Frank Kogan's forthcoming "Real Punks Don't Wear Black"

Kogan has been writing about music for some 35 years—for his own blogs; for his zine, Why Music Sucks; as well as for Spin, Radio On and the Village Voice. For this anthology, he's included everything from juvenile high school essays and silly college poetry to some extremely seasoned discussions of punk and hard rock. This collection is much like the music it describes: some polished, some ragged. Readers can browse around and find their own favorite material. Kogan is great, for instance, at explaining the dynamics of punk clubs: why the performers have to insult their audiences or else they're "contaminated" by their acceptance. Unlike most music critics, Kogan's omnivorous, willing to consider music that makes him "feel things that I don't want to feel, so I have to rethink who I am, where I place myself." For example, he loathed Ohio Express's "Yummy Yummy Yummy" when he was 13, but loved it at 18. "I value most the music that I like despite myself," he writes. "The bands that change me are the ones that win me over." Readers, beware: the raunchy rap lyrics and free-floating expletives may turn off some. (Feb.)

I got an uncorrected proof

pretty good

ysi? photocopier?

Frank Kogan’s book (don't have a heart attack when you clock the price, there's a ppbk version too) looks amazing at a quick skim. As you'd expect, it's highly unorthodox in its structure and provenance. As well as Village Voice reviews and Why Music Sucks rants, there's an email reply to Geeta, chunks of ILM commentary, interviews with the author from rockcritics.com, unpublished Pazz N' Jop commentaries about 15 times longer than the longest blurbs they ever print, and--piece de resistance--a letter to Voice managing editor Doug Simmonds, with Kogan complaining that the paper is failing to utilise his intellect (the largest, Frank writes, and most self-questioning in all of rockcrit--bigger than Frith’s, bigger than mine, bigger than Bangs', and Meltzer's doesn't count because it's out of service!) to the fullest. All this and an acknowledgements list that takes in virtually everybody in this community and runs for pages. The dedicatee, naturally, is Chuck Eddy.

SR linked it to this page.

So what are we going to spend our share of the royalties on?

Is that Frank on the cover? I always imagined he had a beard for some reason.

I thought frank was that more elaborate form

David, do you still have that picture I sent you last year w/ good-looking friend and beard? I lost the file for it in the great computer crash of '04. Anyway, you can post it if you'd like.

(My rationalization for using the old picture is that since the writing covers a span from 1970 to 2004, I'm justified in using one that plops in the middle at 1985.) (To be honest, the vast majority dates from after 1985.)

(They really shouldn't even be listing the hardcover, since my understanding is that it's only going to be available to libraries.)

And here's the link for those of you who use U.S. currency.

And Asian.

it isn't out for three months!

i also think its possible people (and maybe particularly masculine types) in general have a hard time reconciling parts of their experience with art and their intelligence. for instance, on ILM we talk this way about rock alot, but less so about disco. and it's interesting that you see WAY less of this type of writing in europe, particularly spain/italy/france maybe too. men are warmer there...just ask mareisa sabiel.

Prat Power! Guilty as charged!

also maybe this discussion is best had elsewhere.