Comments on: Mystery Train: Images of America in Rock ‘n’ Roll Music

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 22:56:30 +0000

Mystery Train is much more than just a very good piece of rock criticism, nor should it be remembered as perhaps the Father of Rock Criticism. This book is astounding because what Marcus is able to do is get inside a piece of music, an artist, a certain place in time, a brief second inside a recording studio or on a movie screen, and not only recall the moment (or what the moment might have resembled) but also manage to make the moment real for the reader. So often, when reading music criticism, one feels a distance between the work of art itself and the criticism in front of you. Seldom is the excitement, passion, or wonderful possibilities of art well discussed and analyzed, because most authors are unable to find that fine balance between salivating fan and distanced critic. In Mystery Train (and in his other books as well), Greil Marcus has found that balance – or, more precisely, he has refused to accept the balance as necessary. Whatever Marcus trains his eye upon becomes fascinating and important because he sees every possibility, every ramifcation, every opportunity to return to the overriding theme, which is America. After reading Mystery Train, I not only wanted to track down those old Harmonica Frank tapes and re-listen to my Robert Johnson record, and scrutinize The Band’s “Brown Album”and Sly Stone and Randy Newman and Elvis – I also wanted to go beyond the book, to attempt to apply Marcus’ vision to what I saw around me. For some reason, this book reminds me of the works of Thomas Pynchon, but not just because they’re both regularly classified as “post-modernists” by critics and profs. Rather, I find that after reading Marcus and Pynchon, I find myself looking at things differently, recognizing possible patterns around me, being amazed at the myriad possibilities and variety of life. Mystery Train is not simply “a book about rock and roll.” It is a work which exists on its own, a work which is both dependent upon and an improvement on the works it discusses and analyzes. Certainly, in 50 years, this book will be looked at as one of the finer moments in American criticism.
Rating: 5 / 5

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 22:12:28 +0000

Just about the best book about artists which (with the exception of Sly & The Family Stone) I’ve never bothered to listen to. But Marcus’ choice of performers is irrelavant. What matters is his thesis on how rock & roll has influenced American culture, and vice versa. The introduction, about Little Richard’s rant on Dick Cavett’s early-70’s show on ABC, nicely sums up what Marcus does in this book—insisting that rock & roll is THE postwar American music, no matter what the elitists tell you.
Rating: 5 / 5

By: Andy Smith

Andy Smith — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 20:23:45 +0000

…This is a tremendously influential book about Elvis, Robert Johnson, Sly Stone, The Band and Randy Newman as American legends, putting them into the context of the unwritten history and mythology of the frontier, the riverboat, and the Appalachian mines. Later on Marcus got a bit too academic and obscure for this reader’s taste (e.g. in ‘Lipstick Traces’) but this is the business. If you are remotely interested in America or in rock music, there’s plenty for you here. Buy it!
Rating: 5 / 5