Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life: A Book by and for the Fanatics Among Us

by Steve Almond

Drooling fanatic, n. 1. One who drools in the presence of beloved rock stars. 2. Any of a genus of rock-and-roll wannabes/geeks who walk around with songs constantly ringing in their ears, own more than 3,000 albums, and fall in love with at least one record per week. With a life that’s spanned the phonographic era and the digital age, Steve Almond lives to Rawk. Like you, he’s secretly longed to live the life of a rock star, complete with insane talent, famous friends, and hotel rooms to be trashed. Also like you, he’s content (sort of) to live the life of a rabid fan, one who has converted his unrequited desires into a (sort of) noble obsession.    Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life traces Almond’s passion from his earliest (and most wretched) rock criticism to his eventual discovery of a music-crazed soul mate and their subsequent production of two little superfans. Along the way, Almond reflects on the delusional power of songs, the awkward mating habits of drooling fanatics, and why Depression Songs actually make us feel so much better. The book also  • sometimes drunken interviews with America’s finest songwriters• a recap of the author’s terrifying visit to Graceland while stoned• a vigorous and credibility-shattering endorsement of Styx’s Paradise Theater • recommendations you will often choose to ignore• a reluctant exegesis of the Toto song “Africa” • obnoxious lists sure to piss off rock critics But wait, there’s more. For those about to rock—we salute you!From the Hardcover edition.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Memoir, Humor, Essays, Pop Culture, Biography

241 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Steve Almond is the author of two story collections, My Life in Heavy Metal and The Evil B.B. Chow, the non-fiction book Candyfreak, and the novel Which Brings Me to You, co-written with Julianna Baggott. He lives outside Boston with his wife and baby daughter Josephine.

Reviews

[RandomAnthony · Rating 2 out of 5]

I know guys like Steve Almond. They kind of wear me out. These guys go to concerts on weeknights and read Pitchfork every morning. I do not, under any circumstances, want to engage in conversation with Steve Almond and his brethren about anything but especially not about music. I’d rather read the book he wrote about the topic and enjoy the freedom to hit the pause button whenever I want rather than pretend I have to pee when his beery breakdown of why Captain Beefheart is more important than Pere Ubu reaches a fever pitch and starts to scare the rest of the bar patrons, most of whom are at least ten years younger than us and feeling sorry for our pathetic asses. I’ll stay home.

Almond, the author of the far superior Candyfreak and the way worse Not That You Asked, mines the “I’m a complete music nerd” territory explored by Klosterman et al (Did I use “et al” correctly? I’m never quite sure.). He frames the “drooling fanatic” as a kind of a harmless, exuberant dog, like a St. Bernard standing in the back of the concert hall meticulously recording the set list in a notebook so he can compare tonight’s performance with the one the band did in Munich in 1992. These “Dfs” refuse to grow up and exasperate their ever-patient girlfriends and colleagues. The Dfs relentlessly attend gigs and fall in love with the records that can express what the Dfs can’t say themselves. I can respect that; God knows I needed The Smiths and Husker Du to articulate what I didn’t even know I was feeling back when I was a teenager. Much of Almond’s book is funny (e.g. his brilliant analysis of Toto’s “Africa”) but there’s a sense of desperation that’s well, kind of not funny, either. He talks about his wonderful wife when he drives to his friend’s house at two in the morning to talk about Bruce Springsteen records. Uh, buddy, you might want to think twice about those midnight excursions because I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s on the phone to her sister the second you leave about who exactly might be the best divorce lawyer in Boston and when she can get an appointment because you’re going to sleep until noon again while she’s up with the kids at six. It’s one thing for an eight year old to want a star player’s autograph, but that guy pushing forty doing the same looks like a little sad and creepy. Maybe Almond gives more power to his fanaticism for effect, but I liked his more laid-back approach to candy in part because the topic seemed less important to him than music and I didn’t feel as if he was constantly reaching to project meaning on candy. So this book is ok but if you ask me to speak intelligently about it in a year I will probably only remember that Almond visited, as part of his research, Libertyville, Illinois, where I got lost in a rainstorm on 8/8/88, a fact I can recall because I remember that was the day of the first Cubs night game ever. I might also say Almond mentions Bob Schneider, too, but that’s mostly because I remember Mr. Schneider once dated Sandra Bullock and there was a guy named Jim Schneider in my elementary school. I guess Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life is an easy, occasionally entertaining read, but were Mr. Almond to ask me to go see Drive-By Truckers with him I’d make sure I drove myself because I’m sure he’d want to go out after the show and I’d already be tired of him.

[Ed Wagemann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Here is a letter I recently sent to the publisher of a book called Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life:

Hi, I just finished reading your book Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life and I’d like to review it for my blog: Rockism101. Before I write my review I’d like to share some of my thoughts about your book with you and give you a chance to comment on these thoughts.

For the first 100 plus pages or so I had a hard time trying to figure out what the point of this book was. Maybe I was confused by the title, which is very misleading. In fact, until you explained where you got the title from—a Boris McClutheon show you put on—I was wondering/expecting whether this book was some kind of hipster parody of a self-help book like “I’m Ok, you’re Ok” or “How to win friends and influence people.” Maybe it should have dawned on me earlier, but this book was about you, Steve Almond, not about “you” the reader who wants to have his life saved by Rock and Roll. I understand that writers have to conjure up intriguing titles to draw the prospective reader’s attention, but I couldn’t help but feel a bit cynical and that this title choice might have been a slick trick on your part. This slick trick though, ties in well with what I think the real theme of your book is. You aren’t a famous celebrity—and you address this in the book—so why would anyone want to read a book that is essentially a lengthy memoir of one aspect of your personal development as it relates to Rock and Roll? Maybe there are some fans out there who have read your stuff before or who know of you, but that is small fries, I image. You certainly aren’t a Chuck Klusterfuck, I mean. So the title of this book revealed to me that you think that Rock and Roll can save your life.

So Rock and Roll is the vehicle through which you have chosen to gain a larger audience—and gaining a larger audience (gaining celebrity if you will) will make you happy and in the end save your life. Throughout the book then there are a series of musicians who you have come to worship: Nil Lara, Joe Henry, Ike Reilly, Boris Mccutcheon, Bob Schneider, Chuck Prophet, the Strawze. But none of these artists made it big, either because they wouldn’t or couldn’t compromise. Their commercial failure seemed to make them appear lesser and unhappy beings (from your perspective) and the lessons you gleaned from them was that being a creative genius (something that you admittedly aren’t) wasn’t all it is cracked up to be. In the end in fact, it is Dave Grohl, a Commercial Pop Hack (in my opinion), who is your role model. Grohl is the best example of someone who is happy and famous at the same time. And somehow that inspires you to conclude that you might be able to be perfectly happy being a “midlist toiler”. But honestly, after all that has come before that, I find that epiphany a bit hard to swallow. The more believable point of your book seems to be that if you (and by you I mean Steve Almond) want to be happy, you have to be successful. And to be successful (since you aren’t a creative genius) you have to be a Commercial Pop Hack—which is why you have written this book.

Not that there is any shame in that, for being a Commericial Pop Hack isn’t easy—it takes hard work, a little luck, etc. Still though it seems a million times easier than doing the heavy lifting, soul searching and hard living it takes to become a tortured creative genius. Which is why, in the end, you will still be a Drooling Fanatic.



With that said, I’d like to throw you a compliment. While reading your book I was also reading another book called Bandalism by Julian Ridgway. This book was incredibly terrible. In fact after about a half dozen pages I decided to just skip around and I skim through it hoping to find at least one nugget of something that seemed the least bit entertaining or interesting. And I found nothing. This poor sap Ridgway doesn’t even have the skills/ability to be a Commerical Pop Hack. I have no idea what kind of moron would want to buy this book (I get all of my books for free through my library by the way) so I’m not even going to make an attempt to describe how terrible this book was (mainly I just want to forget about it). Maybe you can pick it up for yourself if you are truly curious. But my point is that even being a commercial Pop Hack takes some talent. And there were definitely parts of your book that were very good. Early in the book you described how listening to the Cars “Moving In Stereo” on a walk man transformed the people around you, making them appear deeper, etc. I thought that was a great insight/description. I read a book or two a week, and I have a low threshold for mediocre writing, and it was little gems like that which were enough to keep my interest. One of my favorite sections from the first part of your book was when you described the listening process, from vinyl to 8-tracks to cassettes to cds and to digital files. This one section convinced me that you were worth continued reading. There were times that I would skip a paragraph or two, or even a page or two, but overall I ended up reading about 98% of the book. The end of the book (beginning with the chapter about Ike Reilly) was a lot better than the start of the book. I think you have a real talent for capturing the interesting lives of the musicians you covered.



To end with, I want to nitpick one minor thing that really irks me, and that is when people include hip hop as part of Rock. If you are going to include hip hop in your narrative, then you are talking about Pop music—not Rock. Rock has a history, an evolution, an ethos, etc that is an entirely different animal than hip hop. Talking of Rock and talking of hip hop as if they are of the same ilk is likely to not only piss off Rock fans, but piss off hip hop fans as well. And again, it makes the title of your book appear disingenuous. If you need to include Hip Hop in your story, then maybe a better title would have been “Commerical Pop Will Save My Life.”



I hope to hear from you soon.


Read more: http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu...

[Neil · Rating 3 out of 5]

This started off so well...

Almond writes hilariously in defining the Drooling Fanatic, the obsessive rock music nut. He breaks down the lyrics of famous songs like Toto's Africa and Air Supply's All Out of Love, showing their stunning silliness. I loved the section where he talks about being moved by songs that you know are tripe. I loved his chronology of the different music formats and how they have affected the DF. I loved the section about music that you love one day, hate later. The early lists: "Ten Things You Can Say to Piss Off a Music Critic" and "rock's Biggest Assholes" were also hysterical. Even his early sections about his own journey becoming a music critic, connecting with his wife, and "Five Really Stupid Things I've Done as a Drooling Fanatic" are good.

But then Almond gets into his own story too much. It becomes a memoir about his devotion to various acts that never really made it. It's highly unlikely that you've heard of these lost gods of rock and roll and Almond becomes shrill and crass in trying to build them up. He brags too much about his sexual escapades. This goes on for the final two-thirds of the book with a much lower laugh quotient and nothing very profound to say. So first third: five stars: last two-thirds: two stars at best. This is a capable writer. I'll try other thing by him and remember the part of this book that I liked, but I wish I had just put it down at about page 85.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

At times he lost me, with his over-caffeinated rambunctious prose full of geekiness and horniness and self-deprecation and dorky obsessions. Maybe it was the rage of Caliban at seeing his face in the glass, I don't know. But he won me over with the exuberant and subtly precisely worded portraits of his friends and lovers and musical idols.

And I really liked the fact that he kept enthusing about musicians I'd never heard of. I'm one of those people who can't rest until I've heard all the music that I haven't heard yet. I'll definitely be checking out the different people he raves about like Ike Reilly, Nil Lara, Boris McCutcheon, Dayna Kurtz, Chuck Prophet, and Bob Schneider. This is how it all starts...

"For the Drooling Fanatic, life is littered with these vulgar infatuations, because of our sensitivity to the dramatic capacities of music. We're ready to fall in love, one song at a time...maybe it's the most important indicator of DF tendencies, which is that we're chronically emotional people who have trouble accessing our emotions.

In my own case-- though I suspect this is broadly true-- repression was our family religion. I didn't admit to anyone else that I was feeling sad or frightened or angry because I saw little hope of being regarded or soothed, and a good chance of being mocked. And so I started to hide these feelings from myself; they burrowed inward and took cover under a sarcastic bravado. When I wanted to numb myself out, I watched TV. But songs had the opposite effect. They became secret passageways yo emotion, a way of locating what I was feeling before I entirely understood it myself....

My wife believes I have a retentive neurosis, a notion I don't dispute. It's no coincidence that, in the years I was amassing my collection, I lived in no fewer than eight cities. My discs and tapes were the only objects that came with me. The rest of the memorabilia-- the posters and photos and letters that felt so essential at the time-- got ditched in closets.

Still, I would argue that most Collectors are not guilty of an acquisitive defect but a peculiar blend of sloth and reverence. We're too lazy to sort through our records and philosophically averse to disposing of them. I have certainly tried to purge....here's what happens. I drag out one of my eleven milk crates full of CDs and I start sorting through them and inevitably find an album I haven't heard in years, the unsung soul-pop masterpiece by the band Hobex, say, and the moment I put it on I'm transported back to Greensboro NC and the sweet misery of that era. It all returns: the fuming solitude. the sexy poet who lanced my heart, the yeasty clouds billowing forth from the extravagantly misnamed New York Pizza. And I think: throw this album out? Is my wife crazy? It's a fucking time machine!

This is the thing misunderstood by those who don't have unreasonable music collections. The record is not simply a storage device. Its value resides in the particular set of memories and emotional associations held by its owner. These are inseparable from the physical object, which is no longer a physical object but an article of faith."

AMEN.

[Peri · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bleah. I wish I'd realized that this was more of a ~memoir. I'd read Almond's Candy Freak and enjoyed it enough to seek out his other books. I was expecting something like that. Oops!

Apparently women who like music are all sex-starved groupies and men who like music are the 'true' fans. Taste in music is realized through older brothers and if you don't have one, you're SOL. Only teenage boys can be the genuine arbiters of which sorts of music are "good."

In the few chapters I managed to get through, Almond whinges about both getting laid and not getting laid (mostly this one); how he lied throughout his journalistic career; how musically talentless, lazy schmoes like himself should also somehow be rich and famous. Mmmkay. He lost me at women only pretend to like music because they wanna bang the musicians. Follow that up with some explicit racial slurs and this book went right into the literal recycle bin. Seriously. No one should be subjected to these entitled whinings from a tryhard comic.

[Peacegal · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is one of those memoir/critical collections that a lot of rock fans like to write. Almond talks about the obsessive and transformative role music has played throughout his life, and unlike many rock fans, Almond has been able to make a career of it and even meet some of his musical heroes.

It's like Chuck Klostermann without all of the animal cruelty asides, and the fact that Almond doesn't seem to feel the need to shock and appall readers with this sort of content already makes me like him a little better.

The guy has had some pretty crazy experiences, ping-ponging around the country, having what seems like an insane amount of relationships to people-phobic me. Almond's passion for various musical acts, especially obscure ones, is palpable, even if readers are not moved to seek out these acts themselves. Kudos to him for managing to retain his spark in the eternal quest to discover new music into middle age--not many do.

The author engages in some parental evangelism, which is likely to cause more than a few eyerolls among childfree readers. No thanks, what expendable income I have I'd prefer to spend on concerts, and my pets will never force me to listen to a Kidz Bop CD on repeat.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Steve Almond is a good writer. He chooses his words and his images carefully. And I wouldn't care about it one bit if he hadn't also managed to squeeze such truthy truth into this book. It's a pretty introspective book. Even though the title says save your life, the examples he uses are highly personal. A lot of the bands and musicians he name-checks are people who never reached the type of fame that would make them accessible as examples. For that reason, the online soundtrack is an excellent accessory to the book. But even without that, I would have appreciated them, thanks to his vivid descriptions. That and I love hearing about the local musicians who never made it out of a particular scene but had such an influence on this one guy that he was compelled to write a book about them, mostly because I am that local musician, still hoping my music has made that kind of connection with somebody.
Almond's chapter on listening to music made some great observations: ""Music has become more pervasive and portable than ever. But it feels less previous in the bargain. I don't want to confuse artistic and commercial value, but it's just a fact that some kid who rips an album for free isn't going to give it the same attention he would if it cost him ten bucks. At what point does convenience become spiritual indolence? I realize this makes me sound like an old fart, but sometimes I get nostalgic for the days when the universe of recorded sound wasn't at our fingertips, when we had to hunt and wait and - horror of horrors - do without, when our longing for a particular record or song made it feel sacred."
I also really enjoyed the section "How Writers Sing," about the similarities and differences between writing songs and prose, since I do both. "...The connection being that in my head all language began in song and that the best stories inevitably reutrn to song, to a state of rapture. For years, I had assumed that throwing beautiful words at the page would make my prose feel true. But I had the process exactly backward. It was truth that lifted the language into beauty and toward song. It was a matter of doing what Joe Henry did, of pursuing characters into moments of emotional truth and slowing down. The result was a compression of sensual and psychological detail that released the rhythm and melody in language itself, what Longfellow called "the happy accidents of language."
Toward the end, he lost me a bit, as he began to muse -and I don't think this is a spoiler - that listening to music may be a purer joy than making it. I know where he's coming from - he's seen the hard work behind the recordings now, and the ugly bits - but though he finds himself in studios and near stages, he never finds himself in the middle of the live creation of a song, with amps turned up and his own fingers and voice physically wresting the music from and instrument. I'm glad there are Drooling Fanatics like him in the world to appreciate musicians, but I think he underestimates how making music - even badly, even in a closet with the lights off - can be as transformative as listening. Or maybe that's a different book.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm stuck (again) between three and four stars: on the one hand, I'd give four stars for the writer's funny self-deprecating voice, which he employs at the same time as writing some very beautiful, literary descriptions (he's also an accomplished fiction writer); for the subject matter itself (because I, too, am the kind of Drooling Fanatic he describes in the book); and for the painfully hilarious relatability of certain specific sections (such as the Chapter 4, which details the span of musical configuration of my own time, from the LP to the Mp3; the explication of the ridiculous lyrics in "I Blessed the Rains Down in Africa"; and the visit to Dave Grohl's house.)

At the same time, however, despite how deeply I relate to his intense love for music and his even-more-intense desire to be able to create or experience something as transcendent, I was a little disappointed by the fact that almost half the book is devoted to singer/songwriters I've never heard of (Ike Reilly, Boris McCutcheon, Dayna Kurtz...). This is the point, of course; Almond is fanatical about these (worthy-sounding) artists and wants you to understand, through this writing, how great they are. But I'm a bigger sucker for great writing about music that I already know. (Maybe I'm just getting old and cranky and want what's already familiar.)

Also, I have to detract a half-star, at least, for the fact that Almond mentions, in a footnote, that he once had a "brief and disastrous sexual relationship" with Lionel Richie's daughter. The fact that he was ever involved with her in the first place--and that he mentions this in a footnote, as if we are already supposed to have known about said celebutante dalliance--made me question the author's integrity for at least the next few minutes. (His mention of liking Concrete Blonde, however, redeemed him in my eyes, almost.)

Overall, I love and respect any writer who can explicate cheesy Top 40 songs from their childhood, (like Toto's "Africa,") while not too good to admit how much they loved it at the time, and might still love it, despite "knowing better," today.

[Malbadeen · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's hard for me to be objective about this book because I love so much about Steve Almond. For me it's a 5 because everything that I thought maybe didn't exactly work, I forgave due to his fanaticism, which is what the book is about so how do you judge him for that?

Unlike My Life in Heavy Metal (his first and probably forever my favorite book)I wasn't grabbing for an underlining pencil but I was saying a sometimes silent and frequently loud "yes!" to page after page. I was reminiscing and giggling at my own silly moments of being a "drooling fan".

One of my favorite things about Almond is his unapologetic enthusiasm about stuff (candy, music, his kids) I mean he can be morose as hell but he's just as willing to gush about the silly affirming aspects of life.

also, watch this clip "steve Almond and Toto"! It's a side note-ish essay in his book that he read in Portland and I think it will at least partially allow you to see why I love him so much:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b2aGe...

[Myfanwy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gorgeously honest coming-of-(middle)age for Generation X. Yes, it's a book about music, but more than that it is a love story--a love of lyrics and emotion and a love of those the people who share the love of certain songs with us. Simply put: a great read.

[Jennifer Spiegel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another book review in which I don’t review the book. Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life by Steve Almond, whose prose I’ve declared my love for in numerous forums.

Why do I love Steve Almond’s writing so much? There are a few possibilities:

•It’s a Jewish thing. Latent, undisclosed issues. This guy is Jewish.
•He and his wife joked about naming their first child Peanut Almond.
•I’m sexually-obsessed (see previous blog).
•His narration incorporates my favorite things: strong first-person voice with self-deprecatory humor that isn’t annoying (formatting issues: see Note #1 at end), Generation X preoccupations, and pop culture finesse. (We’re about the same age. You’re older, Steve.)
•In Rock, he writes passages like these:

Had I been quizzed on the meaning of the word glissando I would have answered (with some confidence, I’m afraid) “a type of fancy ice cream.” Not to be confused with vibrato, which was a gynecological instrument.

And

As a broad working definition, art awakens feeling. Every form has its merits and demerits. Paintings, for instance, work fast and require no moving parts, yet are hard to steal. Films are easy to watch and enveloping, but carry the risk you will see Philip Seymour Hoffman naked. The only thing wrong with music, as far as I’m concerned, is that you cannot eat it. From a purely emotional standpoint, it remains far more potent than any other artistic medium (see End Note #2).

It can’t be his take on U2: he wishes they were cannibals who resorted to eating each other. (Don’t. Mess. With. My. Band. Steve.) Well, I’m not going to offer you my reason. I’ve read his stories. I turned to this one, which is nonfiction. In it, he chronicles his life as a “drooling fanatic.” At one point, he uses the word jodhpurs. At another, he refers to rockabilly as the “Fonzie of rock genres.” Isn’t that enough of a reason?

Let’s divide our discussion into three categories.

Sex.

I do find it necessary, in light of my other writing, to say something about Almond’s prose which is, you might say, often sexually preoccupied? Sexually frank? About sex? Pornographic? Crass, vulgar, uncouth? (Incidentally, he’s published a book of hate mail he’s received for this sex-infused prose.)

In truth, the sex stuff is a little over-the-top for me (see previous blog), but not pornographic. Almond does write a lot about sex, and—in fact—I’ve considered doing an essay on the role of sex in fiction. Please stop laughing. Tim. Stop now. In thinking about this, I did come across Almond’s rules or dictums for writing about sex (no link, sorry), and—for the most part—I agreed.

It was T.M. McNally, in one of my MFA classes, who said something like this: Whenever you read about sex, it’s really about something else. This has been my adopted rule-of-thumb for writing about sex. Sex in prose is a tool, a metaphor, for a number of things. My favorite example is one I’ve mentioned elsewhere: Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being, which involves a metaphysical weighing, if you will, of the heaviness of philosophy, politics, and sexuality. But the difference in sex as metaphor and sex as sex is profound; it may be the difference between art and porn. It may be what distinguishes gratuitousness. Don’t quote me. I’m just thinking aloud.

But Steve Almond. I see metaphor, frankly. Plus, there are other things. He’s not particularly graphic. There’s a lot of it, but it’s not described too much. Also—and this may be controversial— it’s within the “norm,” if you will (I’m going to get all kinds of flack over my use of “norm” because, yeah, whose norm am I talking about?). This is out of context, but Almond mentions that he has “done [his] best as writer when [he] focus[es] on the depravities of our species.” I think that’s true. And they’re universal depravities. We’re not talking about a sex life so out there that you’re flabbergasted that this is going on in America. There are other figures in our literary landscape who are lauded for their writing about weird sex, and, well, I’m grossed out. There is, however, a universality and metaphor in Almond’s depictions. This is depravity I know about; it’s depravity you know about. What comes out when reading Almond is that this is about humans, not pervs. I don’t really agree with many of his philosophical conclusions, but I have no problem with his literary merit or aesthetics. The guy can write.

Drugs.

If anything, I feel more put off by the drugs. As in most rock ‘n’ roll stories, there’s a fair amount of people getting stoned. Except for a brief pot-smoking phase (can I be arrested for this?), I’m not into drugs. The pot-smoking phase was marked by sitting in the backseat of a crappy car with another woman also posing as girlfriend while we—this woman and I—waited for our respective boyfriends to purchase drugs inside the home of a dealer (see End Note #3). I remember this well, the two of us sitting and waiting. She had paperback books by the Brontës and Austen on the back of her toilet. In the car, I wanted to turn to her—both of us with storm clouds under our eyes and classics on our shelves—and say, “We don’t have to live like this.”

Yeah, in case you’re wondering, I’m a lot of fun at parties.

Do drugs and rock ‘n’ roll go together, necessarily? Can we not go there? Is that okay?

Rock.

Well, I guess the first thing you should know is that Almond is cooler than I am, had you not already guessed.

I am not cool.

I’ve never been cool, except for a brief time in the Nineties. (Keep in mind, though: STEVE IS OLDER.) The second thing you should know is that our taste in music is pretty divergent. Interestingly, we do share one experience: we both began our writing-about-rock-and-roll careers with Bob Dylan.

During an internship in sports-writing at a Palo Alto, California paper, Almond ended up writing a review of a Dylan concert. He wrote it and, well, voilà! Let the good times roll. In my case, I too reviewed Bob Dylan. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t particularly good either. The Arizona Republic published it (in September 2001), however, and I’m grateful to them for that. Actually, I published an essay on U2 in Image in the summer of 2001 (“Love Rescue Me: Entering the Holy of Holies”), which proves my worthiness of drooling fanaticism. This slightly earlier piece truly launched my career as music critic.

Oh, yeah! I never had a career as a music critic!

I tried. I really liked the idea. No one took my concert reviews. I think I wrote about six or seven before giving up. My personal favorite was on the Rolling Stones, in which I did this stellar comparison between Mick Jagger and my recently deceased father—Mick and Harvey Spiegel in the same breath!—and managed to allude to angels dancing on the head of a pin. The review is lost. I’ve looked everywhere, searching through dusty floppy disks, making my husband open boxes in the garage which contained dried bug carcasses and computer parts—but it’s gone. The review is lost in a virtual wasteland, and—as it turns out—rock and roll will not save my life.

What are you going to do?

Stick with fiction.

But I still have these dormant rock desires. Almond’s prose sizzles with smarmy wit and deep-rooted sorrows (say what?), but rock ‘n’ roll from a writer’s perspective was the draw. Yeah, I wanna be a rock star. So, when I started reading this book, I was predisposed to love it. There are many, many books on rock, but this one is from the perspective of a writer and fan.

His title begs a question, doesn’t it? And this would be my own segue into rock. What is it we want from rock ‘n’ roll? Well, I think the Counting Crows actually said it best in “Mr. Jones.” I’m pretty scared about quoting song lyrics (more scared than I am about confessing to drug abuse abroad) because I’ve heard horror stories about copyright laws—but, basically, Adam Duritz sings, “We all want something beautiful. Man, I wish I was beautiful.” This is it! The whole thing with rock music. I believe this! I really do! For an updated, less literary take on the same thing, go listen to Nickelback’s “Rockstar.”

So, yeah, to possess beauty. That’s what it’s all about (See End Note #4).

Anyway, time keeps slipping into the future, so I’m now going to pay tribute to Almond’s chapter called “The DF Starter Kit: No Assembly Required!” Almond outlines five necessary foundational elements for the basic DF or Drooling Fanatic. His words are italicized. I’ll offer my own, unbelievably relevant, experiences.


The DF Starter Kit

1.It helps considerably if your parents are musicians of some sort.

Mine are not. Besides that time my dad played the Pied Piper in a school musical, I don’t think there were any parental displays of musicianship. They walked around singing a lot, though. And they were hippies, which means they had an excellent record collection. I definitely grew up hearing albums by the likes of Jethro Tull and Isaac Hayes. There was also pot, incidentally—which may have something do with my aversion. (For the sake of my mom, let me say this: all drug use stopped and all paraphernalia was out of the house some thirty-five years ago.)

2.Display just enough musical talent to suffer lessons.

I think I took piano lessons for seven years, though I didn’t display any talent whatsoever.

3.Have an older sibling who thinks you’re a dipshit.

This is pretty complicated, but I did have this sister who loved the Rolling Stones and made fun of me for my Shaun Cassidy affections. She wouldn’t let up. She delivered scathing indictments and bitter prophesies. Most significantly, she assured me that I, too, would love the Stones—and I would abandon Shaun.

I didn’t take this well. I remember sitting on my bed, mooning over Shaun Cassidy’s record album, thinking things like, I’ll always love you. Even if you smoke. Oh, why do you smoke? Won’t you stop smoking? Smoking cigarettes was about the most serious depravity I could imagine at the time; little did I know about my future involvement in international drug cartels.

But, well, Tracey was right. Eventually—and it didn’t take long—Shaun was out, and the Stones were in. C'est la vie.

4.Find a guardian angel.

Barry Hause. I’ve written about this in the U2 essay in Image, so I won’t repeat myself. But, Barry, using the word pabulum to describe my Duran Duran habits, gave me a U2 cassette. I’m serious when I say to you that it was like the heavens opened up and a light shone and doves fluttered about. I may have even heard a voice from above. I was never the same again.

There were other guardian angels. My cousin Scott hinted that I should trade Rick Springfield in for Bruce Springsteen. My friend Laura, who faithfully attended teeny-bopper concerts with me (from A-ha to Rick Springfield) morphed as well, joining me for three (four? five?) U2 concerts. And there is Kelly, my special U2 friend. (You’re more than that, Kelly—I’m just talking.) After loving U2 for decades—decades, my friends—I’m pretty sure she’s the only one who understands what I mean when I say that my affection for Bono has truly changed from that of unattainable object of desire to this brotherly love thing. I see him and want to ask, How’s the family? Additionally, Kelly was there when I did this lapse into Classic Rock after my dad died. I abandoned “Alternative” and started buying up Classics—Richie Havens, Joe Cocker, Rare Earth. It was during this time that Kelly and I saw Neil Young, that I prayed aloud for Led Zep reunion tours, that I gained a special appreciation for Stevie Nicks.

A special word does need to be said about Tim, my husband. He too has acted as a guardian angel. I would say that, though our taste doesn’t fully mesh, it doesn’t really conflict either. I like his music 90% of the time. I have, to some extent, adopted much of his taste. (This is a one-way street. I’ve never come home and caught him listening to U2 or anything. He did, however, stand for four or five hours in the front row of a U2 concert with me—along with Kelly and her husband.) Sometimes, I’m still a little weirded out by his listening habits. The other night, I walked into the office/playroom, and he was listening to Wu Tang Clan and Gordon Lightfoot. What’s up with that? He’s more into music than I am, but this might be an interesting personality difference: while I want to be known as a DF, Tim wouldn’t want that distinction. Really, this blog would be a whopping success to me if Steve Almond said, You, Jennifer Spiegel, Are Christened “DF.”

But, well, interpret this one. Somewhere in that first year of marriage, we attended this seminar on financial planning for couples—how to live within budgets, save, cut expenses, etc. The problem was that Bruce Springsteen tickets went on sale that day. So, right in the middle of a seminar on not doing rash things with one’s money, Tim and I got on the phone during lunch and bought two tickets to see Bruce. I think the tickets were something like $90 each. Then, we returned to balancing our budget.

5.Be lonely, and spend your hours amid the lonely.

Nothing more needs to be said about this one.

So am I a DF? Please?

In conclusion, and because it’s so much fun—like much of his book—let me copy the list idea. At the end of chapters, he often provides some goofy list. Here are mine.


List #1 – Songs That Led To My Lucrative Writing Career

1.“Like A Song” by U2. This also led to my lucrative career in politics, which I abandoned within two years of wracking up a million bucks in student loans. Thankfully, the song fits all occasions.
2.“Sister Golden Hair” by America. Funny, isn’t it? You know, I’ve noticed something. A woman will often like a particular song whose subject is a desired woman; when she listens to it, she relates. Though maybe no one really wants her, the song offers a small window, a magical moment. She is that woman, and she is misunderstood. I don’t think men are like this. They don’t seem to listen to songs about other men. Objectification! Is it what we want? We are Rhiannon. We are Witchy Woman. And, yeah, I’m Sister Golden Hair. Even though I haven’t been a blonde since I was four.
3.“W.O.L.D” by Harry Chapin. I can’t help myself. It’s that whole album. I hear Short Stories and I stop and listen, hooked on the narrative—every freakin’ time.
4.“Honky Tonk Woman” by Rolling Stones. See #2.
5.“Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac. I think I began to get a sense that I might be headed for trouble around then. I knew I’d end up in the backseat of some car while my boyfriend bought drugs. It wasn’t going to be good.



List #2 – Musical Confessions
1.I’m coming to terms with the fact that I like the banjo.
2.I was on a date. I guess it was a date. This was right before I’d meet Tim. We were discussing Nickelback. Truth be told, I find myself liking Nickelback—I find myself listening to the stories of their songs! So, this guy and I were talking about Nickelback, and I exclaimed, “I like that song!” At the time, both “Someday” and “Figured You Out” were getting a lot of airplay. The guy wanted to know which one I was talking about. I paused. I suddenly felt compelled to lie. I liked “Someday,” I said—the paperback writer thing. I like the writer thing. But the truth is I liked the other one, the one about sexual humiliation, depravity, duplicity. “Figured You Out.” That one. I’ve been carrying this around for years.
3.There have been three times when rock songs have made me stop in the middle of something to look around wildly with an expression that meant, Excuse me! Are you guys hearing this? The first time was when I heard Bono. Don’t laugh about the second one: Eddie Vedder. I think Almond makes a Pearl Jam joke in his book. But, yeah, I was in Gentle Ben’s in Tucson on a Friday afternoon with some “Media Arts” grad students. I heard Eddie in the background. I stopped and happy hour became stop-in-your-tracks hour. I told you I’m not cool. Everybody already knew who he was. And though you’re dismissing me as mainstream, I’m not that either. Number three: David Eugene Edwards. It wasn’t quite the visceral response of earlier days; it was more tempered, but the point is this: I confess to still being a groupie.
4.I feel mildly dirty when I hear “The Freshman” by the Verve Pipe. I was well out of school when the song came out. It rubs me the wrong way.

This is really long. I’m sorry. I really wanted to write Steve Almond’s book—but he did it, better than I ever could. But I wanted to write a funny, poignant, snarky, smart book about loving rock ‘n’ roll. This is the book.



End notes:
1. This is a fairly new revelation for me. I’ve always noticed my preference for first-person narration, but I’ve recently realized that I like the imposition—whether fictional or real—of a strong, maybe even in-your-face, narrative voice. I find myself enjoying the love-me-or-hate-me, downright daring or taunting, presence of an intimate first person narrator.
2.Quotes, unless otherwise noted, are from his book: Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life, Random House, New York, 2010.
3.(A) This is abroad, no less. If this is legally problematic to admit in a blog, would someone immediately let me know so I can remove this post? Isn’t this like an international felony? Didn’t some kid get thrown in jail forever and/or tortured in Singapore? Will I be barred from a country like a Beatle or deported if I try to enter Japan? Did that happen to Russell Brand? Or was that Wham!? (B) My mother is reading this. I look forward to her comments.
4.I seriously didn’t know until well into the second draft of this blog that Almond’s epigraph for Rock is the following quote from Leonard Cohen: “We are ugly, but we have the music.”

[Nic · Rating 3 out of 5]

Almond is a disarming narrator in these essays, very self-effacing, and exaggerating (I hope!) to humorous effect his super fandom for (mostly) obscure, moderately-successful musicians. I share his exaltation of songs and bands for expressing emotions I couldn't articulate, particularly as a teen and young adult. (And, frankly, a single woman in her 30s into her 40s). In my journal, I wrote out many paragraphs where he describes how music makes us feel, the purpose it serves, and what makes it sacred as an experience that elevates the spirit and explains us to ourselves.

My enjoyment of the book would have been enhanced if I were familiar with more of the songs and musicians he sites, but that's always how it is with music snobs. There is pride taken in "getting" someone others don't - paired with a protectiveness over them breaking out and selling out. Spotify helped, in that I could call up a taste of people he refers to. But even if your Gil Scott-Heron is Andrew Bird or Bill Nelson - readers will relate to the devotion and disillusions Almond relates. The essay collection is uneven, a bit jerky, like listening to a Drooling Fanatic's record stash, but on the whole, it's an enjoyable read. The list "How to Piss off a Music Critics" made me laugh out loud.

[Stef C · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was amazing.

[Tanya · Rating 2 out of 5]

Someday I want a woman to write one of these “my life in music” memoirs because I’ve had about enough of these man child bloviating blowhards. Maybe I’ll do it my damned self.

[Paula · Rating 5 out of 5]

Apparently all my contemporaries are writing right now. I just found out, for example, that Carrie Bradshaw (and, one assumes, Candace Bushnell) is/are just about exactly my age. In her book "The Carrie Diaries," she references Jimmy Carter and the Gremlin.

But Carrie Bradshaw listens to Aztec Two-Step, and right then and there I knew she could never be my friend.

Steve Almond knows what I'm saying here. Steve Almond gave up on a woman after a weekend of bananas sex because she listened to Air Supply on purpose.

I know that Steve Almond is also just exactly my age, because HE references Aztec Camera, whose song "Oblivious" remains one of the most incandescent pop songs I know. It's got that androgynous 80's croon but on top of friendly, jangly guitars - and then you notice the line, "I see you crying and I want to kill your friends" and you start paying a little more attention.*

And that makes Steve Almond and I the same age because Aztec Camera was not together for terribly long, had one or two little MTV hits, and is one of the VERY few acts of that era who have not regrouped and gone on tour. Presumably, groups like The Jesus and Mary Chain, who were so charming to begin with**, have realized in their maturity that the world NEEDS their music, and they have a DUTY to provide it. One doesn't like to assume that they are back together, rather, because the tattered college students who liked them in 1983 now have the cash to fly to Iceland to see them play.***

Steve Almond's new book, in case you had not intuited this, is footnoted and rambling and studded - no, packed - with pithy little insights, analyses, and summations of bands and artists.

"...let me cite Duke Ellington, who once famously declared that 'there are only two kinds of music: good music and bad music. And by bad music I mean specifically the song "(I Bless the Rains Down In) Africa" by Toto.' Ellington died two years before Toto formed as a band, which speaks to his prescience."

But the book isn't about music. No? Whoops now I've pissed you off. No, ok, it's about music. But it's about how music affects us, and by us I mean the kind of repressed kids who have fallen between the generations - boys who weren't supposed to have emotions until times changed and all of a sudden they were expected to. Or girls who grew up on a feminism that couldn't yet incorporate vulnerability.

Steve doesn't oversimplify people in this way - I did that. Steve takes it from the other angle - he has noticed that the people most fanatical about popular music are the ones who have trouble integrating their emotions into their life. He posits that people who slam on the headphones and squeeze their eyes tight to hear every breath of Carolina Chocolate Drops doing "Hit 'Em Up Style" are looking for an intensity that they wish existed but fear to attempt.

Huh. Sounds pretty accurate, if memory serves. I would suggest to our boy Steve that he have a kid, but he's done that. His daughter was two at the time of publication - unless he's seriously emotionally retarded, I suspect that if he had waited a couple years he would not have been able to write this book except as a nostalgia piece. Kids allow one to access one's emotions with some fair expedience. In fact, it's probably the birth of his daughter that allowed him to express the ways that music has fulfilled his needs all these years.

All right, I think I'm done here. I laughed out loud at this book. There are some crystalline memories, some song references that bring me RIGHT THERE alongside him, some entertaining swearing, and - I hate to admit it because ok, emotion-y things still make me itchy - some insights that beat anything I learned in therapy.

Still not completely sold on Bob Schneider though.****



*Don't believe me about Aztec Camera? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM3mB6...

**I "saw" them in Cleveland, behind a veil of chemical smoke so thick that I had to watch the show from a crouch. They played their entire set with their backs to the audience, I guess so that they could see their instruments.

***I don't, but my friend Eric did, to see the Flaming Lips whom yes I realize have been together the whole time but let's face it most people lost track of them between the Vaseline song and "Do You Realize" showing up in a Mitsubishi commercial.

****Steve's massive mancrush, also the mancrush of my friend Leslie Miller, who may actually BE Steve - they like all the same music, and where Steve wrote a book about candy, she wrote one about cake (the delightful dessert, not the unpleasant band). Although Bob Schneider is ALSO exactly my age, and undeniably attractive, so I guess if we need a new Loudon Wainwright III, Bob could be it, because Rufus kind of isn't.

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you're going to use a promise as your title, you'd better deliver. In his sixth book, " Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life: A Book by and for the Fanatics Among Us (With Bitchin' Soundtrack)," Steve Almond presents a memoir wrapped in a collection of observations about music and packaged as a source of salvation. The book is a rock fan bildungsroman in which Almond offers personal anecdotes related to his lifelong love of music. His story is interwoven with some cultural analysis of what it means to be a "Drooling Fanatic" in the face of "That Which We Worship With Irrational and Perhaps Head-Banging Glee." It is the fanaticism itself that is offered as a means to redemption.

As Almond comes of age, he discovers music and then how to make money from it. He describes the life of a nomadic music journalist, moving between cities such as El Paso and Miami, trying to scrape together a living. Almond's stories often revolve around the pure joy that a fan experiences when touched by a song or an artist. His book also includes clever classifications of fandom and various forms of short interjection: gratuitous lists, interludes and the occasional "reluctant exegesis."

The Drooling Fanatic, or DF, is the true audience for this book. DFs will recognize themselves in Almond's definitions and classifications with a mixture of revelation and embarrassment. Yes! I also believe "the only thing wrong with music … is that you cannot eat it." Yes! I also "spent several thousand dollars to create an ultra convenient digital library with the sound quality of a 1958 transistor radio." But seriously, did you need to bring up the ridiculous name of my DJ spot?

Almond spends a fair amount of time splitting hairs as he outlines the DF "ghettos" and what they are definitively not: Concert queens are not groupies, collectors are not music snobs. Yet after all this taxonomy, he argues that we are all DFs. Astute analysis is sacrificed to a play for a more generic readership. Sweeping generalizations about music's relationship to the culture at large also tend to fail. As early as Page 10, Almond tries to conflate American popular culture, capitalism, consumption and porn in one long, unfocused paragraph.

Almond is much more successful when he focuses on the merry exegesis of songs by the likes of Toto ("Africa") and Air Supply ("All Out of Love"). These are so entertaining that one wishes he'd sprung for rights to use more lyrics in full. The thing is, Almond can be very funny. It may be snarky to describe an MC Hammer concert as similar to "watching an ad for a delicious soda that makes people want to commit murder," but other observations are sharp: "I can't remember when cassettes displaced vinyl, but it happened quick and mean, like most everything else in the eighties."

This witty commentary is compelling until, in the last several chapters, the book hits a snag; these chapters are a series of idolatries or, as Almond would put it in one case, "man crushes." These tales suffer for two reasons: They are basically all the same story — Almond uses his journalist cred to score a disillusioning interview — and they are all too much about the writer (usually playing the fool) and not enough about the musician. This reclamation project portrays "guys who had twice the talent necessary to be stars, but who remained essentially neglected figures": Nil Lara, Gil Scott-Heron, Ike Reilly, Boris McCutcheon, Bob Schneider and, for good measure, a female, Dayna Kurtz.

Almond admits the gender bias apparent in his profiles, but he does a solid job of including women among his DFs. As he recounts his courtship of his wife and previous romantic disasters, it becomes obvious that for Almond, music and women are inextricably bound, as love objects and song subjects, but also as active partners in the joy of shared music.

Being a DF is a "spiritual condition" — early on, Almond makes a distinction between the DF and the Professional Music Critic, with the critic not focused enough on how the music makes you feel. An added bonus of this book for the DF is the steady stream of mostly unpretentious references to bands and songs from the last 30 years or so. There is a lack of snobbery in the style because, as the author points out, "There is no sin in the realm of taste.… We all have a Styx in our closet."

Perhaps rescuing unashamed pleasure from the guilt bin is how rock and roll will save our lives.

Originally reviewed for the LA Times - April 29, 2010

[Superstition Review · Rating 5 out of 5]

“This is what songs do, even dumb pop songs: they remind us that emotions are not an inconvenient and vaguely embarrassing aspect of the human enterprise but its central purpose. They make us feel specific things we might never have felt otherwise.”

Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life is a book that targets the fanatical love each person has inside them, regardless of whether the love is for music, like Almond’s, or for movies, knitting, cooking, or anything really. Tied together with humorous, endearing, and sometimes downright unbelievable anecdotes, Almond paints a picture of a love and passion for something that makes life worth living, or at least a little more exciting.

Everyone has something they are or have been borderline obsessed with during their lifetime, and the book’s satirical, self-help format reminds those people that they are not alone in their fanatical love. This novel has the ability to bring together millions of people, all with different lives and loves, based on the fact that they have all been there, been that person waiting in line for hours hoping to glimpse an idol, spending more money than is probably sane on paraphernalia only other fanatics would understand, and, occasionally, lying to their boss for the chance to interview a rock legend.

Almond assures the reader that being a “Drooling Fanatic” is not necessarily bad, despite what family and friends might think, and it can make for some pretty amazing experiences. His stories, tips, and lessons covering everything from his years as a music critic, to his thoughts on Toto’s “Africa” remind the reader there is no harm in loving something as much as he loves music. Love, after all, keeps life interesting.

By Lindsey Bosak

[Christopher · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wow, this was actually painful. I'm not quite sure who this book is for. My estimation is that it's for people who don't particularly care much about rock and roll or writing. Imagine if the particular part of Chuck Klosterman's brain responsible for his musical taste, pop culture sensibilities, and knack for weaving both into an engaging narrative, was somehow lobotomized. Or, pretend the passion and heartfelt connection to tunes, no matter how (arguably) cheesy, that make Rob Sheffield's books so often touching, was somehow ripped out. That should give you a general feel for Steve Almond's book.
I guess it's not entirely Almond's fault. He grew up in California and then went right to college in Connecticut. So,(music cognizance-wise) he never really had a chance. In general, I don't dislike Almond as a writer; his early collections of short stories are actually quite good. What he's done with "Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life", however, is create something not only bad, but downright dangerous for anyone young enough to be musically impressionable.

[Tina Hamilton · Rating 4 out of 5]

By now, many of you know that one of my favorite books is "Candy Freak" by Steve Almond (he visits independent candy makers throughout the United States). A must read, especially if you like candy.

This book does not disappoint. Much of Almond's young adulthood and adulthood has revolved around candy and music. He is a self-described "Drooling Fanatic" when it comes to certain bands. He's DJ'd, written for many music mags, gone on the road with bands, and so on. Many of the bands he loves and follows I do not know, but it does not matter. Who hasn't listened over and over again to a favorite album/cd or song and found new meaning each time? A quick read as it is broken in chronological chapters, one in which he meets his future wife (a punk guitar player).

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Given what I do for a living, I should probably dislike this book for no reason other than Almond's early insistence that rock criticism is impossible and useless. I see his point, though I disagree -- but more importantly, the rest of the book is full of funny, touching stories about Almond's life as a so-called Drooling Fanatic, including passionate essays about some of his favorite musicians (many of whom are on my own list).

Bottom line -- if you love music, Steve Almond comes across as the kind of guy you'd love to be friends with. He'll remind you of the joy of discovery, and he might even reignite your passion for great music. I didn't want this book to end.

[Hannah Jo Parker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of course I'm giving it 5 stars. It's funny. It's heartfelt. And, it's about rock and roll. Or, more precisely, drooling rock and roll fanatics. Like me!

If you get a chance to see Steve Almond read in person, do it. I saw him at Elliott Bay Books last Friday and he was fabulous. I will be suggesting this book to many library patrons, and buying it for friends, I'm sure.

[Valarie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not intended to be taken terribly seriously, but it is truly written by a drooling fanatic. Lists and all. The book paralleled my life except for the inescapable fact that I have a chicken feathers' width worth of humility and shame and Almond clearly doesn't. But then none of the pieces I've written delved into the lives of my subjects like his does, so I guess that's the trade-off.

[Colleen Wainwright · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful writing and a memoir using music as a lens is brilliant. I suspect that our musical experiences vary enough that I had trouble identifying with a lot of this. (But I checked out a few of his "desert island" albums and we have at least some areas of overlap.) Probably a perfect read for a music-head who loves articulate, honest writing that's self-revelatory.

[Sarah]

I have never laughed out loud at a book the way I did at this one. It's about music, and growing up, and culture, and writing. And awkwardness and oversharing. Also, it's a bit, well, raunchy.

But so, so funny and true.

[A.K. Benninghofen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This rating may seem sort of over-the-top for this type of book, but I can't help it - a favorite writer on a favorite subject. Loved every word of it!

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review originally published in Looking For a Good Book. Rated 4.5 of 5

It’s no secret that I’m a fan of Steve Almond’s work. I religiously buy everything he publishes, and even have purchased anthologies with strange themes just to read an Almond story. And it was all I could do to not behave like a Raving Fan Boy when he was speaking at my local bookstore a year or so back.

What is my attraction to Almond’s work? Well, his writing first and foremost. He’s got a smooth, conversational way with words – conversational for those who can speak in more than Twitter codes. But I think it’s more than just his writing style. There are many writers whose style or way with words I greatly admire. Almond also manages to have the same interests or concerns or ideals that I gave.

Whether it’s being a Candyfreak, or having a grudge against football while still being a fan of the sport, or being a Drooling Fanatic for music and musicians … Steve Almond GETS me! It’s like we’re the same person (except that he’s younger, likes harder rock music, a Jew, and has probably gotten laid with a lot more women than I have [if he’s not exaggerating in his writing]).

Okay…so Almond and I are not on the same page in regards to the style of music and the musicians, but the intent and feeling of being a Drooling Fanatic is the same. My wife still rolls her eyes at the time we drive four hours (and stayed overnight) so that I could see a now very old 1950’s/60’s folk musician I’ve admired for years. And how I waited to be the last in line for autographs so that I could take out my 20 lps, dozen cds, and five song books for his signature and how he and I chatted for an hour and how I still have one of those albums, along with a photo of the two of us, framed and hanging on my office wall. Yeah, I understand Drooling Fanaticism.

And Almond manages to be humorous and not take himself too seriously, while still being a bit philosophical.

…I’m willing to argue at this point that we are all Drooling Fanatics, that every single human being carries within him or her the need for music and that we differ only in the matters of degree and expression. If this were another sort of book – a book with intellectual self-respect, for instance – I would support this assertion with a tantalizing anthropological survey of musical devotion within indigenous cultures, and assorted neurological data vector astonishments. Instead, we’ll all have to settle for another bleak memory from my days as a bumbling lothario.

I can’t tell you how many times, as I was reading this book, I was smiling and nodding my head in gleeful acknowledgement of Almond’s hitting the point so perfectly. (I can’t tell you because I didn’t keep track, not because it didn’t happen.)

His chapter, “On the Varieties of Fanatical Experience,” from which the quote above comes, is one of the best, truest, and most humorous essays I’ve ever read. I read the chapter out loud to my wife (who is also a Drooling Fanatic in her own right and falls somewhere between Almond and myself [closer to Almond] on the music style spectrum).

It seems both appropriate and heretical that my bookmark while reading this was a concert ticket stub … from a Symphony Orchestra concert.

Do I recommend this book? Absolutely. I recommend this author. Read some Almond and you will be hooked.

Looking for a good book? Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life by Steve Almond is a collection of essays in and around the music world and anyone who’s ever had a song running through their head that they can’t get rid of should read this book.

I bought this book with cold, hard cash.

[Ramona Mead · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's like this book was written by John Cusak's character in High Fidelity, except Steve Almond is a little less intense and much snobbier. I didn't enjoy this essay collection as much as I'd hoped. I don't meet all the criteria for Steve's definition of a "Drooling Fanatic" but I think I still am one. I suppose being a DF means judging other people's taste in music and I don't do that too much.

Perhaps if I was the exact same age as Steve and appreciated the same bands at the same time, I would have enjoyed this book more. There were a few essays I skimmed because I didn't know who he was talking about. There are some really great lines in here too, that resonated with me because music is my church, concerts are a spiritual experience. I looked up some of the referenced songs as I was reading, and I'll be sure to go back and check out the rest at some point.

I recommend this one for readers of essay collections and music lovers.

[Elisa Winter · Rating 4 out of 5]

That was FUN! Been feeling, well, like, how could I still be a DF at this age? When's it going to stop? I thought it'd stop by now. And Drooling Fanaticism has not only not stopped, it's worse than ever. Thank you digital streaming. Thank you also to Steve Almond for making me feel right at home, but more than that, proud of this relentless need to soak myself rock of all sorts. Still. After all these years.

[Nicole Woolaston · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought this was just going to be an account of different bands and musicians, but it turned out to be a bit of an autobiography. This was a very interesting read. I liked the way the author relayed stories of how he met certain musicians, and how much music impacted his life.

[Artie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A low five but it gets bonus points for saying nice things about someone who used to live across the street from me. I can't decide if it's a good thing or a bad thing that some of the musicians he writes about are so obscure that I can't find their recordings in my library.