Courtney E. SmithCritiques

Although I will never be a music nerd, this quote captures perfectly my opinion of a majority of today's popular music: "For those who just want to rail against the perceived complacency in yuppie indie music, I have a few Black Eyed Peas albums you need to listen to while you get in touch with true mediocrity, because your insular worldview has become drastically skewed" (81).

Four stars, if only because it is the ONLY book I've seen written on this particular subject. However, I found a lot of the ideas regarding girls and women rather dated. It felt a bit like window into 90's culture regarding feminism with some music thrown in at times. Not terrible, but it just feels dated. Music is of course a quickly moving and youth oriented art form but it did make it rather hard to read at times in the wake of Me Too and a lot of contemporary politics, especially given artists who have avoided politics like Taylor Swift have continued to dominate the music landscape while more politically outspoken female artists haven't. Also, you might want to avoid if the Smiths are your favorite band or if your more of a Stones girl than the Beatles (and no mention of the Dead?!):).

I think that music is very personal, and what one person like may not be what I like - even if I like that person and respect their opinions.

I'm a self-proclaimed music snob just like Courtney E. Smith and I've NEVER met another girl as into music as me so I was instantly drawn to this book when it popped up as a recommendation by Amazon while looking for - you guessed it - music. It was a quick and easy read with a few moments of head nodding but, most of the time, I felt a generation gap between me and the author or maybe it was really an experiential gap since the author and I are less than 10 years apart in age. I've never worked for MTV, lived in New York City, or slept with a guy in a band. I'm probably the only music snob I know whereas the author is a music snob among a world of music snobs. Instead of sitting down with my new best friend, I felt a little like I was on the outside looking in. I really wanted more and just didn't find it but I definitely found something I'd never found before - a girl as into music as me.

Before reading this book I read reviews and even an author interview. I was really excited to start reading. That ended when I found out that the author has a top 5 list of musicians (which we find out in Chapter 1). REALLY…how could anyone who claims to love music ever create such a limited list?!?!?! Apparently she got this idea from the book High Fidelity. I admit, I didn’t read High Fidelity and, after this book, I have no plans to!

So books are supposed to make us feel something, right? This one sure did…frustration, aggravation, confusion, anger. You get the picture. I was under the mistaken impression that I was going to read a book about how and why females collect the music they do. Instead, it felt like a series of stories about "this was the song/album I played when (insert name of guy of the month) broke up with me." From the stories and music opinions the author shares, it’s clear she only listens to angry girl bands and indie rock with Elvis Costello thrown in for good measure.

How can anyone possibly write a book about music collecting and leave out complete genres of music and some of the most influential artists in history?? The only mention of Elvis Presley was when she talked about musicians’ wives vs. groupies! That paragraph wasn’t even about Elvis. It was about Priscilla! There was virtually no mention of country music and forget about classical, jazz, blues, reggae…you name it…it wasn’t in there.

While reading this book, I kept wanting to scream, “Get a life!!”. This is pretty ironic since I live in a VERY rural coal town where going to the movies and to the new Walmart is what we do for fun. :) It was very frustrating to read about the author’s life and her thoughts about music given all the wonderful experiences she must have had/is having living in a big city, working for MTV, and hanging out with musicians. Instead of using her experience to write a guidebook for music collecting, she uses it as an outlet to talk about all her crappy relationships.

I have many other complaints about this book but I’ve wasted too much time on it already. My words of advice…if you’re looking for a book to help you understand why you collect the music you do, DO NOT READ THIS BOOK!

--So, why did I give this book a whole star if I disliked it so much? The author has a chapter about The Beatles vs. The Rolling Stones...she chose The Beatles! Also, even if I didn't like the book, I found myself talking (complaining) about it to anyone who would listen...that's got to count for something. :)