From Booklist
Guest editor Mary Gaitskill says she put together this edition of Da Capo’s annual to be “like a mix tape of sounds a person might hear in life,” some of which “enter your imagination and take strange dream-shapes.” Manifesting strangeness are Kevin Whitehead’s disquisition on the “hidden affinity” between the music of Art Tatum and that of Thelonious Monk, Raquel Cepeda’s thoughts on the rise of “reggaeton,” and David Thorpe’s biting commentary on R. Kelly’s notorious sexcapades. Moustafa Bayoumi reports on American use of music in the war on terror: “usually heavy metal or hip-hop but sometimes . . . Barney the Dinosaur” is “pumped at detainees with such brutality [as] to unravel them” without leaving the telltale marks of bodily violence. Of particular interest to classic-rock fans and aging boomers is Tom Ewing’s remembrance of August 1966, when the Beatles’ two-hit single, Eleanor Rigby/Yellow Submarine, topped the charts. Terrorism, sexual misconduct (more…)