listener's Guide to the Blues. NY: Quarto, 1982.

___. Sweet Soul Music : Rhythm And Blues And The Southern Dream Of Freedom . New York : Harper & Row, 1986.

Hagar, Steven. Hip Hop: the Illustrated History of BReak Dancing, Rap Music and Graffiti.

Harris, Sheldon. Blues Who's Who. New Rochelle: Arlington House, 1979.

Heilbut, Anthony. Gospel Music: Good News and Bad Times. Limelight Editions, 1985.

Hirshey, Gerri. Nowhere to Run: The Story of Soul Music. NY: Times Books, 1984.

Hoare, Ian and Terry Cummings. The Soul Book. NY: Delta, 1975.

Keil, Charles. Urban Blues. Chicago, University of Chicago Press [1966]

Lomax, Alan. The Land Where Blues Began. NY: Pantheon, 1993.

A first-handhistory of the early southern blues from the first man to record delta blues artists. Lots of lyrics.

McKee, Margaret, and Fred Chisenhall. Beale Black and Blue: Life and Music on America's Main Street. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1981.

Mitchell, Elvis, et al. The Motown Album: The Sound of Young America. NY: St. Martin's, 1990.

Murray, Albert. Stompin' The Blues: Duke, Bessie, Louis, Bird, Lester, Jelly. NY: McGraw-Hill, 1976.

Lively, affectionate, and literate study of the progression of blues into jazz. Fairly essential

Nelson, Havelock, and Michael A. Gonzalez. Bring the Noise: A Guide to Rap Music and Hip Hop Culture. NY: Crown, 1991.

Owens, Joseph. Dread: the Rastafarians of Jamaica. London: Heinemann, 1979.

Palmer, Robert. Deep Blues. N.Y. : Penguin Books, 1982.

A concise, authoritative account of the blue's African beginnings, its early evolution, and its transfomration from a backcountry goodtime music into todays modern blues and rock n roll; includes personal histories of Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Robt Lockwood and Sonny B. Williamson. Very readable. Essential Reading.

Perkins, William Eric, ed. Droppin' Science: Critical Essays on Rap Music and Hip Hop Culture. Philadelphia: Temple, 1996.

Essays deal with sociological and multicultural aspects of hiphop. Essays on women, latino rap, gangsta and LA, Rose on the policing of rap.

Redd, L.N. Rock is Rhythm and Blues. East Lansing: Mich. St. UP, 1974

Account of rock's Black roots.

Rose, Tricia. Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America. Hanover: Wesleyan UP, 1994.

Theoretical analysis of Rap, Hip-hop, and contemporary black culture. A published doctoral dissertation with an excellent bibliography.

Sexton, Adam, ed. Rap on Rap: Straight Up Talk on Hip -Hop Culture. NY: Delta, 1995.

An anthology of essays on Rap, mostly about the controversies that it creates than on the culture and criticism of the music.

Small, Christopher. Music of the Common Tongue: Survival and Celebration in Afro-American Music. NY: Riverun, 1988.

Southern, Eileen. The Music of Black Americans: A History. NY: Norton, 1971.

Spencer, Jon (?) M, ed. The Emergency of Black and the Emergence of Rap. Durham: Duke, 1991.

Spencer, Jon M. Blues and Evil. Knoxville: Tennessee (?)

This study argues that spiritual values are clearly refelcted in the blues' mythologized history, folk-theological language, and philosphical speculation on the dual existence of good and evil.

Tate, Greg. Flyboy in the Buttermilk : Essays On Contemporary America New York : Simon & Schuster, c1992.

The first section of the book includes her rock criticism. Her essays on such subjects as Dylan, The Velvet Underground, and punk, are rich in cultural knowledge and insight. Willis established the first feminist voice in an otherwise male-dominated genre, but her essays are much more than polemics. Essential.

___. "What is Hip-Hop?" Rap on Rap (see Sexton, above)

Toop, David. The Rap Attack: African Jive to New York Hip Hop.

Vincent, Ricky. Funk: The Music, the People, and the Rhythm of the One. NY: St. Martin's, 1996.

Waller, Don. The Motown Story. Scribner's, 1985.

Alternative Press

Big, Rolling Stone/Spin-type coverage of fairly mainstream alternative music. Some pieces on the history of punk, but much of the writing is mediocre.

Billboard.

Mostly concerned with business aspects.

Cashbox

Like Billboard, provides various charts and news on business.

Circus (1967-- ).

Crawdaddy.

Perhaps the first major rock and roll 'zine, and self consciously so, where several major critics got their start. Writing tends to take rock too seriously. Old copies can be purchased from the web, and several articles are reproduced from the web.

Creem. (1970--1988, 1990-93). Birmingham, MI [etc.] Creem Magazine, inc.

This rag had the most outrageous weltanschaung and the best writers, including Bangs, Marsh, Marcus, Meltzer.

Goldmine

Primarily addresses record collectors, has some good criticism , history, and biography

Kerrang

British publication of the 80's

Melody Maker.

British music business rag, with criticism included.

New Musical Express.

British counterpart to Rolling Stone

Punk

The major underground magazine of the NY punk scene, published between 1976-79, edited by Jon Holstrom and Legs McNeil, including Mary Harron among its writers. Reissued in bound volumes.

Sniffin' Glue

The British counterpart to Punk.

Spin

Trouser Press (1975-84)

Considered by some to be the best of the alternative rock mags.

Vibe

The contemporary black music equivalent to Rolling Stone.

Village Voice

Probably the most consistent source of excellent rock criticism

The Wire

British mag focusing on the Electronica scene. Very well written, including Reynolds and Savage among the contributing editors.