Review: Love All the People: Letters, Lyrics, Routines

Love All the People: Letters, Lyrics, Routines Bill Hicks Soft Skull Press Street: 2004 For the uninitiated, the book will likely read as a strange, awakening and perversely offensive post-humous chronology of a warped, angry little man, though god-damn funny. To those already primed in the legacy left by Hicks, this book might very well

Review: Empire of Dirt: The Aesthetics and Rituals of British Indie Music

Empire of Dirt: The Aesthetics and Rituals of British Indie Music Wendy Fonarow Wesleyn University Press Street: 07.22 Dr. Fonarow exemplifies everything it means to be an academic in the modern world: overthought-out arguments, a compulsive desire to explain everything and the technicality of book learning to back it up. But instead of giving a

Review: Don’t Quit Your Day Job! Adventures for the Working Stiff

Don’t Quit Your Day Job! Adventures for the Working Stiff Jay Toberman IUniverse Street: 01.01 Ever since Toberman went on a floozy trip through the stretches of Canada, he has been seeking “adventure” and, unfortunately, writing about it. Recollections of his sparse international trips are bleak journal-styled accounts that go into as much detail and

Review: Cult Rock Posters

Cult Rock Posters Roger Crimlis and Alwyn W. Turner Billboard Books Street: 10.06.06 Self-appointed Knight of Glam, Bryan Ferry, once said, “Something not only has to sound good, but also has to feel good and look good.” This is indeed true of most musical fads, but particularly anyone involved in the glam, punk and new-wave

Review: Josef Albers: To Open Eyes: The Bauhaus, Black Mountain and Yale

Josef Albers: To Open Eyes: The Bauhaus, Black Mountain and Yale Frederick A. Horowitz and Brenda Danilowitz Phaidon Press Street: 11.02 Wow … to say the least. Phaidon Press has done it again in producing a book that not only is stunningly graphic and visual but has the academic content to back up such a

Review: McLuhan’s Wake

McLuhan’s Wake Kevin McMahon The Disinformation Series Street: 01.23 Marshall McLuhan became one of the most famous intellectuals of the twentieth century with books such as The Mechanical Bride and Understanding Media. His theories of media’s effects on culture were of huge significance in his own time, and have only grown in importance since his