DAVID KAMP AND STEVEN DALY The Rock Snob’s Dictionary (Broadway)
I suspect that some of you will realise that your destiny is to own this book just from the title, but to give you a little more background as you feverishly click your way to Amazon, Kamp and Daly’s stated mission is to provide “an A-to-Z reference guide for readers who want to learn the cryptic language of rock snobs, those arcane-obsessed people who speak of “Rickenbacker guitars” and “Gram Parsons””. The thing is, though, that “The Rock Snob’s Dictionary” affectionately backfires upon itself, because to truly appreciate its gently mocking, if rarely laugh-out-loud funny, prose it helps to already have a reasonable grounding in the subjects it covers.
Kamp and Daly splice their painfully up-to-date rundown (which includes entries for Morrissey-hoisted late glam oddity Jobriath and White Stripes-endorsed primitivism shrine ToeRag Studios) with the inevitable lists, here including such barroom perennials as “Fifth Beatles, In Order Of Worthiness” and “Ten “Lost” Masterpieces”. I was particularly delighted by the inclusion in the latter of Talk Talk’s magnificent “Spirit Of Eden”, “”Lost” because no one cared about a repentant haircut band’s quest for organic, anti-synth gravitas”. Very ouch! Points are deducted for the lazy fact-checking (even in a volume as dedicated to correctness as this!) that argues that the Technics SL-1200 Mark 2 turntable owes its decades of DJing supremacy “to the sturdiness of its belt drive”, but otherwise if you too have had that conversation where you attempt to explain to a hapless but confused fellow music lover the difference between Nicks Cave and Drake, you’ll greatly appreciate this book’s arch lozenges of knowledge.