• Acknowledgments xiii Introduction
• 1 I. Collectibles The Informer: John Leonard's When the Kissing Had to Stop
• 11 Advertisements for Everybody Else: Jonathan Lethem's The Ecstasy of Influence
• 14 Democratic Vistas: Dave Hickey's Air Guitar
• 17 II. From Blackface Minstrelsy to Track-and-Hook In Search of Jim Crow: Why Postmodern Minstrelsy Studies Matter
• 23 The Old Ethiopians at Home: Ken Emerson's Doo-Dah!
• 40 Before the Blues: David Wondrich's Stomp and Swerve
• 43 Rhythms of the Universe: Ned Sublette's Cuba and Its Music
• 46 Black Melting Pot: David B. Coplan's In Township Tonight!
• 49 Bwana-Acolyte in the Favor Bank: Banning Eyre's In Griot Time
• 56 In the Crucible of the Party: Charles and Angelilki Keil's Bright Balkan Morning
• 59 Defining the Folk: Benjamin Filene's Romancing the Folk
• 64 Folking Around: David Hajdu's Positively 4th Street
• 67 Punk Lives: Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain's Please Kill Me
• 70 Biography of a Corporation: Nelson George's Where Did Our Love Go?
• 72 Hip-Hop Faces the World: Steven Hager's Hip Hop-- David Toop's The Rap Attack-- and Nelson George, Sally Banes, Susan Flinker, and Patty Romanowski's Fresh
• 75 Making Out Like Gangsters: Preston Lauterbach's The Chitlin' Circuit, Dan Charnas's The Big Payback, Ice-T's Ice, and Tommy James's Me, the Mob, and Music
• 80 Money Isn't Everything: Fred Goodman's The Mansion on the Hill
• 86 Mapping the Earworm's Genome: John Seabrook's The Song Machine
• 89 III. Critical Practice Beyond the Symphonic Quest: Susan McClary's Feminine Endings
• 97 All the Tune Family: Peter van der Merwe's Origins of the Popular Style
• 100 Bel Cantos: Henry Pleasant's The Great American Popular Singers
• 102 The Country and the City: Charlie Gillett's The Sound of the City
• 109 Reflections of an Aging Rock Critic: Jon Landau's It's Too Late to Stop Now
• 115 Pioneer Days: Kevin Avery's Everything Is an Afterthought and Nona Willis Aronowitz's (ed.) Out of the Vinyl Deeps
• 117 Impolite Discourse: Jim Derogatis's Let It Blurt: The Life and Times of Lester Bangs, Richard Meltzer's A Whore Jus Like the Rest, and Nick Tosches's The Nick Torches Reader
• 123 Journalism and/or Criticism and/or Musicology and/or Sociology (and/or Writing): Simon Firth
• 129 Serious Music: Robert Walser's Running With the Devil
• 137 Fifteen Minutes of . . . : William York's Who's Who in Rock Music
• 139 The Fanzine Worldview, Alphabetized: Ira A. Robbins's (ed.) Trouser Press Guide to New Wave Records
• 140 Awesome: Simon Reynolds's Blissed Out
• 143 Ingenuousness Lost: James Miller's Flowers in the Dustbin
• 147 Rock Criticism Lives: Jessica Hopper's The Fist Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic
• 151 Emo Meets Trayvon Martin: Hanif Abdurraquib's They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us
• 156 IV. Lives in Music Inside and Out Great Book of Fire: Nick Tosches's Hellfire and Robert Palmer's Jerry Lee Lewis Rocks!
• 163 That Bad Man, Tough Old Huddie Ledbetter: Charles Wolfe and Kip Lornell's The Life and Legend of Leadbelly
• 169 The Impenetrable Heroism of Sam Cooke: Peter Guralnick's Dream Boogie
• 171 Bobby and Dave: Bob Dylan's Chronicles: Volume One and Dave Van Ronk's The Mayor of MacDougal Street
• 178 Tell All: Ed Sanders's Fug You and Samuel R. Delany's The Motion of Light in Water
• 180 King of the Thrillseekers: Richard Hell's I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp
• 185 Lives Saved, Lives Lost: Carrie Brownstein's Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl and Patti Smith's M Train
• 189 The Cynic and the Bloke: Rod Stewart's Rod: The Autobiography and Donald Fagen's Eminent Hipsters
• 194 His Own Shaman: RJ Smith's The One
• 199 Spotlight on the Queen: David Ritz's Respect
• 201 The Realist Thing You've Ever Seen: Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run
• 205 V. Fictions Writing for the People: George Orwell's
• 1984
• 213 A Classic Illustrated: R. Crumb's The Book of Genesis
• 217 The Hippie Grows Older: Richard Brautigan's Sombrero Fallout
• 222 Comic Gurdjieffianism You Can Masturbate To: Marco Vassis' Mind Blower
• 224 Porn Yesterday: Walter Kendrick's The Secret Museum
• 225 What Pretentious White Men Are Good For: Robert Coover's Gerald's Party
• 230 Impoverished How, Exactly? Roddy Doyle's The Woman Who Walked into Doors
• 236 Sustainable Romance: Norman Rush's Mortals
• 237 Derrnig-Do Scrapping By: Michael Chabon's Telegraph Avenue
• 240 Futures by the Dozen: Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire
• 245 YA Poet of the Massa Woods: Sandra Newman's The Country of Ice Cream Star
• 248 A Darker Shade of Noir: The Indefatigable Walter Mosley
• 252 VI. Bohemia Meets Hegemony Epatant le Bourgeoisie: Jerrold Seigel's Bohemian Paris and T. J. Clark's The Painting of Modern Life
• 263 The Village People: Christine Stansell's American Moderns
• 278 A Slender Hope for Salvation: Charles Reich's The Greening of America
• 280 The Lumpenhippie Guru: Ed Sanders's The Family
• 285 Strait Are the Gates: Morris Dickstein's Gates of Eden
• 289 The Little Counterculture That Could: Carol Brightman's Sweet Chaos
• 293 The Pop-Boho Connection, Narrativized: Bernard F. Gendron's Between Montmarte and the Mudd Club
• 297 Cursed and Sainted Seekers of the Sexual Century: John Heidenry's What Wild Ecstasy
• 301 Bohemias Lost and Found: Ross Wetzsteon's Republic of Dreams, Richard Kostelanetz's SoHo, and Richard Lloyd's Neo-Bohemia
• 304 Autobiography of a Pain in the Neck: Meredith Maran's What It's Like to Live Now
• 309 VII. Culture Meets Capital Twentieth Century Limited: Marshall Berman's All That Is Solid Melts into Air
• 315 Dialectical Cricket: C. L. R. James's Beyond a Boundary
• 320 Radical Pluralist: Andrew Ross's No Respect
• 323 Inside the Prosex Wars: Nadine Strossen's Defending Pornography, Joanna Frueh's Eroctic Faculties, and Lara Kipnis's Bound and Gagged
• 327 Growing Up Kept Down: William Finnegan's Cold New World
• 331 Jesus Plus the Capitalist Order: Jeff Sharlet's The Family
• 334 Dark Night of the Quants: Ten Books About the Financial Crisis
• 338 They Bet Your Life: Four Books About Hedge Funds
• 345 Living in a Material World: Raymond Williams's Long Revolution
• 350 With a God on His Side: Terry Eagleton's Culture and the Death of God, Culture, and Materialism
• 369 My Friend Marshall: Marshall Berman's Modernism in the Streets
• 374 Index 381.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

In this generous collection of book reviews and literary essays, legendary Village Voice rock critic Robert Christgau showcases the passion that made him a critic-his love for the written word. Many selections address music, from blackface minstrelsy to punk and hip-hop, artists from Lead Belly to Patti Smith, and fellow critics from Ellen Willis and Lester Bangs to Nelson George and Jessica Hopper. But Book Reports also teases out the popular in the Bible and 1984 as well as pornography and science fiction, and analyzes at length the cultural theory of Raymond Williams, the detective novels of Walter Mosley, the history of bohemia, and the 2008 financial crisis. It establishes Christgau as not just the Dean of American Rock Critics, but one of America's most insightful cultural critics as well.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introduction. Robert Christgau's Greatest Hits: Volume UUU
• 1 Prologue. Good to Ya, Not for Ya: Rock Criticism vs. the Guilty Pleasure
• 9 I. History in the Making Ten-Step Program for Growing Better Ears
• 19 Dionysus in Theory and Practice
• 19 B.E.: A Dozen Moments in the Prehistory of Rock and Roll
• 27 Let's Get Busy in Hawaiian: A Hundred Years of Ragged Beats and Cheap Tunes
• 34 Rock Lyrics Are Poetry (Maybe)
• 42 "We Have to Deal With It": Punk England Report
• 48 Rock 'n' Roller Coaster: The Music Biz on a Joyride
• 65 Not My Fault, Not My Problem: Classic Rock
• 76 A Weekend in Paradise: Woodstock '94
• 81 Staying Alive: Postclassic Disco
• 96 Harry Smith Makes History: Anthology of American Folk Music
• 103 Getting Their Hands Dirty: Michael Azerrad's Our Band Could Be Your Life
• 107 A Month on the Town
• 111 U.S. and Them: Are American Pop (and Semi-Pop) Still Exceptional? And by the Way, Does That Make Them Better?
• 120 What I Listen for in Music
• 130 II. A Great Tradition Pops as Pop: Louis Armstrong
• 135 Not So Misterioso: Thelonious Monk
• 140 First Lady of Song: Billie Holiday
• 149 Folksinger, Wordslinger, Start Me a Song: Woody Guthrie
• 154 Caring the Hard Way: Frank Sinatra: 1915-1998
• 159 Like Ringing a Bell: Chuck Berry: 1926-2017
• 161 Unnaturals: The Coasters with No Strings Attached
• 165 Black Elvis: Same Cooke
• 172 Tough Love: Etta James
• 176 The Excitement! The Terror!: Miles Davis's '70s
• 181 Sister, Oh Sister: Kate and Anna McGarrigle
• 185 Two Pieces About the Ramones:
• 190
• 1. Ramone
• 2. Road to Ruin Nevermore: Nirvana
• 196 A Long Short Story: The Go-Betweens
• 200 Generation Gaps: The Spice Girls
• 204 Ooh, That Sound: The Backstreet Boys
• 206 Tear the Sky Off the Mother: 'N Sync
• 207 The World Is His Boudoir: Prince
• 208 Two Pieces About Aretha Franklin:
• 209
• 1. Queen of Pop
• 2. Familiar and Fabulous Two Pieces About Bob Dylan:
• 214
• 1. Dylan Back: World Goes On
• 2. Secrets of the Sphinx Ain't Dead Yet: Holy Modal Rounders
• 220 How to Survive on an Apple Pie Diet: John Prine
• 221 The Unflashiest: Willie Nelson
• 225 III. Millennium Music from a Desert Storm
• 231 Ghost Dance
• 238 The Moldy Peaches Slip You a Roofie
• 241 Attack of the Chickenshits: Steve Earle
• 245 Facing Mecca: Youssou N'Dour
• 249 Three Pieces About M.I.A
• 1. Burning Bright
• 2. Quotations from Charmin M.I.A.
• 3. Right, the Record IV. From Which All Blessings Flow Full Immersion with Suspect Tendencies: Paul Simon's Graceland
• 259 Fela and His Lessers
• 267 Vendant l'Afrique
• 270 Dakar in Gear
• 275 A God After Midnight: Youssou N'Dour
• 278 Franco d Mi Amor
• 279 Forty Years of History, Thirty Seconds of Joy
• 285 Tribulations of St. Joseph: Ladysmith Black Mambazo
• 289 Music from a Desert War
• 292 V. Postmodern Times Growing by Degrees: Kanye West
• 301 The Slim Shady Essay: Eminem
• 303 Career Opportunity: The Perceptionists
• 314 Good Morning Little School Girl: R. Kelly
• 316 Master and Sacrament: Buddy Guy
• 319 The Commoner Queen: Mary J. Blige
• 321 A Hot Little Weirdo: Shakira
• 323 What's Not to Like?: Norah Jones
• 326 No-Hope Radio: Radiohead
• 330 Rather Exhilarating: Sonic Youth
• 334 Adult Contemporary: Grant McLennan: 1958-2006
• 337 Titan. Polymath. Naturalist: Ray Charles: 1930-2004
• 338 He Got Us: James Brown: 1933-2006
• 339 Old Master: Bob Dylan
• 342 Estudando Tom Ze
• 343 Gypsy Is His Autopilot: Gogol Bordello
• 349 Triumph of the Id: Lil Wayne
• 353 Brag Like That: Jay-Z
• 357 Paisley's Progress: Brad Paisley
• 362 Smart and Smarter: Vampire Weekend
• 367 The Many Reasons to Love Wussy
• 372 Hearing Her Pain: Fiona Apple
• 377 Firestarter: Miranda Lambert
• 381 Monster Anthems: Lady Gaga
• 384 Dancing on Her Own: Robyn
• 388 Three More Pieces About M.I.A.:
• 393
• 1. Spread out, Reach High: M.I.A.'s Kala
• 2. Illygirl Steppin Up
• 3. Spelled Backwards It's "Aim" The Unassumingest: Lori McKenna
• 400 VI. Got to Be Driftin' Along Who Knows It Feels It: Bob Marley
• 407 Shape Shifter: David Bowie: 1947-2016
• 411 The Most Gifted Artist of the Rock Era: Prince: 1958-2016
• 414 Forever Old: Leonard Cohen: 1933-2016
• 416 Sticking It in Their Ear: Bob Dylan
• 419 Don't Worry About Nothing: Ornette Coleman
• 420 Sensualistic, Polytheistic: New York Dolls
• 421 Index 425.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Is It Still Good to Ya? sums up the career of longtime Village Voice stalwart Robert Christgau, who for half a century has been America's most widely respected rock critic, honoring a music he argues is only more enduring because it's sometimes simple or silly. While compiling historical overviews going back to Dionysus and the gramophone along with artist analyses that range from Louis Armstrong to M.I.A., this definitive collection also explores pop's African roots, response to 9/11, and evolution from the teen music of the '50s to an art form compelled to confront mortality as its heroes pass on. A final section combines searching obituaries of David Bowie, Prince, and Leonard Cohen with awed farewells to Bob Marley and Ornette Coleman.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

One of our great essayists and music journalists, the Dean of American Rock Critics, leads a heady tour through his life and times in this atmospheric, visceral memoir--both a love letter to a New York long past and a tribute to the transformative power of artLifelong New Yorker Robert Christgau has been writing about pop culture since he was twelve and getting paid for it since he was twenty-two, covering rock for Esquire in its heyday and personifying the music beat at The Village Voice for over three decades. Christgau listened to Alan Freed howl about rock and roll before Elvis, settled east of Manhattan's Avenue B forty years before it was cool, wit-nessed Monterey and Woodstock and Chicago 1968 and the first abortion speakout. He caught Coltrane in the East Village, Muddy Waters in Chicago, Otis Redding at the Apollo, the Dead in the Haight, Janis Joplin at the Fillmore, the Clash in Leeds, Grandmaster Flash in Times Square, and every punk band you can think of at CBGB.Christgau chronicled many of the key cultural shifts of the last half century and revolutionized the cultural status of the music critic in the process. Going into the City is a look back at the upbringing that grounded him, the history that transformed him, and the music, books, and films that showed him the way. Like Alfred Kazin's A Walker in the City, E. B. White's Here Is New York, Joseph Mitchell's Up in the Old Hotel, and Patti Smith's Just Kids, it is a loving portrait of a lost New York. It's an homage to the city of Christgau's youth from Queens to the Lower East Side--a city that exists mostly in memory today. And it's a love story about the Greenwich Village girl who roamed this realm of possibility with him.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Where "rock and roll" began-- where "rock" began-- snatched from the maw of commerce-- smashing the state of the art-- kings of rhythm-- between punk and a pop place-- they are the world-- careers in iconicity-- careers in semipopularity-- nature's noblemen.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

This text chronicles popular music in America. It covers the originators of rock and roll, established artists and those newer to the scene, ranging from 1950s singer-songwriters through hip-hop alternative. It illuminates legends from pop music, and rock and roll such as George Gershwin, Nat King Cole, B.B. King, Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley. It also looks at the subtle transition to just plain "rock" in the music of Janis Joplin, the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, and others. From Rolling Stones to Sonic Youth to Nirvana, from Bette Midler to Michael Jackson to DJ Shadow, Robert Christgau the text seems to show how money calls the tune in careers not necessarily compromised by their intercourse with commerce.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Here is the first and only book to survey the popular music of the decade that brought us rap, hardcore, MTV, new age, new wave, worldbeat, and speed metal -- the decade of Prince, King Sunny Ade, Marshall Crenshaw, DeBarge, The Replacements, Black Uhuru, Husker Du, New Order, Sonic Youth, R.E.M., Madonna, and Public Enemy. Robert Christgau, author of "Rock Albums of the '70s" (also available from Da Capo Press), has earned his place as America's foremeost rock critic by distilling enthusiastic nonstop listing into incisive, knowledgeable, and sometimes hilarious judgements. In this book he reviews and letter-grades some 3000 albums providing a comprehensive guide to the rock, pop, country, rap, blues, rock-related jazz, reggae, and African records of the 1980s.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)