Initially, I enjoyed this book. But very quickly it descended into a realm of pretentiousness that I really can’t stand. Clearly this man has an encyclopaedic knowledge of music. Clearly he has lived his life within a world of music so I will be at least a little cautious in criticising him too much as I haven’t. However, he is the sort of guy who has every vinyl record ever and loves to bask in people’s amazement when he talks about the most obscure artist or song ever as if it was the most obvious and well known thing in the world.
His analysis of music itself is overly complicated and I feel a little too clinical. He goes on tangents of such irrelevance that the book becomes a mess. The chapter headings that hint at some sort of structure are false. This book was a real slog towards the end which is a shame as the concept was, at least on the face of it, a sound one. Excuse the pun.
Avoid unless you are a super super geek for music. Even then, probably avoid.