Trying to reach as broad a range of tastes and pocketbooks as possible, we this year scavenged everything from the front pages of the Onion to R. Crumb's genesis, to valedictory Updike. Stuff to read, stuff to look at, glossy pages and matte. Remember: be careful not to nick the pages or spill eggnog on them before you wrap. Happy holidays!
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Who Shot Rock & Roll: A Photographic History, 1955-Present | by Gail Buckland | Knopf | 336 pages | $40
With Who Shot Rock & Roll, iconic photo editor Gail Buckland performs a tremendous service for the culture voyeur in us all. After spelunking the portfolios of 100 acclaimed music photographers, she emerged with nearly 300 pages of public and candid moments that warrant significant stares. Some selections— like Mark Seliger's tortured Kurt Cobain portrait and Max Vadukul's shot of Amy Winehouse fingering herself — are everyday images at this point. Others — such as Ricky Powell's pic of Method Man and Edward Colver's flinch-worthy black-and-white piece from a 1980 Minor Threat show — are newfound classics.
In his review of Who Shot Rock & Roll, New York Times critic Ken Johnson suggests "one way to make rock photographs more interesting would be to analyze them as sociological or anthropological documents." If you agree with that nonsense, don't just take a hammer to your highbrow — you should also avoid this tome. Because while Buckland stuffed it with fascinating stories about these sharp shooters and their subjects, the thrill is only spoiled by negotiating her project as something more than a phenomenal kaleidoscopic tribute to the kings and queens of sound and stage.
— Chris Faraone
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Related:
Coffeenomics, Book Review: The Tin Drum, 2009: The year in books, More 
- Coffeenomics
In 50 states and 49 countries, the experience is the same: a placid sense of place, air suffused with the rich aromatics of fresh-brewed espresso. Customers dollop cream and sprinkle brown sugar into their drinks. Behind the counter, green-clad baristas grind beans and steam milk, smiling as they take orders in a made-up language.
- Book Review: The Tin Drum
There are — and have always been — two Günter Grasses. There's the Grass who was born in Danzig and the Grass who was born in Gdansk.
- 2009: The year in books
Here, listed alphabetically by author, are 10 of the best books the Phoenix reviewed in 2009.
- Interview: Raj Patel
"The opposite of consumption is not thrift but generosity; if you look at happiness studies, we are happiest when we give things away rather than when we accumulate or when we don't spend."
- Creating a legend
The soldiers of the 20th Maine Regiment marched quickly into the night, moving west from Hanover toward Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, on July 1, 1863.
- Scientology defector tells all
If every last allegation that Church of Scientology (CoS) defector Nancy Many charges in My Billion Year Contract is true, then her book should inspire several FBI raids and a Lifetime mini-series to rival any Charles Manson documentary.
- Walk hard
In Joshua Ferris's unsparing second novel, Tim Farnsworth doesn't know why he walks, but nothing but exhaustion can stop him.
- Heart keeps beating
Storytelling is largely about character, and writer Thomas Cobb came up with a doozy when he conceived Bad Blake.
- Power of place
I'd arranged the trip (Dogtown is about an hour and a half south of Portland) because I was planning to write about Elyssa East's new book, Dogtown: Death and Enchantment in a New England Ghost Town.
- Interview: Ozzy Osbourne
Long before he bit the heads off bats and doves, Ozzy Osbourne worked in a cheerless abattoir in the hardscrabble Aston section of Birmingham, England, where for 18 months he held such titles as "cow killer," "tripe hanger," "hoof puller," and "pig stunner."
- A memoir, a tour, and a state coming to grips with slavery
The latest turn in Rhode Island's complicated dialogue with its slaveholding past: a yearlong project encouraging locals to read a memoir by the son of a freed slave.
- A painful case
Is it living in a wishy-washy culture of sheepish PBS humanism and numbing political correctness that makes the nasty, psychopathic amorality — no, immorality! — of Patricia Highsmith's novels so savory and appealing?
- Less
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Books
, Entertainment, Entertainment, Altamont, More
, Entertainment, Entertainment, Altamont, Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, Kevin Spacey, Lou Reed, Paul Bowles, Visual Arts, Kurt Cobain, William F. Buckley, Jr., Less
