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3.0 out of 5 stars
It does infuriate, it does make one laugh,but....., Dec 9 2002
The tradition of "The 50 Worst stuff" started with The 50 Worst Films by the Medved Brothers. The stuff the Medveds chose films that were horrible but they clearly were having fun with their attacks. In fact, they invited the reader to join in the fun as the reader would sit and think how could any sane person come up with this junk. After films, it was natural that someone would choose the category of the rock'n'roll. And Guterman and O'Donnell took on the task. They claim the material was meant to be amusing or to infuriate. They also claim this book was an attempt to get rock criticism away from being pretentious and stuffy. Do they succeed? I did laugh with Richard Simmons' Reach or John Travolta in Travolta fever. I was infuriated with their attacks on The Guess Who and Jethro Tull. But if they're trying to come off as unprentionous, casual and lighter than other rock critics, they fail. The Medved Brothers maintained a light and funny tone throughout their "50 Worst Films" because they see Bad Cinema as cause celbre. Not the case here. Guterman and O'Donnell aren't always out to have fun or infuriate. A good deal of the time, they seem to use the book as a platform to vent their frustations which is neither funny nor infuriating and makes the authors sound serious as the rock critics they attack here. At least 2/3 of the book is spent on major artists(i.e,Bob Dylan,Stones Chuck Berry) lesser moments. They'll review something as Dylan's "Live In Budokan" or Berry's "My-Ding-A-Ling" and come off like a hardcore fan who was disappointed and expected something better. Now granted, "Live In Budokan" or "My-Ding-A-Ling" were neither Dylan nor Berry's high point. But if only your ears are the issue here(and not your heart or expectations), this stuff isn't all that bad. Other times they vent their frustations on popular artists who they don't like. When they review The Doors' Alive She Cried, a good deal is focused is on how they can't belive that Jim Morrison is still popular long after death. The attack on Morrison sounds more like a parent asking his kid "How can you listen to that crap?" than someone who wants to annoy a Doors Fan. Another case is where Billy Joel is listed as the worst rock'n'roller, but most of the attack is dedicated to how much his attitude annoys the authors. Graham Parker in one line alone makes his attack more amusing or annoying (if you're a fan) than anything the authors come up with, "In Russia, they are so misinformed about America, they think Billy Joel is a rock'n'roll star!" Finally, some details are flat out wrong. The book starts off with 33 1/3 rules of rock'n'roll. One of them is that Heavy Metal should be fast". Well, if you take Black Sabbath or Led Zeppelin as pioneers of heavy metal, you'll find a good chunk of classics that were not fast. How did you explain "Iron Man" or "Dazed and Confused" whose pace is slowed down to a crawl? In fact, Black Sabbath, influenced gazillions of metal bands with their dark riffs AND SLOW RHYTHMS. I did mentioned Graham Parker. Well, his live Parkerilla made the list and they attack Parker for making a bad record so his record label Mercury would drop them. Graham has said in interviews and on his web site, his decisions on making Parkerilla had nothing to do with Mercury. (A more unimportant note, I have noticed a couple of entries seem to have orignally come from reviews that Jimmy Guterman wrote for Rolling Stone. The entries on Bon Jovi's Slipper from Wet, Bruce Willis' Return of Bruno or Anderson, Wakeman, Bruford or Howe are a couple I noticed that is an exact word for word copy of Guterman's Rolling Stone review. In fact, 3/4 of the Billy Joel attack is lifted from Guterman's review of Billy Joel's Greatest Hits Vol I or II. Wonder what Owen's role was in the book? Hmmmmm!)
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