Utne Reader Book Reviews: March-April 2009

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Music Geeks Gone Wild

Rum, Sodomy & the Lash
by Jeffrey T. Roesgen (Continuum)

In 1985, simply putting out an album titled Rum, Sodomy & the Lash and produced by Elvis Costello was enough to guarantee a certain cachet with the punk set. Luckily for every spiky-haired kid who picked it up for its rich promise of degradation, the Pogues’ breakthrough album was a mind-blowing trip through time and across borders, drawing unexpected connections between Celtic folk, punk rock, and American roots music. In this book by the same sordid name, Jeffrey T. Roesgen tells the story behind the album, interwoven with a tale of his own creation, a seafaring narrative starring the band and several of their lyrics’ characters.

If this all sounds like something by and for serious fans, you’re right. The book is one of the latest in the 33 1⁄3 series, a collection of smartly dissective tomes about notable rock albums, from Captain Beefheart’s Trout Mask Replica to the Smiths’ Meat Is Murder and beyond. (See the full list at www.33third.blogspot.com.) The idea is to hitch up talented music writers with the object of their audio obsession and let them parse and probe it at length—an enterprise that, as you might guess, is as fraught with peril as being adrift at sea with the Pogues. There is the ever-present danger of wrecking on the shoals of metaphor, then flailing about in search of adjectives.

Roesgen, for his part, steers clear of such hazards and delivers a spirited novella along with vivid snippets of rowdy, romantic rock ’n’ roll history. —Keith Goetzman

But Will It Play in Ottawa?

Jack by Mike Spry 
and All our Grandfathers are Ghosts by Pasha Malla (Snare)

Canada: First they took our geese, then our bacon, nowadays our literary hijinks. But thanks to Snare Books, a Montreal-based press, even we Yanks can plumb the poetic fruits of the “experimental Canadian literary tradition.” Even if you thought experimental poetry wasn’t your cup of tea, hold up. These poems aren’t avant-garde exercise routines. They’re funny. An erotic ode to Natalie Portman? Neato! A series of meditations involving a breakup, brutal self-mockery, and sardonic moping over imaginary photographs? You mean, there’s unrest in—Ottawa? Though Snare’s offerings are occasionally precious, they prove that the Great White North has just as many zany nutballs telling some version of the truth as there are anywhere else. —Michael Rowe

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