Rolling Stone Rec GD

Bys: Marsh, Joss, Marsh, Dave, Rolling Stone Press

Book Overview

The New Rolling Stone Record Guide. Edited by Dave Marsh and John Swenson. 1983. Stated First Edition. Random House. Paperback. 'Revised,updated and more compete than ever, tis indispensable book... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0394735358
• ISBN13: 9780394735351
• Release Date: November 1979
• Publisher: Random House (NY)
• Length: 631 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.

Customer Reviews

25 Years Before the 2004 Rolling Stone Album Guide

If you found the 2004 Rolling Stone Album Guide as disappointing as most of us did, much of the reason can be traced back 25 years to the first Guide. Dave Marsh's original edition was intelligent, witty and informative. Naturally you'll find some smugness (this is Rolling Stone after all), but it was smugness which emphasized a point about the music, not a clumsy attempt to make the reviewer appear "hip." This book is certainly for historians more than anything. The publication year is also Year One for hip-hop, so it really does come from another world, but it gives us a window into those first 25 years of rock n' roll. It also contains a couple of features which future RSAGs should consider. The ratings system ranges from 5 stars to a 'bullet,' or black square, denoting albums which aren't even worthy of one star or half a star, and there are enough of those to bring back this appropriate symbol. Another feature was small pictures of the covers of many of the 5 star albums, which was nice. Maybe in the next Rolling Stone Album Guide we'll get a picture of the cover of OutKast's Speakerboxxx/The Love Below and a bullet next to a couple of Josh Groban albums. And maybe next time we'll get critics more like Dave Marsh and less like Rob Sheffield.

The only RS record guide worth owning

I did enjoy the pictures from the first guide, but the unacceptable Rush bashing on the part of the 1979 reviewer annoys me tremendously. In any event, John Swenson does an excellent job of righting the wrong that Alan Niester once perpetuated. Other than that, I am not particularly fond of the denigration of Yes, esp. with respect to TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS, however this book was very informative and I enjoyed it overall. IMHO, the only record guide that is comparable to this 1983 version is the ALL MUSIC GUIDE TO ROCK. As far as I am concerned, the 1992 guide was a waste of paper.

A very good, almost indispensible (but flawed) music guide.

I used to have this book and it got lost somewhere along the way. Although I vehemently disagreed with many of the reviews, I found it an indispensible source of information on both known and little known singers and groups, which helped me make many wise purchases. It is long out-of print and I hope somebody will be able to come up with a copy in reasonably good condition. I am keeping it on my wish lists at several sites until then. I have the newest edition (Rolling Stone Album Guide, 1992), and it covers many new groups and singers, more types of music and speaks in a more unified voice, because it was written by only four critics this time, instead of over fifty. However, I was disappointed to see how many important groups and singers from the previous edition (1983) were not even mentioned, even in passing, just omitted entirely. Although the 1992 edition is more up-to-date, I prefer this one. At least it has an honorable mentions page for those singers and groups it was not seen fit to write a full review about. On the other hand, I was pleased to see some more negative opinions of some of the artists still reviewed in the 1992 edition had been revised more favorably. Time and thought are not always so unkind, just sometimes. I agree with the reader whose review stated Dave Marsh's lack of input into the 1992 edition greatly hindered it. However, I feel both the 1983 and 1992 editions are well worth having and may possibly review the 1992 edition separately. However, I still have several major caveats with both editions. Most of the critics are rather narrow- minded and do not like anything too arty, spacy, avant-garde, or experimental. I also find it unfortunate that they find way too many artists too commercial, formulaic, untalented, or without other merits. If they were only more open-minded and progressive, but then they wouldn't be critics,would they? They just overanalyze everything too much. Too much training can be a bad thing and take away a lot of your spontaneity and ability to just sit sit back, relax and enjoy things like music and art. I promise if I review the 1992 edition of this book separately, my review will be considerably shorter and will probably refer back to this one. I just felt the need to compare the 1983 and 1992 editions and get some other feelings about critics (a necessary evil) off my chest. I'm sure many of you readers would agree with quite a few of my points. If not, well of course it's a free country and everyone is entitled to their opinion, agreeable or not, just as long as they can express it without getting too obnoxious.

The best music guide ever written.

The 1983 edition of THE NEW ROLLING STONE RECORD GUIDE is the best book on music ever written. Dave Marsh has very tough standards for music. He is not afraid to strongly criticize bands that are considered by most other critics to be untoucable. For example, check out his tough criticism of the Doors. And when Dave Marsh loves a band, he gives it praise as no other rock critic is capable of doing. For example, check out his kind words about Bruce Springsteen. In 1992, an update to this book was published. Unfortunately, Dave Marsh had nothing to do with that version, and, as a result, it is grossly inferior to the 1983 edition.

good, reasonably comprehensive guide to popular music

This is a great book to rummage through used record bins, help build a good record collection. It's best used to introduce you to new artists. Even if you don't agree with their general evaluation of an artist, most readers find the relative ranking of albums within the artist is reasonable. Some problems though: the jazz and blues section is very poor is coverage (hence the other book that followed this) and they typically pan any progressive music and love anyone once associated with their magazine (check out reviews of Yoko Ono and Patti Smith, ughh!). Biggest problem is inconsistent ratings across editions. For example, there is not one Doors album with the same rating across all three editions. Evaluating music is rather subjective but when the rater can't even decide what the value is, well there's little point is there?