Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: Christgau's Consumer Guide: Albums of the '90s by Robert Christgau ISBN: 0-312-24560-2 Publisher: Griffin Trade Paperback Pub. Date: 15 October, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.02 (40 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: flawed but essential
Comment: The new rating system, with its "turkey," "bomb," and "choice cut" icons, is confusing. The cover looks like Granny's leftover Christmas foil. My copy has what looks like blobs of ink on a few of the pages. And, most disappointing of all, there's no "Core Collection" list, as with the 70s and 80s versions (both also highly recommended). Still, if I had to pick only one record guide from the many titles out there, it wouldn't take long...
Why is Christgau better than even such venerable rock critics as Ken Tucker and Greil Marcus? He thinks and listens harder, for one thing. And in an age when most critics are little more than paid lapdogs for the corporate record industry, he remains immune to what he calls "autohype." (Which, as I interpret it, means "loving" a record because of the artist's public image rather than on its own merits.)
I have been following Christgau's monthly Consumer Guides in The Village Voice since the mid seventies, and I can honestly say that he has broadened my perspective on not only popular music, but politics, race, and sex as well. (Can reading a music criticism make one a better husband/father/citizen? In this case I'd have to say yes.) In short, he is, to quote that dreaded phrase "the thinking person's rock critic," albeit one who also possesses the occasional ability to make you laugh so hard beer shoots out of your nose. (He isn't known as "the king of the pithy one-liner" for nothing!)
Finally, I would take Christgau's own advice when deciding whether or not to purchase this book: Find a copy at a library or book store, and turn to the year-end best-of lists in the back. If at least a few of his higher ranked cds are also among your faves, then purchase immediately. If, on the other hand, you find yourself turning up your nose at most of them, then pass.
Rating: 5
Summary: In praise of shorter reviews
Comment: This book claims "over 3800 reviews", but that's more like a sample size. That's far from exhaustive, but no doubt exhausting work for any single reviewer: more than a new record a day, every day for ten years. (For what it's worth, I have a web site where I've rated some 3000 records from the same decade, including many reissues, and it's taken me 8-10 hours/day listening time to accumulate that -- without writing reviews. Much more is hard for me to imagine.) Sure, most are quickly disposed of with icons for Bombs, Neither (good nor bad), short lists of Choice Cuts, or cryptic Honorable Mentions, but in most cases that's information enough. That leaves us with about 1100 single paragraph reviews: mostly "A List" records, with a smattering of Turkeys for balance, perspective, and blowing off a little steam. I don't care much for the Turkeys, but I suppose it's good to know that Christgau actually thought about the likes of Michael Bolton, MC Ren, and the Verve Pipe before sloughing them off. But once you sort through the data, what's left is the broadest and most erudite survey of popular music in our time. Christgau eschews categories since he transcends them: his picks range from Al Jolson to Spring Heel Jack, Sleater-Kinney to Mzwakhe Mbuli, Ruby Braff to Prince Paul, Freedy Johnston to Liliput, Tricky to Garth Brooks. The writing is denser than in previous Consumer Guides: partly the accumulated weight of his experience, partly a bias for the analytical over the informative, and possibly a reaction to the bloat in the music he critiques. This can be difficult, and can send you scurrying off to other guides for background. And by limiting the scope to an arbitrary decade, it lacks context. But these days almost all record guides are tepid committee works, usually locked into a single limiting genre. By contrast, this book offers us a single, coherent critical viewpoint, often brilliant, applied to an impressively broad musical spectrum. This book is unique, and we're fortunate to have it.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Only Critic Who Matters
Comment: Robert Christgau has been writing rock criticism for over 35 years. He has graded over 12,000 albums. That's TWELVE THOUSAND. He's almost certainly heard more albums than anyone in history. When I read any other critic (not to mention outspoken laymen), my response is "Is that your opinion based on the 6 albums you've heard?" This book is the definitive work on the music of the 1990's. Oh no. Did he give OK Computer a B-? And What's The Story Morning Glory only got an honorable mention? And Anthology 2 got a dud? Yes. Have you heard Iris Dement: My Life? D J Shadow: Entroducing... D J Shadow? Freedy Johnston: Can You Fly? The Magnetic Fields: 69 Love Songs? Have you heard The Rolling Stones: Exile On Main Street? Every critic panned it when it came out except one.
 |
Title: Rock Albums of the '70s: A Critical Guide by Robert Christgau ISBN: 0306804093 Publisher: DaCapo Press Pub. Date: October, 1990 List Price(USD): $17.50 |
 |
Title: Grown Up All Wrong: 75 Great Rock and Pop Artists from Vaudeville to Techno by Robert Christgau ISBN: 0674003829 Publisher: Harvard Univ Pr Pub. Date: November, 2000 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
 |
Title: Any Old Way You Choose It by Robert Christgau ISBN: 0815410417 Publisher: Cooper Square Press Pub. Date: June, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
 |
Title: Main Lines, Blood Feasts, and Bad Taste : A Lester Bangs Reader by John Morthland, Lester Bangs ISBN: 0375713670 Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 12 August, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
 |
Title: Christgau's Record Guide: The '80s by Robert Christgau ISBN: 0306805820 Publisher: DaCapo Press Pub. Date: September, 1994 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
