Addicted To Noise: The Music Writings of Michael Goldberg

Addicted to Noise collects the best interviews, profiles, and essays Michael Goldberg has written during his forty-plus years as a journalist. From combative interviews with Frank Zappa and Tom Waits to essays on how Jack Kerouac influenced Bob Dylan and the lasting importance of San Franciscos first punk rock club, Goldberg, as novelist Dana Spiotta wrote, shows us how consequential music can be.

Contained within these pages: interviews with Sleater-Kinney, Sonic Youth, Patti Smith, Lou Reed, Flipper, John Fogerty, Neil Young, and Rick James, along with profiles of Robbie Robertson, John Lee Hooker, James Brown, the Clash, Prince, Michael Jackson, the Flamin Groovies, Ramblin Jack Elliott, X, Laurie Anderson, Stevie Wonder, George Clinton, Devo, San Francisco punks Crime, and more.

Plus short takes on Muddy Waters, Townes Van Zandt, Captain Beefheart, Professor Longhair, and others. As Greil Marcus writes in the Foreword, You can feel the atmosphere: someone has walked into a room with a pencil in his handas the words go in perhaps the first song about a music critic, not counting Chuck Berrys aside about the writers at the rhythm reviewsand suddenly people are relaxed . . . He isnt after your secrets. He doesnt want to ruin your career to make his. He doesnt care what you think you need to hide. He actually is interested in why and how you make your music and what you think of it. So people open up, very quickly, and, very quickly, as a reader, youre not reading something youve read before.