Eric Weisbard is Assistant Professor of American Studies at the University of Alabama. His previous books include, as editor, Listen Again: A Momentary History of Pop Music, also published by Duke University Press.

Introduction / Eric Weisbard 1Collapsing Distance: The Love-Song of the Wanna-Be, or The Fannish Auteur / Jonathan Lethem 7Black Rockers vs. Blackies Who Rock, or The Difference between Race and Music / Greg Tate 15Toward an Ethics of Knowing Nothing / Alexandra T. Vazquez 27Divided Byline: How a Student of Leslie Fiedler and a Colleague of Charles Keil Became the Ghostwriter for Everybody from Ray Charles to Cornell West / David Ritz 40Boring and Horrifying Whiteness: The Rise and Fall of Reaganism as Prefigured by the Career Arcs of Carpenters, Lawrence Welk, and the Beach Boys in 1973¿74 / Tom Smucker 47Perfect is Dead: Karen Carpenter, Theodor Adorno, and the Radio, or If Hooks Could Kill / Eric Lott 62Agents of Orange: Studio K and Cloud 9 / Karen Tongson 82Belliphonic Sounds and Indoctrinated Ears: The Dynamics of Military Listening in Wartime Iraq / J. Martin Daughtry 111Since the Flood: Scenes for the Fight for New Orleans Jazz Culture / Larry Blumenfeld 145(Over the) Rainbow Warrior: Israel Kamakawiwo'ole and Another Kind of Somewhere / Nate Chinen 176Travel with Me: Country Music, Race, and Remembrance / Diane Pecknold 185The Comfort Zone: Shaping the Retro-Soul Audience / Oliver Wang 201Within Limits: On the Greatness of Magic Slim / Carlo Rotella 230Urban Music in the Teenage Heartland / Brian Goedde, Austin Bunn, and Elena Passarello 240"Death to Racism and Punk Revisionism": Alice Bag's Vexing Voice and the Unspeakable Influence of Canción Ranchera on Hollywood Punk / Michelle Habell-Pallán 247Of Wolves and Vibrancy: A Brief Explanation of the Marriage Made in Hell between Folk Music, Dead Cultures, Myth, and Highly Technical Modern Extreme Metal / Scott Seward 271The New Market Affair: Media Pranks, the Music Industry's Last Big Gold Rush, and the Hunt for Hits in the Shenandoah Valley / Kembrew McLeod 282All That Is Solid Melts into Schmaltz: Poptimism vs. the Guilty Displeasure / Carl Wilson 299Contributors 313Index 317