Xgau SezThese are questions submitted by readers, and answered by Robert Christgau. New ones will appear in batches every third Tuesday. To ask your own question, please use this form. May 21, 2025On guitar: Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Bones check, the spiritual exhaustion of the Must to Avoid, quality albums never to be heard again, the excellence of the A minus, and Xgau on film. [Q] Your article about Tiny Tim and Sly Stone turning their weddings into spectacles left out Sister Rosetta Tharpe, who staged her wedding to her manager in 1951 at Griffith Stadium Washington DC for 25,000 paying customers (according to Wikipedia). I also have a question: I have a three-CD set of her recordings that concentrates on her gospel singing. That's ok as far as it goes, but do you know of a collection that focuses on her guitar playing? What videos I've been able to find are real knockouts. Thank you. -- Paul Hardin, Dearborn, Michigan [A] I've written about plenty of gospel music over the years, but—call it the lapsed Christian in me—nowhere near as comprehensively as I have blues, where I'm not a completist either. I no longer recall how my Tharpe review came to pass, though it was only five years ago, but for sure there's plenty of guitar on that album. Were I to make a project of it I'm sure I'd find more of her music I liked but not therefore music that demanded coverage or was right down my alley. Plus serious gospel delving would probably unbalance my music coverage in general. As for throwing herself a Griffith Stadium wedding, a story I don't recall ever running across, I say good for her. For one thing, there's no doubting the strength of her religious commitment as there is with Sly and Tiny. [Q] Have you or Carola read John Lurie's memoir, The History of Bones? Carola features in a very funny anecdote in Chapter 23. -- Ryan S., Barrington, New Hampshire. [A] That one never came in the mail, although I do have some social connections to Lurie that to the best of my faltering recollection do not touch on Carola. If somebody were to send me a copy I promise I'd take a look at Chapter 1 after checking out Chapter 23. But not therefore to finish the thing. That would have to be on narrative merit alone, though for sure Lurie is a very smart guy. [Q] Some of my favorite things you've ever written are negative reviews for albums I've never listened to and probably never will, often by artists about whom I have no knowledge or opinion. I don't know why this is, but I think it has something to do with the way you convey your ideas about music you dislike—it helps me clarify why I dislike certain things, and thinking this way helps me understand and appreciate why I like what I like. I know you don't write pans anymore and you've said you don't miss it, which makes sense, But was there a point in your career when you felt like processing what you dislike helped you enjoy what you like? -- Ben, Grand Rapids, Michigan [A] For quite a while I counteracted the Voice's annual Thanksgiving things-to-be-thankful-for guff, which I found ickily liberal, by writing an annual all-pans November CG I dubbed the Turkey Shoot, plus for a while there every CG included one highly unrecommended album I dubbed the Must to Avoid, a label inspired by the Herman's Hermits hit "(She's) A Must to Avoid." I once did an EMP lecture about these devices in which I explained that the basic reason I did this over and above broadening my coverage was that it's easier to be funny when you're putting something down. The lecture also reported to the assembled academics that while this ploy may have looked easy in fact I found it intellectually and spiritually exhausting. [Q] Reflecting on a sentiment you shared a couple of years ago, you mentioned that one of the unfortunate aspects of being a music critic is the realization that there are albums you love but may never get to listen to again. As I grow older, I find myself experiencing a similar challenge with the albums I cherish. Could you share if there are any albums that you think about fondly but are unlikely to revisit in the future? How often (if ever) do you think about albums like Attempted Mustache by Loudon Wainwright III, Wide Awake by the Vulgar Boatmen, Party Music by the Coup, D Is for Dumptruck by Dumptruck, Stateless by Lene Lovich. -- A. Ridwan, Chemnitz, Germany [A] For reasons of physical convenience I don't play much vinyl or I'd add Attempted Mustache to the sole album you named that made me think it might be a good idea to put on right now: the Coup's Party Music. Without checking back I'm also pretty sure that one's the only full A. OTOH, were any of those albums to be requested by a guest (or maybe in the highly unlikely event that Nina, who turns 40 in June and has her own pantheon that enabled me to warm to Queen, belatedly became interested in alt-rock) of course I'd pull them out. And I bet they'd sound more than OK. But there are obviously countless alt-rock acts and other artists of some quality too that I'll never hear again. [Q] 127 A+ grades from 15,000+ reviews over more than 50 years. Seems low given all the time and effort so many people have put in trying to create a masterwork. Is it that difficult? Or is the dreaded bell curve in effect? Do you think literature, visual arts, or even movies would have a similarly low excellence rate? Avoidance where there is no pleasure to be found is just as useful. -- Ben O'Neil, Toronto, Canada [A] There are plenty of A and A minus records—all of them, to be precise—that achieve a measure of "excellence." If they didn't I would't give them A's of any sort. Those A plus albums (and quite a few full A's as well), however, are at a different level of excellence. In general they prove to be not just really good but actively thrilling, enthralling, uplifting, renewing. They make you feel better about being a human being, which these days the entire anti-Trump cohort needs (and if you don't belong to that cohort get out of here.) [Q] Hi Bob, I may be wrong but I don't recall you writing anything about the always watchable 1999 four-part Rock n' Roll Animal documentary residing over on YouTube. I'd be interested in hearing how it came about, what you thought of it at the time, and what you think of it now looking back (can it really be?) over a quarter of a century on. -- Trevor Minter, Shoreham by Sea, United Kingdom [A] That film came to pass when a young NYU student named Paul Lovelace proposed it. Films and especially student films being the somewhat crude and iffy and time-consuming propositions they tend to be, I had my doubts, but I liked the kid a lot and figured what the hell. I thought the results were fine—think often of the final shot of my riding up Fourth Avenue on my bike from the Voice offices—and became full-fledged friends with Paul. Carola and I attended his marriage to Jessica Wolfson and as unremitting baby fans went to visit them uptown more than once after they became parents. Then they moved to Austin, where they became successful filmmakers; recently Paul was brought on board to help make a much larger-budget feature-length documentary directed by bizwise tech entrepreneur Matty Wishnow and focused on none other than uxorious rock critic Robert Christgau. Working with Paul on that film has been somewhere between a pleasure and a joy. In case you hadn't guessed, I can't wait to see it. Let me add that Paul was an producer, writer, and editor on the now-in-theaters documentary Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted, which I've recommended here before and recommend again. April 16, 2025Essential pre-internet reference works, El Lay vs L.A., more music from the Great White North, de gustibus non disputandum est, roll over Beethoven, and party politics briefly considered. [Q] Hi Bob, I wonder what some of your essential pre-internet reference works were. Back before Google, what books or resources did you keep around and refer to regularly as you wrote the Consumer Guide or long-form pieces—whether for genre history, artist catalog, music theory/terminology, chart information, or anything else? -- Jay Thompson, Seattle [A] Joel Whitburn's guides to the Billboard charts have always been valuable. I still keep them on my desk's bookshelf, although I see that the unbound, stapled, pamphlet-style first edition without which I couldn't have written the '70s CG book that made me slightly famous, is missing its first and final pages, so tattered it now starts with Avalon and ends with Welch. The Whitburn I still use is The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits. I also keep The Trouser Press Record Guide close at hand. [Q] Why do you call it "El Lay?" -- Lonnie, Boston [A] This New York chauvinist gibe was concocted by Village Voice fashion writer Blair Sabol. As an unbowed NYC chauvinist I couldn't resist it but will note that this was well before the flowering of such (note spelling) L.A. punk-era bands as X, the Minutemen, L7, Black Flag, NOFX, and my special faves the Descendents. El Lay is or should I say was about the biz, which I always made room for as well despite my continuing skepticism about the Laurel Canyon folkie-virtuoso sensibility, which helped generate plenty of good music even so. [Q] Why isn't THE BAND on your list of great Canadian artists? Yes one of them, Levon Helm, was American but their formative years were playing in Toronto. Moreover, there's something very Canadian about them, despite the fact that they're sometimes classified as "Americana." By the way, the late Garth Hudson was awarded the Order of Canada. -- Lawrence Casse, Toronto [A] Pure oversight, obviously—an oversight reflecting the inconvenient fact that I've always respected them more than I've liked them, although I do have a dim memory of being surprised at how much I enjoyed hearing them after seeing a movie featuring them that's also a dim memory. One reason is that I've never found even one of them a remarkable singer, another that I've never thought either their songwriting or their groove all that either. The only album of theirs I actively liked was never Consumer Guided, at least in part because it came out precisely when I was breaking up with Ellen Willis, an all too engrossing endeavor: 1969's eponymous, as they like to say, The Band. If this answer hasn't perturbed you I suggest you look over the Consumer Guide reviews they inspired. The corrective to this disinterest is Greil Marcus's Mystery Train, where the Band plays a major role. After which you might take a look at Barney Hoskyns's considerably less idyllic Woodstock book Small Town Talk. Not exactly a utopia, that town. [Q] Why do you dislike progressive rock music so much when the genre has brought so much amazing music to my ears that I would have never heard in any other genre of music? There's no way that music this beautiful and emotionally affecting can be bad. -- Brent Dubroc, New Orleans [A] For starters, de gustibus non disputandum est. Like what you like. But prog is pretentious by proud self-definition and too often utterly devoid of anything I would call groove. If you actively enjoy its style of full-of-itself and have managed to reside in the Groove Capitol of the Universe without developing a deep-seated craving for groove itself, a peculiarity you clearly share with millions of others who prefer the technical skills of such prog drummers as Yes's Bill Bruford, none other than Genesis's Phil Collins, ELP's Carl Palmer himself, and Lord help you Kansas's Phil Ehart, enjoy if enjoyment is what that feeling is. This major Ziggy Modeliste fan would much rather feel his lungs expand as his mind taps its foot and his favorite person in the world dances around the dining room. [Q] First of all I want to wish you a happy birthday—we share the same one [April 18, ed.]. I've been listening to a lot of classical music lately. Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Vivaldi, and Haydn continue to get listening time. I know you don't review many classical recordings. Still you clearly have knowledge of the music by your references in reviews of various artists such as Yes and Eric Carmen. Do you find yourself listening to any classical these days and if so what composers? -- Nathaniel Lathy, Columbus, Ohio [A] I own a fair amount of classical music that came in the mail but just about never play it. I could say I like Stravinsky and Bach and Vivaldi and it would be true enough, but that's memory at best, although when I took it upon myself to read Proust at 17 my professor, a terrific old poet named Ramon Guthrie, told our little seminar that Proust was inspired by Beethoven's C sharp minor quartet, which I listened to on earphones in the library and liked so much I bought it as an adult and have even played it a few times. [Q] Have you ever voted Republican in any presidential election? -- Daniel, Satu Mare, Romania [A] Nope, but maybe for senator or something. In 1968 I did vote for at least one Republican councilman I recall, named Don Weeden. The basically anti-electoral Ellen Willis did too. Our councilman, whose name has slipped my mind, was a Jewish Democrat who'd been around for decades and was no progressive. Of course, that was in 1968, by which time Republican John Lindsay was the relatively progressive mayor. And in 2000 I voted for Nader rather than Gore, which in New York meant nothing in the electoral college but in Florida might well have provided Bush with his tiny margin of victory. In retrospect, I think the fame Nader earned for his considerable consumer-protection and environmental achievements went to his head the way even earned and principled fame so often does and as a result wrecked our electoral politics. And I will add that I can't imagine how a Romanian could follow all this detail. March 19, 2025Music of the True North, boxing days, the Bobbsey Twins as vocabulary builders, no soul radio (see also: Mark. 8 Verses 34 to 38), patriotic verb clusters, and remembering David Johansen. [Q] Now that we are on the brink of war with Canada, I share with you my Canad8:
Safe assumption that you never warmed up to Rush—even after Geddy's register dropped an octave or two—but I argue that they had a great run from Hemispheres to Signals, with some listenable albums here-and-there otherwise. You gave Loreena McKennitt a dud, but I found myself more and more curious, as she often ventured into early Celtic music and tales. -- Adam S. Fenton, Menifee, California [A] Young, Mitchell, McGarrigles, to a somewhat lesser extent Cohen—titans all. And right, Rush to a much much lesser extent are my kind of band—my tastes jn rock run obviously run more punk/new wave, although the Guess Who played a minor role in my 1969 breakup with Ellen Willis ("Undun" was key at that moment) and I also found Bachman-Turner Overdrive OK. But really, give me the New Pornographers, Tokyo Police Club, recently Pony. Plus some great rappers: K'naan, Backxwash, and last but also very near the top of this graf the great Buck 65. [Q] I used to treasure your December Consumer Guides in the 1990s because they featured the best reissues of the year. Re-reading some of them lately, I notice that your introduction always mentioned how you focused on single disc (or sometimes two-CD sets) instead of box sets. Nevertheless, you have reviewed several box sets over the years and my question relates to box sets. Assuming that you own a lot more box sets than those you've reviewed, what are one or two or three boxes that you're glad are on your shelves, even though they may not be worth reviewing, and why? -- Henry T, Flushing [A] A quick count indicates that I have going on 60 box sets in my office and another 30 or so in the hall. There may be more somewhere. I don't recall buying a single one, though there may be a few exceptions—just about every one arrived in the mail free, usually back in the good old review-copy days. I keep them primarily because they orient me as nothing else could when I want to write about one of the artists a collection compiles. The only ones I play with the slightest regularity are the two Armstrongs—Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, a career-spanning omnibus, and The Complete Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings, which documents his '20s stuff. I don't play them because a choice album or sometimes two or even three will sate my hunger and curiosity (and/or maybe prove a special delight for Carola or Nina). [Q] One of the benefits I've received from reading you for 40-plus years is that my vocabulary has been expanded due to your penchant for using arcane language at times. From who else would I have learned "prognathous" from an Aerosmith review or "lagniappe" while checking your thoughts on a Warren Zevon record? Nobody, that's who. Do you just have a natural gift for absorbing and retaining obscure vocabulary or have you always had a thesaurus (or open thesaurus tab) by your side. I suspect the former, but am curious. -- Bob Kannen, Brattleboro, Vermont [A] From first grade, where I quickly learned to read well enough to devour all my mom's old Bobbsey Twins books, I've had a large vocabulary for my age, because my reading did not stop with the Bobbsey Twins. I've always read a lot. That said, however, "prognathous" I must have come upon while doing my best to nail a metaphor. "Lagniappe," however, has been in my recall vocabulary for decades. Have no idea why or how. But I don't use big words to impress; I use what I regard as the most apt under the circumstances, which can vary enormously. [Q] I have two questions; the first is simply a request. Please get out of politics and stop insulting the President. You have done nothing tangible for this country and worship a band called Wussy. No comparison. And you have no idea how despicable and damaging your ideologies are or how deficient your understanding. My question is this: Where will you go when you "check out"? I've read your work for years and value it highly, but I'm truly concerned for your soul. -- William C. Kittrell, Byhalia, Mississippi [A] I believe that when I die I will survive nowhere except in the hearts and minds of my loved ones, friends, and admirers. But I'm aware that no living human has any way to be certain that there's no such thing as life after death, although if there is it will certainly not be life as physical humans experience it. As for the president (literate humans do not capitalize it as a noun as opposed to title, a grammatical usage I'm sure sticks in the barely literate motherfucker's craw in the unlikely event that he's aware of it at all): He's a vindictive, pathologically resentful, racist greedhead—evil, as I have not the slightest doubt the God whose existence I think so unlikely is all too aware if he's out there keeping tabs. Value that highly if you will. [Q] Hey Mr. Christgau, America, my sunny and dusty old friend. The cowboys, the horses, and the plains. The bands of brothers. Is this goodbye? -- Martin Moeller, Vejle, Denmark [A] Hope not, but can hardly blame you for asking. To borrow two verb clusters from Talking Points Memo's Josh Marshall, it's up to all of us on this side of the Atlantic to defy-delay-undo, to slow-impede-defeat. I'm a patriotic democrat/Democrat. So is almost everyone I know except a few out-and-out leftists. But I don't know anyone who's feeling actively confident that we'll be able to take some deep breaths four years from now. [Q] David Johansen. One of rock's great characters. An incredibly charismatic entertainer and a hell of a writer and singer. The New York Dolls are bigger and more fun than the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Incomprehensible that they are not inducted. That they even happened, that the group's fantastic music has been in orbit around the sun for over 50 years, is quite mind-blowing. They feel more and more underrated every time I play their records. It's music that for me remains as fresh and exciting as ever. My sincere question to you is simple: How will you remember Johansen and what will you miss about him? I admire him for his humor and intelligence, but also for his bravery, his insistence on being who/what he wanted to be where and when, and fuck you if you thought for even a second that you could stand in his way. And I miss him for exact those reasons as well. -- Andres, Malmö, Sweden [A] Amen, brother. February 19, 2025Louis Armstrong and the Beatles in book form, 'Brat' but it's a lowish A but also still 'Brat,' Emmylou Harris and Wussy grades grubbed, and combating the evil which is going on. [Q] My wife Rachel is loving the Ricky Riccardi interview with Terry Gross and what she's learning about Louis Armstrong. I liked your thoughtful summary of the biographies. In your opinion has there been anything better than Teachout in the years since you wrote that? And thank you for everything you do. -- Aldan G. Wylde, Oakland [A] Armstrong being Armstrong, there probably has been, but that's not the kind of thing I keep track of. My big Terry Teachout-hooked piece was a lot of work and ended up one of the best things I ever wrote. Recently there was an Armstrong-inspired Broadway musical called A Wonderful World that I found accurate and admirable and thought-provoking as regards the strong women in his life should some version come your way. But do I want to read another Armstrong book? That depends. For sure the profusely illustrated Gary Giddins retrospective Satchmo: The Genius of Louis Armstrong is worth having around to look at as well as read. [Q] I hope you have not answered this before but what are the best books about the Beatles? -- Dave W, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania [A] Oddly enough, I haven't read that many Beatles books. But I'd be very surprised if there was a better one than Rob Sheffield's Dreaming the Beatles, which pays close attention to the female fans he argues were the band's too often neglected artistic secret. That said, Philip Norman's Shout: The Beatles in Their Generation was early and excellent, and Brian Epstein's very early A Cellarful of Noise, which I bought from a drugstore paperback rack circa 1966, is embedded deep in my heart. May Pang's strange and sometimes embarrassing Loving John has stuck with me, as has Norman's 2008 Lennon bio and for that matter The John Lennon Letters, which I found so engrossing I reviewed it. As I began by admitting, I'm no expert, and as you may have noticed I keep going back to JL. But I guarantee you'll get plenty from the Sheffield. |