New Books Network
Music
Popular Culture March 1, 2021

Damaged

Musicality and Race in Early American Punk

Evan Rapport

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
Damaged: Musicality and Race in Early American Punk (University Press of Mississippi, 2020) is the first book-length portrait of punk as a musical style with an emphasis on how punk developed …

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Performing Arts February 25, 2021

Maybe the People Would Be the Times

Luc Sante

Hosted by Andy Boyd
Maybe the People Would Be the Times (Verse Chorus Press, 2020) could be described as a memoir in essay form. Collecting pieces from the past two decades, this book covers Luc Sante's …
Popular Culture February 23, 2021

Can't Nobody Do Me Like Jesus!

Photographs from the Sacred Steel Community

Robert L. Stone

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
Folklorist Robert L. Stone presents a rare collection of high-quality documentary photos of the sacred steel guitar musical tradition and the community that supports it. The introductory text and extended …
African American Studies February 23, 2021

Liner Notes for the Revolution

The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound

Daphne A. Brooks

Hosted by Amanda Joyce Hall
Liner Notes for the Revolution: The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound (Harvard University Press, 2021) by Dr. Daphne Brooks is a lyrical masterpiece that takes readers on an exhilarating …
History February 19, 2021

The Way of Bach

Three Years with the Man, the Music, and the Piano

Dan Moller

Hosted by Zachary McCulley
A tale of passion and obsession from a philosophy professor who learns to play Bach on the piano as an adult. Dan Moller grew up listening to heavy metal in the …
Dan Hill's EQ Spotlight February 11, 2021

Bluegrass Ambassadors

The McLain Family Band in Appalachia and the World

Paul O. Jenkins

Hosted by Dan Hill
Today I talked to Paul O. Jenkins about his book Bluegrass Ambassadors: The McLain Family Band in Appalachia and the World (West Virginia UP, 2020). This episode covers a band that defies …
Celebration Studies February 9, 2021

Jump Up!

Caribbean Carnival Music in New York City

Ray Allen

Hosted by Emily Ruth Allen
Jump Up!: Caribbean Carnival Music in New York City (Oxford University Press, 2019) is a comprehensive history of Trinidadian calypso and steelband music in the diaspora. Blending urban studies, oral history, archival research …
Music February 8, 2021

Resonant Recoveries

French Music and Trauma Between the World Wars

Jillian C. Rogers

Hosted by Kristen Turner
Understanding how people cope with large-scale traumatic events has become more urgent as we continue to cope with the effects of the pandemic. In Resonant Recoveries: French Music and Trauma …
Performing Arts February 5, 2021

Fictional Blues

Narrative Self-Invention from Bessie Smith to Jack White

Kimberly Mack

Hosted by Andy Boyd
The familiar story of Delta blues musician Robert Johnson, who sold his soul to the devil at a Mississippi crossroads in exchange for guitar virtuosity, and the violent stereotypes evoked …
Music January 26, 2021

Musical Solidarities

Political Action and Music in Late Twentieth-Century Poland

Andrea Bohlman

Hosted by Kristen Turner
Musical Solidarities: Political Action and Music in Late Twentieth-Century Poland (Oxford University Press, 2020) by Andrea Bohlman is a study of the music of dissent and protest during the Solidarity …
LGBTQ+ Studies January 18, 2021

Live At Jackson Station

Music, Community, and Tragedy in a Southern Blues Bar

Daniel M. Harrison

Hosted by Morris Ardoin
The smoke was thick, the music was loud, and the beer was flowing. In the fast-and-loose 1980s, Jackson Station Rhythm & Blues Club in Hodges, South Carolina, was a festive …
Asian Review of Books January 14, 2021

Three Asian Divas

Women, Art and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou

David Chaffetz

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
The “diva” is a common trope when we talk about culture. We normally think of the diva as a Western construction: the opera singer, the Broadway actress, the movie star …
Performing Arts January 12, 2021

Sailor Song

The Shanties and Ballads of the High Seas

Gerry Smyth

Hosted by Andy Boyd
Sailor Song: The Shanties and Ballads of the High Seas (University of Washington Press, 2020) by performer and scholar Gerry Smyth includes lyrics and commentary for dozens of sea shanties, as well …
Christian Studies January 7, 2021

Shout to the Lord

Making Worship Music in Evangelical America

Ari Y. Kelman

Hosted by Ryan Shelton
How do songwriters, worship leaders, and music industry professionals collaborate to make music that can become prayer? Ari Y. Kelman explores this question in his excellent study, Shout to the Lord …
Biography January 4, 2021

Before the Sidewalk Ended

A Walk with Shel Silverstein

Anthony Valerio

Hosted by Mark Klobas
Anthony Valerio's Before the Sidewalk Ended: A Walk with Shel Silverstein (Daisy H. Productions, 2020) is a startling portrait of the great writer of children's books, songs and plays Shel Silverstein. What …
Asian Review of Books December 31, 2020

The Baddest Bitch in the Room

A Memoir

Sophia Chang

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
Enter the Wu-Tang. Return to the 36 Chambers. People listening to these albums by the Wu-Tang Clan and its members likely never knew about Sophia Chang: a Korean-Canadian woman who …
Christian Studies December 30, 2020

Ecologies of Resonance in Christian Musicking

Mark James Porter

Hosted by Ryan Shelton
Mark Porter (@mrmarkporter) explores the relationship between music, sound, space, and spirit in his new book Ecologies of Resonance in Christian Musicking (Oxford University Press, 2020). Using the analytical tools …
Popular Culture December 23, 2020

Modern Music Masters - Oasis

Almost Everything You Wanted to Know about Oasis, and Some Stuff You Didn't...

Tom Boniface-Webb

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
In the first book in the Modern Music Masters series, Tom Boniface-Webb examines the Manchester band Modern Music Masters-Oasis (MMM, 2020). Founded in 1994 and playing together until their spectacular and abrupt …
Popular Culture December 21, 2020

Bedroom Beats & B-Sides

Instrumental Hip-Hop & Electronic Music at the Turn of the Century

Laurent Fintoni

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
In Bedroom Beats & B-Sides: Instrumental Hip-Hop & Electronic Music at the Turn of the Century (Velocity Press, 2020), Laurent Fintoni explores the rise of a new generation of bedroom producers at the turn of …
Celebration Studies December 21, 2020

Honk!

A Street Band Renaissance of Music and Activism

Reebee Garofalo, Erin T. Allen, Andrew Snyder

Hosted by Emily Ruth Allen
HONK! A Street Band Renaissance of Music and Activism (Routledge, 2020), edited by Reebee Garofalo, Erin T. Allen, and Andrew Snyder, explores a fast-growing and transnational movement of street bands—particularly …