Footnote:
In English
Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web
Description:
Is It Still Good to Ya? sums up the career of longtime Village Voice stalwart Robert Christgau, who for half a century has been America's most widely respected rock critic, honoring a music he argues is only more enduring because it's sometimes simple or silly. While compiling historical overviews going back to Dionysus and the gramophone along with artist analyses that range from Louis Armstrong to M.I.A., this definitive collection also explores pop's African roots, response to 9/11, and evolution from the teen music of the '50s to an art form compelled to confront mortality as its heroes pass on. A final section combines searching obituaries of David Bowie, Prince, and Leonard Cohen with awed farewells to Bob Marley and Ornette Coleman
Is It Still Good to Ya? -- Frontmatter -- Contents -- INTRODUCTION. Robert Christgau’s Greatest Hits: Volume III -- PROLOGUE. Good to Ya, Not for Ya -- I. History in the Making -- Ten-Step Program for Growing Better Ears -- Dionysus in Theory and Practice -- B.E. A Dozen Moments in the Prehistory of Rock and Roll -- Let’s Get Busy in Hawaiian -- Rock Lyrics Are Poetry (Maybe) -- “ We Have to Deal with It” -- Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster -- Not My Fault, Not My Problem -- A Weekend in Paradise -- Staying Alive -- Afternoon of the Roar -- Harry Smith Makes History -- Getting Their Hands Dirty -- A Month on the Town -- A Month on the Town -- What I Listen For in Music -- II. A Great Tradition -- Pops as Pop -- Not So Misterioso -- First Lady -- Folksinger, Wordslinger, Start Me a Song -- Caring the Hard Way -- Like Ringing a Bell -- Unnaturals -- Black Elvis -- Tough Love -- The Excitement! The Terror! -- Sister, Oh Sister -- Two Pieces About the Ramones -- Nevermore -- A Long Short Story -- The Go-Betweens -- Tear the Sky Off the Mother -- The World Is His Boudoir -- Two Pieces About Aretha Franklin -- Ain’t Dead Yet -- How to Survive on an Apple Pie Diet -- John Prine -- III. Millennium -- Music from a Desert Storm -- Ghost Dance -- The Moldy Peaches Slip You a Roofie -- Attack of the Chickenshits -- Facing Mecca -- Three Pieces About M.I.A. -- IV. From Which All Blessings Flow -- Full Immersion with Suspect Tendencies -- Fela and His Lessers -- Vendant l’Afrique -- Dakar in Gear -- A God After Midnight -- Franco de Mi Amor -- Forty Years of History, Thirty Seconds of Joy -- Tribulations of St. Joseph -- Music from a Desert War -- V. Postmodern Times -- Growing by Degrees -- The Slim Shady Essay -- Career Opportunity -- Good Morning Little School Girl -- Master and Sacrament -- The Commoner Queen -- A Hot Little Weirdo -- What’s Not to Like? -- No Hope Radio -- Rather Exhilarating -- Old Master -- Estudando Tom Zé -- Gypsy Is His Autopilot -- Triumph of the Id -- Brag Like That -- Paisley’s Progress -- Smart and Smarter -- The Many Reasons to Love Wussy -- Hearing Her Pain -- Firestarter -- Monster Anthems -- Dancing on Her Own -- Three More Pieces About M.I.A. -- The Unassumingest -- VI. Got to Be Driftin’ Along -- Who Knows It Feels It -- Shape Shifter -- The Most Gifted Artist of the Rock Era -- Forever Old -- Don’t Worry About Nothing -- Sticking It in Their Ear -- Sensualistic, Polytheistic -- Index