Da Capo Best Music Writing 2004

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UPS guy just delivered my copy. Anybody else get theirs? Opinions?

― Roy Kasten, Tuesday, 12 October 2004 14:18 (twenty-one years ago)

Barry Mazor's Ms. Cornshucks piece is epic, for those who haven't read it. Matos' love song mix tape piece is splendid too.

― Roy Kasten, Tuesday, 12 October 2004 14:23 (twenty-one years ago)

Contents?

What's Mickey Hart's intro like?

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 12 October 2004 14:27 (twenty-one years ago)

I'll post contents later, but Hart's intro is short and, in parts, well written. A little hippy cosmic, but not in an offensive way.

― Roy Kasten, Tuesday, 12 October 2004 14:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Nik Cohn had a piece about New Orleans rap in the Music issue of Granta that I thought was one of the best things I've ever read. Was that ever put in one of the Best Music Writing books?

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 01:19 (twenty-one years ago)

yes, in 2003

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 01:27 (twenty-one years ago)

Thought so -- couldn't remember if it came out last year or not.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 01:36 (twenty-one years ago)

can we get a contents highlights, por favor?

― frankE (frankE), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 01:59 (twenty-one years ago)

Nik Cohn had a piece about New Orleans rap in the Music issue of Granta that I thought was one of the best things I've ever read. Was that ever put in one of the Best Music Writing books?

I don't like that piece at all. But I think it's probably been discussed at length by others already....

― djdee2005 (djdee2005), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 02:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Contents (forgive typos):

Intro by Mickey Hart
Dan Baum "Jake Leg" New Yorker
Elizabeth Mendez Berry "The Last Hustle" Village Voice
Andrew Bonazelli "Five Nights, Five Karaoke Bars" Seattle Weekly
Geoff Boucher "Beat at Their Own Game" Los Angeles Times
William Bowers "I Think I Am Going to Hell" Oxford American
Ta-Neishi Coates "Keepin It Real" Village Voice
Michael Corcoran "The Soul Blind Willie Johnson" Austin American Statesman
Michael Eldridge "Remains of the Day-O" Transition
Bill Friskics-Warren "Johnny Cash, 1932-2003: The Man in Black--And Other Colors" Nashville Scene
Robbie Fulks "Sex, Heartbreak and Blue Suede" GQ
Howard Hampton "Let Us Now Kill White Elephants" Believer
Jessic Hopper "Emo: Where the Girls Aren't" Punk Planet
T.R. Hummer "The Mechanical Muse" Oxford American
David W. Johnson "Following the Valley Road to the Homeplace of American Music" Mars Hill Review
Lynne D Johnson "Hip Hop's Holy Trinity" Popmatters
Roy Kasten "Wild Is the Wind" (on Nina Simone) Riverfront Times
Chuck Klosterman "6,537 Miles to Nowhere" Spin
Adam Mansbach "Hip-Hop Intellectuals" San Francisco Gate
Michaelango Mato "69 (Years of) Love Songs" Nerve
Barry Mazor "Same Shabby Dress: the Legacy of Little Miss Cornshucks" No Depression
Andy McLenon and Grant Alden "Branded Man" No Depression
Mark Anthony Neal "The Tortured Soul of Marvin Gaye and R. Kelly" Popmatters
Alex Ross "Rock 101" New Yorker
Carl Hancock Rux "Eminem: The New White Negro" Everything But the Burden
Gene Santoro "Willie Nelson at 70" The Nation
Roni Sarig "Dungeon Family Tree" Creative Loafing
Joel Selvin "Stevie Wonder" Mojo
Jeff Sharlet "Big World" Harper's
Rod Smith "The Party at Pou Corner" Seattle Weekly
Philip Stevens "Fate and a Jukebox" Oxford American
Corey Takahashi "Musical Marsala" Vibe
Toure "The Mystery of Lauryn Hill" Rolling Stone

― Roy Kasten, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 06:46 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.popmatters.com/music/features/030808-50cent.shtml

there's the pop matters piece.

― djdee2005 (djdee2005), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 06:56 (twenty-one years ago)

They should have called it Best American Music Writing 2004 shouldn't they?

But then Glenn McDonald isn't in there so even that title would be fallacious.

Perhaps in 2005 they should give the editor's job to someone who is at least in minimal touch with music in the 21st century rather than an addled old hippy.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 08:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe you should read the book before tossing off cliched insults.

― Roy Kasten, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 15:36 (twenty-one years ago)

I think this looks like a pretty damn good collection, actually. There is stuff I read in the last year that I like better than some of the stuff in there (at least of the stuff in there I have read) but generally the contents look good and don't inspire any WTF outrage.

And congrats to Matos for having his own piece and two SW pieces in there (and congrats to those two writers, too, of course).

― Scott CE (Scott CE), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 15:41 (twenty-one years ago)

They should have called it Best American Music Writing 2004 shouldn't they?

OTM!! This is bullshit!!

― Mr. Snrub, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 15:42 (twenty-one years ago)

Are there any other online publications in there besides Popmatters and Nerve? I'm interested in bringing this fact up at the online music journalism panel at CMJ.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 15:45 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, the pieces I've read in mags were really good, and the rest of these look promising. Also like that it's not "rockist." But no writing from outside the US measured up? And none about jazz, avant, "world"? ("Musical Masala," that looks promising.) Who's the editor this time?

― Don, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 16:11 (twenty-one years ago)

It's Mickey Hart. See clever reference to "addled hippy above".

Doesn't look like there are other strictly online pubs sourced. Obviously, most of the pubs above have on-line versions. In some ways, the line between on-line and off-line publications is pretty blurry.

― Roy Kasten, Wednesday, 13 October 2004 16:14 (twenty-one years ago)

There's a second PopMatters piece:
http://www.popmatters.com/music/features/031103-rkelly.shtml

That Neal article was one of my favorites of the past year, and it's nice to see him get a spot.

― JC-L (JC-L), Wednesday, 13 October 2004 17:46 (twenty-one years ago)

two months pass...

it's a good book I think.

― masada (shookout), Thursday, 6 January 2005 06:24 (twenty years ago)

I like it alright. The article on how 50 Cent isn't authentic enough is well written but its overall point seems fundamentally flawed. Nice piece, matos.

― deej., Thursday, 6 January 2005 06:30 (twenty years ago)

I haven't read it yet! It is in a pile somewhere.

― jaymc (jaymc), Thursday, 6 January 2005 06:59 (twenty years ago)

thanks deej.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 6 January 2005 10:14 (twenty years ago)

Too much 50 Cent! And Jesus, that Pop Matters piece hurt my head. I guess that it's interesting to explore the nexus between violence, religion and hip hop, but the article's central conceit (the holy trinity thing) was too forced, off the mark in so many regards and in the end said next to nothing about either hip hop or popular culture.

"(50 Cent) managed to achieve great earthly success by somehow speaking to and for 'the people'."

I thought 50 Cent's appeal was more about regurgitating a fleeting fantasy than speaking to the common man. See the Ta-Neishi Coates piece in the Voice.

Adam Mansbach's "Hip-Hop Intellectuals" article was good in that "Oh my God, hip hop ain't just about dumb ghetto kids" sorta way.

But I guess that I should shut up and just be happy that De Capo finally deemed hip hop worthy of inclusion.

― s>c>, Thursday, 6 January 2005 18:24 (twenty years ago)

two months pass...

I finally picked this up today. The Jay-Z piece was rather good until the end, where she claims Jay-Z is "a hustler first and an artist second" (paraphrase). Not only is this a silly dichotomy, but it seems to go against what she's said for the rest of the piece.

― Hurting (Hurting), Monday, 28 March 2005 01:52 (twenty years ago)

To say that the book "finaly includes hip-hop" is a rather silly understatement. Hip-hop almost dominates the book. It's practically the only current music discussed. Seven of the pieces are directly about hip-hop or contemporary R&B artists, and an eighth, "Musical Masala," discusses hip-hop at some length. By comparison, the only new rock, folk, pop or country artists with pieces more-or-less devoted to them are My Morning Jacket, Vince Gill, and Animal Collective, plus the piece about feminism and Emo. The collection of hip-hop pieces, while mostly good on their own, seem depressingly narrow in spectrum (Eminem and 50 Cent again and again). Meanwhile, the rest, aside from a few miscellaneous pieces, seem stuck on older music that has already been discussed ad nauseum -- Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Blind Willie Johnson, etc. Perhaps it's no surprise, with Mickey Hart as an editor, but one gets the impression that most of the exciting music has already been made, and the only frontier remaining is ultra-mainstream hip-hop.

― Hurting (Hurting), Monday, 28 March 2005 22:04 (twenty years ago)

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