Some wise observer once said that "writing about music is like dancing about architecture." In other words, how could one possibly recreate in plain, boring text the feeling and imagination of a Jimi Hendrix solo, the frenetic chord changes of Charlie Parker's sax, or the eerie, high-lonesome voice of Ralph Stanley? The best kind of music journalism doesn't even attempt that. Instead, it tries to illuminate the side of an artist or their work unexplored by the standard "rock interview." Or it sheds light on a musical trend and perhaps its impact outside of the listener's headphones.

"You will find lots of stuff trying to explain why music matters, what does it means, where it --- and the impulse to make it --- comes from," writes Hornby in his introduction. And the man would know, being the author of HIGH FIDELITY, one of the best music-related novels ever written.

This book is --- thankfully --- not a collection of puff-piece profiles on today's hot artists who are already being booked for the 2005 season of VH-1's "Where Are They Now?" show. While some pieces (all published in 2000) do concentrate on a specific musician live or dead (Neil Young, Eminem, Django Reinhardt, Jeff Buckley, Sleater-Kinney, Billie Holiday), others explore themes and topics ranging from Napster, Arab rappers, and record promoters of yesteryear to a bluegrass festival and a side-splitting, all-too true "Rock Snob's Dictionary."

But if one had to pick just a handful of superlative entries, they would include Bill Buford's examination of Lucinda Williams and her relationship with loss (easily the most insightful piece ever done on the performer) and Rian Malan's exhaustive investigation in the story of Solomon Linda, the South African Zulu tribesman who composed the melody for what we now recognize as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" --- 15 notes that went on to make millions over decades for white record company execs but nothing for Linda's family, who could not even afford a tombstone for his grave. In the course of writing the piece, Malan even became involved as an unofficial ambassador for Linda's family, with heartening results.

Other outstanding pieces include wry musician Robbie Fulk's account of his income tax audit, Gilbert Garcia's sniffing out of Home Shopping Network mega-selling Esteben's questionable guitar lineage, and Greil Marcus's profile of Johnny Cash as he faces the end of his life.

One of the anthology's best aspects is the sheer breadth of writers and sources included. The scribes include some of the biggest names in rock journalism, but also non-music writers, novelists, performers, and even one die-hard fan. Likewise, the material is culled not just from the usual suspects (Rolling Stone, Village Voice) but unlikely sources as well, from web sites and The Oxford American to a slew of cities' alternative newsweeklies --- the forum that arguably produces the best music writing in general today.

Interestingly, some of the pieces even turn the table around to explore the role of the rock critic, an idea first presented in the introduction. In Lori Robertson's "Golden Oldies," she expertly poses the question of the validity of today's rock critics (mostly middle-aged white guys) trying to explain, interpret and accurately cover new music and bands meant for people half their age and younger. She even interviews many of the same critics who have pieces elsewhere in this book. And then there's Jim DeRogatis --- no fan of the band Third Eye Blind --- conducting a tense, riveting, and hilarious battle of words with that band's singer, Stephen Jenkins. As they bicker back and forth in the piece printed as a transcript, it shows how one man can create music with the same level of passion that another can detest it.

The book's only faults are its lack of any pictures and its size --- it's too short! There could easily be twice as many pieces, but Hornby at least includes a list of other "suggested readings." Maybe it's a nod to the punk rock ethic (where have you gone, Joey Ramone?) that brevity is often better than bloatedness.

   --- Reviewed by Bob Ruggiero

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