Spitznagel’s Interview collection is a feast for music-lovers.
“It takes a special kind of music nerd to think an entire book of conversations with music nerds talking about the albums that turned them into music nerds is a marketable idea,” quips Eric Spitznagel in the acknowledgements of “Rock Stars on the Record: The Albums That Changed Their Lives.”
That comic oversimplification still manages to speak to the heart of this collection of Q&A exchanges with musicians about the records that most move them. The stories shared stretch beyond breaking down catchy choruses or stirring chord changes and into issues of identity, inspiration and elevation. The interviews affirm Spitznagel’s assertion that he has “never had a tedious conversation that began, ‘What was the first album that cracked open your skull and made you feel things?’ ”
The range of interview subjects contributes to the success of the project. The variety of musicians ages, represented by young newcomers like
Mia Berrin of Pom
Pom Squad and musical lifers like Verdine
White of Earth, Wind &
Fire, makes for interesting conversations about the benefits of music experienced via vinyl, tape, CD, downl o a d or streaming throughout the last seven decades. A wide variety of genres are also represented in both those sharing their thoughts and the artists they spotlight, with jazz, metal, pop, punk, alternative and Americana music all making appearances. As is so often the case with such diverse collections, some of the most interesting conversations happen with artists the reader may be less familiar with or less fond of musically. Marisa Dabice and Donny Osmond, anyone?
Spitznagel’s basic questions barely vary from artist to artist: How was music experienced in your home and community when you were growing up? How did you discover the album(s) that excited you? How is listening to your favorite album today different from first hearing it? Can listening to that album transport you back in time and reawaken sensory experiences of that earlier era? From these building blocks, Spitznagel proves an adept listener and interviewer, letting his subjects take their memories in any number of directions and encouraging them to dig deeper into asides and suppositions.
The tones of the conversations vary. Musical enthusiasts like Brother Cain frontman and band-hopping tour guitarist Damon Johnson ooze joy about the music they love. For Johnson, that’s early Van Halen, and he delights in recalling being inspired by the band’s first album as a young musician and now laughing about it being his favorite soundtrack for mowing the lawn. Intellectual, unconventional thinkers like Kristin Hersh of Throwing Muses, meanwhile, consider music more obliquely. In discussing the single “Walk Away Renee,” Hersh ponders “celebration of sound,” inventing and reinventing a “musical language” and her musician son’s observation that crossing certain thresholds results in being “reborn with a new soundtrack.” And then there are the proselytizers for whom music is talked about with religious fervor. That Wayne Kramer of the MC5 feels the music of The Who and John Coltrane way down in his soul may not come as a surprise. That motormouthed humorist Mojo Nixon feels it just as deeply, though expressing it more profanely, about George Thorogood, Bruce Springsteen and The Clash, proves amazingly moving.
The temptation to reveal more of the book’s best moments is strong, but it would be unfair to give too much away. Music aficionados will surely delight in the moment Spitznagel basically stops an interview just to listen in awe to Stevie Wonder’s “Love’s In Need Of Love Today” and “Sir Duke” along with his subject. Anyone with parents who had mixed feelings about their teenage music obsessions will be charmed by Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn’s story of his dad, in full golf regalia, coming with him into a hip record store to purchase an edgy album for his eighthgrader son. And, Mia Berrin’s insights about the exploitation of artists struggling with addiction and mental health issues, and the incredible power of music to uplift and heal, belie her youth.
Thirty-six artists discuss that number of records and more throughout Spitznagel’s book. From Don McLean to Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh, Laura Jane Grace to “Weird Al” Yankovic, Suzi Quatro to Wendy and Lisa from the Revolution, professional players deliver insight into what music first captured their attention and why music matters to them well beyond their work. Music “nerds” might be most excited about that, but anyone who cares passionately about something will find much about these conversations engaging and enlightening.
“ROCK STARS ON THE RECORD: THE ALBUMS THAT CHANGED THEIR LIVES”