Fargo Rock City

I've always been pretty easily entertained by music journalism and I'm not sure why. At a friend's house when I was a kid I would always read through stacks of out-of-date Rolling Stone magazines, then at a later age moved on to the bitingly hilarious Your Band Sucks until it's unceremonious ending, and finally settled on the constant daily updates of Pitchfork.com. With all that said, I wasn't particularly interested in reading Chuck Klosterman's Fargo Rock City, even though I like the author and know his chops for music journalism. The subject matter of how hair metal affected children growing up in the Midwest in the 1980's just didn't appeal to me. Don't get me wrong, I think 'Round and Round' is a fun song and all, but I just always figured 80's metal was something I would never 'get' or appreciate quite like people who were living through it at the time. I don't think I'm alone, and it's probably why Rock of Ages is currently flopping in theatres (note: I started this entry weeks ago). Still though, Klosterman's got a pretty good track record so I gave Fargo Rock City a shot, and it proved to be a pretty good read. It's obvious that Chuck feels very strongly about 80's metal, and while he doesn't try to claim it is ridiculously important and draw broad conclusions from the phenomenon, he rightly feels that the 80's metal trend was at least somewhat important and deserves better than to be swept under the rug. He basically takes on every topic you can think of- what separated 'hair' and 'glam' from other types of metal, which bands have proven themselves over- and underrated in years since, the sexuality (Warrant made a career out of a vagina joke), whether or not having a keyboard was cool, power ballads, and of course how the music affected a teenage Chuck Klosterman. If you've got any interest in 80's music (I know someone on this blog who does...), then you'd do well to check out Fargo Rock City.