Greil Marcus: Writing About Rock Music for People Who Care About Rock Music

Greil Marcus is rightly regarded as one of the pre-eminent writers about rock music of all time. His writings in Rolling Stone magazine were among the best reasons to buy that chronicle of all things rock and roll throughout the 70s and 80s, before he lost a subject to write about with the death of rock and roll in the 90s. Most of his must-have articles from Rolling Stone were collected in a volume titled Ranters and Crowd Pleasers. Reading this book is like reading a history of the greatest music in the world from the late 70s to the early 90s, especially music with a punk sensibility, but not exclusively so.

An introduction gets the engine revving with a review of the classic Rolling Stones album Let It Bleed. Greil Marcus takes this seminal Stones album and uses it to build the foundation upon which most of the rest of Ranters and Crowd Pleasers is built. The real meat of the this beginning of the book, however, focuses on the sadly little known novel The Ice Age as a comparison piece for the final Sex Pistols concert and disintegration in San Francisco. Greil Marcus takes these seemingly disparate and unconnected cultural events and uses them to create a theme for what would otherwise just a standard collection of essays.

Throughout Ranters and Crowd Pleasers, Greil Marcus focuses on some of the true heavyweight rock acts of the period between 1977 and 1992. At the same time, he does one of the things he always did best when writing for Rolling Stone. He introduces the music lover to little known and even obscure acts. It was Greil Marcus who first turned me on to Gang of Four; they remain one of my favorite bands. This piece is included in this book and it not only introduced Gang of Four to many lovers of rock music, but a litany of bands and artists coming to the fore at the same time in England: The Raincoats and Essential Logic among them.

When Greil Marcus writes about music, he has the unique ability to underscore how important the movement behind the acts are to the music they are making. This is no more true than in his piece of Gang of Four and the post-punk explosion that took place in England in the late 70s. When reading this essay, you will learn how ideas can drive young men to make music just as much as getting girls can motivate them. What is especially interesting in this piece are the little snatches of dialogue between the members of Gang of Four that show them disagreeing over the Marxist background that drives their music.

No less fascinating are the multiple essays in which the iconoclastic British band The Mekons show up. Since this book is ordered chronologically, you get brief little glimpses of this one of a kind band as they begin as just another disaffected Marxist punk band and ultimately turn into something more like a performance art band. How often have you read prose that effectively translate musical efforts so brilliantly that it makes you not only want to track the music down and listen to it, but allows you to understand what that music is likely to sound like? Marcus does this not only with The Mekons, but with many, many other artists as well.

As you journey through Ranters and Crowd Pleasers, these are just a few of the musical acts you will get to know: The Delta 5, the Au Pairs, Joy Division and New Order, and The Adolescents. As if that weren’t enough, Greil Marcus also writes a terrific essay that will completely alleviate any guilt you may still be feeling over the fact that Rick Springfield’s Jesse’s Girl was your favorite song of the early 80s. He will also help you get over the bitter memory that you just didn’t really get Fleetwood Mac’s Tusk when it first came out.

Greil Marcus at his level best when it comes to revealing all those hidden gems flew under your radar because radio wouldn’t play the songs, but he is also an unparalleled master both at showing the true brilliance magnificence behind a generally accepted masterpiece as The Clash’s London Calling as well as at calling We Are The World to the carpet for its contemptuousness.