David Kamp and Steven Daly, The Rock Snob*s Dictionary: An Essential Lexicon of Rockological Knowledge

If, as the decidedly non-snobbish David St. Hubbins immortally said, there is a fine line between stupid and clever, there is an even finer one between satire and self-laceration. Such is the lesson this very funny—but also very informative—little book teaches. Kamp and Daly clearly know too much about rock not to be snobs themselves, and they offer up this mostly convincing take on a fundamental canon of rock arcana with a delightfully schizophrenic mix of loathing and love. Most inspired of all are the sentences they concoct to illustrate the uses of snob lingo in context, a few of my favorites being:

His aesthetic may be straight out of the Dust Bowl, but Tom Waits's strangulated vocals have a soupcon of Beefheart about them.

I can’t be bothered with rock music anymore; all I listen to is Miles Davis’s Nefertiti and the Master Musicians of Jajouka.

Let’s put some mellotron over the fadeout to make it really Revolver-ish.

When I saw all those great Stax/Volt players backing up Belushi and Aykroyd, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

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