Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #608004 in Books
• Published on: 2002-09-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Synopsis
HIGH FIDELITY meets THE MULLET in this deliriously funny memoir of growing up a metal-head in 1980s North Dakota. The year is 1983, and Chuck Klosterman just wants to rock. But he's got problems. For one, he's in the fifth grade. For another, he lives in rural North Dakota. Worst of all, his parents aren't exactly down with the long hairstyle which rocking requires. Luckily, his brother saves the day when he brings home a bit of manna from metal heaven, SHOUT AT THE DEVIL, Motley Crue's seminal paean to hair-band excess. And so Klosterman's twisted odyssey begins, a journey spent worshipping at the heavy metal altar of Poison, Lita Ford and Guns N' Roses. In the hilarious, young-man-growing-up-with-a-soundtrack-tradition, FARGO ROCK CITY chronicles Klosterman's formative years through the lens of heavy metal, the irony-deficient genre that, for better or worse, dominated the pop charts throughout the 1980s.

For readers of Dave Eggers, Lester Bangs, and Nick Hornby, Klosterman delivers all the goods: from his first dance (with a girl) and his eye-opening trip to Mandan with the debate team; to his list of 'essential' albums; and his thoughtful analysis of the similarities between Guns 'n' Roses' 'Lies' and the gospels of the New Testament.

Customer Reviews

Remember the '80s?
At the very end of his Midwestern memoir/history of hair metal Klosterman writes: "Very often, I inexplicably embrace the same ideas I just finished railing against: Part of me wants to insist that heavy metal really _is_ stupid. I make fun of the same people who loved the bands I loved (and still do). Social pressure has made me cannibalize my own adolescent experience." This serves as a remarkably self-perceptive summation of the book, and highlights its main weakness. The book veers wildly from hyper-erudite wink-wink, nudge-nudge mockery of hair metal (Motley Crue, Def Leppard, Van Halen, Guns N' Roses, et al), to heartfelt declarations of its centrality of meaning to Klosterman during his teen years. The same tension pervades his next book (Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs), and it's a shame that just when it seems he's ready to fully commit to an idea, he spends the next several pages tearing it apart. This makes for often hilarious reading, but is also in a sense cowardly.

That said, it's a remarkably entertaining read, even for non-metal fans like me. It does help, however, to have grown up at the same time as him (graduating high school at the end of the '80s), and my reading was enhanced by memories of one of my closest friends having rather inexplicably been a hair metal fan at the time, right down to the Lita Ford and Skid Row albums. Right from the start, Klosterman links his heavy metal fandom to the utter boredom of his small-town surroundings (despite the book's title, Klosterman grew up in Wyndmere, ND and Fargo has pretty much nothing to do with the story). The fantasy lifestyles of hair metal bands were so far removed from rural life, and so predictably offensive to adult authority figures that there was a natural synergy with bored small town kids. This is hardly earth-shattering analysis, but Klosterman is presenting it from such a direct personal experience that it really resonates far more than any work of musicology or teen sociology could.

The book unravels chronologically, presenting a sort of haphazard history of '80s hair metal. All the bases are covered (from roots influences like Sabbath, Kiss, et al), to hilarious analyses of album covers, videos, and especially lyrics. There's a lot of time devoted to explaining why some bands were considered metal and some weren't (such as the whole question of whether keyboards are an acceptable instrument for a metal band), and why some were classified into subgenres, and what constituted authenticity—all highly reminiscent of my teenage years in the hardcore scene. There's the required list of favorite albums, presented with the twist of listing how many dollars one would have to pay Klosterman to never be able to listen to the album again. Naturally, he addresses the charges of Satanism and suicide advocacy that the mainstream leveled against heavy metal and—as many before him have—utterly demolishes the notion. His take of heavy metal's sexism is that to criticize it is to miss the whole point: it's supposed to be outrageously sexist and offensive. While that may be true, it's also a clever way of sidestepping the issue altogether.

One thing Klosterman does an excellent job of is reminding us (a scant 10-15 years later) how big metal was in the '80s, how bands like Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, and especially Guns N' Roses dominated the charts. He blames the genre's decline on the rise of the "Seattle Sound" and Kurt Cobain's appearance on Headbanger's Ball in particular. Intriguingly, he points out that Axl Rose loved Nirvana and wanted them to open on the Guns 'N Roses / Metallica tour. Throughout the book, the prose is liberally scattered with the pop culture references Klosterman is known for. The danger in this is that he occasionally misses something you would think he'd know (for example, I'm surprised that in his mention of Junkyard he didn't note that their guitarist was in the wildly influential DC hardcore group Minor Threat), and occasionally errs (his definition of straight-edge is inaccurate, which is disappointing from someone who makes a living showing off his pop culture chops). I'm sure metal fans could do a good job tearing the book to shreds, but for the rest of us, Klosterman's done a very credible job of showing why metal was such a big deal to so many people back in the '80s. For all the book's flaws, it's hard to imagine a more readable account of heavy metal.

The best book about msuic I have ever read
Chuck Klosterman attempts to defend the indefensible (in the eyes of pretentious critics) and totally succeeds. He writes with passion and humour, speaking like a fan, not a critic, first and foremost, he tells us stroies of how songs impacted on his life, whilst showing us the meaning of the rock'n'roll ethos. Utter genius.

A joy to read, witty and sagacious.
If you've ever been into rocking out to the likes of Mötley Crüe, Guns N' Roses, Poison, Van Halen, etc., then you'll be into this. Klosterman is clever, funny, and perceptive as to why we enjoyed (and still enjoy) this music. I found myself laughing out loud at parts of the book, and others I found to be very perspicacious.
If you've read 'The Dirt', you'll probably enjoy this. If you haven't, buy them both - you're missing out!