Review by Booklist Review
Azerrad and Ching graze different fields in the vast pastures of so-called alternative music. Azerrad bookends his study of 1980s punk music with profiles of bands at opposite ends of the punk-DIY-indie-whatever continuum. The lead chapter recounts the saga of Black Flag, the West Coast group that launched the career of Henry Rollins and proved so popular with the nascent alternative-rock crowd that it gave birth to a musical conformism, consisting of thrash tempos and grim lyrics, against which later bands rebelled. The last chapter concerns Beat Happening, which featured a "fey" lead singer and a minimalist approach to instrumentation. Its low-tech, low-fi early recordings didn't just defy commercialization--they taunted it. In between, Azerrad limns such bands as Husker Du--whose early "mission [was] to impress the hell out of Black Flag" --the Minute Men, Butthole Surfers, and Mudhoney in one of the best books yet on punk, college, or indie rock and the roots of the alt-rock juggernaut. Ching sketches the history of a major substyle of alt-country, hard country, which thrives without the media saturation that syrupy Nashville country enjoys. Harking back to honky-tonk country touchstone Hank Williams for inspiration, it offers, Ching says, "an important perspective on the bewildering cultural situation, often called postmodernism, in which we find ourselves." Of course, she would say that. She has been trained "in literary criticism and cultural theory," which she finds "particularly useful for discussing" a music relying so heavily on songs full of "remarkable characters and lyrics." Think Susan Sontag declaiming on the spiritual thread connecting Buck Owens and Dwight Yoakam: that's Ching. Besides deconstructing the likes of Merle Haggard and getting into highfalutin matters like high culture versus low culture, she kicks enough s--t to satisfy dedicated country fans. --Mike Tribby
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Nirvana's mega-bestselling Nevermind was credited with dramatically altering the American pop-musical landscape. Azerrad ably demonstrates that the "new" sound actually sprang from almost 15 years of innovation by hundreds of bands who remained "[b]elow the radar of the corporate behemoths." Linked under the loose rubric "indie rock," bands like Black Flag, Sonic Youth, Minor Threat and the Replacements languished in the musical minor leagues because they were too experimental for commercial radio, made unfortunate career decisions or eschewed mainstream success. Yet these bands formed the nucleus of a new youth movement. Youths who defined themselves in opposition to middle-American values found an aesthetic and a community through the music. Given the fervor for indie progeny like Nirvana and Pearl Jam, the indie scene's impact was not insignificant and rock journalist Azerrad (Come as You Are) partly aims to trace that larger cultural legacy. But this thick slice of nostalgia, replete with colorful anecdotes that demystify even deliberately mystifying artists, primarily targets die-hard supporters of seminal 1980s indie bands, underground-club scenesters and 1980s college radio buffs. Though day-in-the-life bios predominate over extensive musical or cultural analysis, this is an astute insider's account of the collective accomplishment of these various bands: strong musical and political statements by people with little clout and even less financial support that reverberated throughout youth culture. A devotee himself, Azerrad is occasionally belligerent in his support of his subjects' art and attitudes, but he also deftly captures the thrill of being young, antiestablishment and impassioned the inspiring ingredients of all these bands. Photos. (July 31) Forecast: Indie culture has lost little mystique for insiders or outsiders, and with national TV and radio interviews, this tribute may draw the MTV crowd. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Music journalist Azerrad (Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana) makes it clear through his tales of 13 highly influential punk and indie rock bands from Black Flag to Beat Happening that his subjects could have easily been any misshapen, angst-filled, morbidly creative teens on the planet. In painting the portrait of the volatile 1980s underground music scene, he reveals the importance of subversive-minded musicians in an industry controlled by hit-hungry executives. Azerrad, however, is careful not to glorify this era: sprinkled throughout his inspiring pictures of musical revolt are details of the poverty and drug-induced dilemmas each band faced on its path to cult icon status. Featuring original interviews with the scene's leading lights (e.g., Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth), this collective biography is written in a cultured voice that even low-brow, in-the-know fanzine readers will appreciate. For all public libraries. Robert Morast, "Argus Leader Daily," Sioux Falls, SD (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A substantial, elegantly rendered assessment of the "indie rock" era, a modest and disheveled American musical underground that presaged its nemesis, the 1990s "alternative" explosion. Music journalist Azerrad (Come as You Are, not reviewed, etc.) has an insider's savvy in documenting this most insider-ish genre, 1980s-era indie: energetic, abrasive post-punk bands that barnstormed small US and European clubs, dependent on a low-budget network of labels and fanzines for survival. The author portrays a national movement composed of thriving regional scenes, with bands, small record shops, and college-radio programmers finding common ground outside the commercial realm. He focuses on the histories of 13 "emblematic bands of that incredible time" whose often hilarious stories indeed sum up the pre-alternative rock days of touring in vans and sleeping on floors. His accounts of the bands are ordered chronologically, providing a rough narrative of the rock underground's collision with the mainstream. Early "hardcore" bands such as L.A.'s Black Flag treated the established order with contempt (resulting in their famed clashes with police), while out-there Texas rockers Butthole Surfers were embraced by punks for their compellingly weird, puerile antics. Significant bands like the Minutemen, Mission of Burma, and Big Black had their trajectories cut short, yet their innovations reverberated throughout the scene. Later in the '80s, bands like Minneapolis power-pop trio H|sker D| and the perpetually intoxicated Replacements flirted with major labels and collegiate success, only to have their careers derailed by corporate meddling. Finally, the most survival-minded of the indie bands either approached the mainstream on their own terms (early Nirvana boosters Sonic Youth), or resolutely carved out their own uncompromised territory (Fugazi). Azerrad's approach necessarily overlooks the countless little-known rock powerhouses that defined the movement's grassroots, and he describes the indie labels' and enthusiasts' anti-corporate, self-sustaining ethos without really seeming to promote or approve of it. A well-done, thoroughly detailed look at the stories behind the music that captures both the heart and the eccentricity of outsider rock's golden age.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
