But is it garbage? : on rock and trash / Steven L. Hamelman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hamelman, Steven L., 1952-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rock music--Analysis, appreciation.

Rock music.

Rock music--History and criticism.

Physical Description:

xiii, 272 pages ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Athens : University of Georgia Press, [2004]

Summary:

Trash has been blowing across the rock'n'roll landscape since the first amplified guitar riff tore through American mass culture. Throwaway tunes, wasted fans, crappy reviews, junk bins of remaindered albums: much of rock's quintessence is handily conveyed in terms of disposability and impermanence. Steven L. Hamelman sums up these rubbishy affinities as rock's "trash trope." Trash is an obvious physical presence on the rock scene -- think of Woodstock's littered pastures or the many hotel rooms redecorated by the Who. More intriguingly, Hamelman says, trash is the catalyst for a powerful mode of rock composition and criticism. It is, for instance, both cause and effect when performers like the Ramones or Beck at once critique junk culture and revel in it. But Is It Garbage? spills over with challenging insights into how rock's creators, critics, and consumers transform, and are transformed by, trash as a fact and a concept. In the music's preoccupation with its own trashiness readers will perceive a wellspring of rock innovation and inspiration -- one largely overlooked and little understood until now.

Contents:

I. Trashed

1 It's Now or Never 3

2 It's Still Rock and Roll to Me 10

3 Do It Again 13

4 Give the People What They Want 18

5 Isn't It a Pity 26

6 Reflections 29

7 Big Yellow Taxi 31

8 Over and Over 35

9 Bad Boy 38

10 It's All Too Much 42

11 Graceland 47

12 Tell It Like It Is 53

13 Total Trash 60

14 Vicious 64

15 Fame and Fortune 66

16 Torn and Frayed 70

17 Junk 77

18 How Long 82

19 Catholic Boy 84

20 Sunny 86

21 Rape Me 86

22 Take It as It Comes 91

23 Those Were the Days 97

24 Rip It Up 102

25 There's a Place 104

26 Rock Show 105

27 Rock and Roll Music 109

28 The End 134

II. Wasted

29 Another One Bites the Dust 141

30 All Things Must Pass 144

31 Shattered 148

32 The Last Time 178

III. Saved

33 Rock and Roll 187

34 The End 211

Appendix Section Titles 215.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 237-250), discography (pages 250-252) and index.

ISBN:

0820325368

0820325872

OCLC:

52929199