Rolling Stones Book:

The Rolling Stone Record Guide: Reviews and Ratings of Almost 10,000 Currently Available Rock, Pop, Soul, Country, Blues, Jazz, and Gospel Albums Reviews:
The only record guide at the time (unfortunately)
2007-02-27 - Back when I was growing up and discovering music, all "serious" music fans read The Rolling Stone Record Guide (and later the "blue" edition from 1983).

There was lots of information about a lot of records in these books. Unfortunately, there was way too much Dave Marsh. Dave Marsh's reviews are the weakest (and most prevalent) of anyone's in these books. He was so wrong about so much music (and so self-righteously smug about it) that he ticked a lot of people off, myself and all my music fan circle included. It really was poor analysis, often quite lazy and shallowly dismissive of anything he didn't "get," and overly praising of many critical flavor-of-the-month acts that went commercially (and critically) nowhere after the fact. But it was the only book like that at the time, and everybody read it. And got mad at it. I know for a fact that it went sailing violently across many a teenager's bedroom back in the day.

It's quite interesting to compare this book with the DeCurtis edition from 1992. As far as I can tell, that's the one to beat in terms of useful information about worthwhile records.

Bedrock Educational Text Vol.1
2006-09-29 - I first discovered this book in '82. The "hip" and perspicacious overview of popular music-and rock and roll and it's antecedents in particular, provided the framework of understanding which has informed my listening to music ever since.

Dave Marsh possessed a singular vantage point in the history of the music and the artists. The passion and insight endlessly infuses the reviews with humor, wit and, where necessary, some of the most caustic summaries ever committed. You will live a richer and fuller life if you avoid at all expense the "bulleted" albums in this book.

A different reviewer noted that Hip-Hop had just begun its emergence when this book was published-important because of the reworking of "classic" popular music hip-hop and rap brought to the fore. Savvy rap artists GET why a loop may provide clever or ironic elements to the music; the audience, alas, mostly doesn't. This book identifies the milestones and monumental moments in musical history critical to a deep understanding of popular music.

Anyone who wants to learn about rock and roll, and anybody who surfs garage sales and Goodwill bins looking for lost masters needs to own and read this book.

25 Years Before the 2004 Rolling Stone Album Guide
2005-03-28 - If you found the 2004 Rolling Stone Album Guide as disappointing as most of us did, much of the reason can be traced back 25 years to the first Guide. Dave Marsh's original edition was intelligent, witty and informative. Naturally you'll find some smugness (this is Rolling Stone after all), but it was smugness which emphasized a point about the music, not a clumsy attempt to make the reviewer appear "hip." This book is certainly for historians more than anything. The publication year is also Year One for hip-hop, so it really does come from another world, but it gives us a window into those first 25 years of rock n' roll. It also contains a couple of features which future RSAGs should consider. The ratings system ranges from 5 stars to a 'bullet,' or black square, denoting albums which aren't even worthy of one star or half a star, and there are enough of those to bring back this appropriate symbol. Another feature was small pictures of the covers of many of the 5 star albums, which was nice. Maybe in the next Rolling Stone Album Guide we'll get a picture of the cover of OutKast's Speakerboxxx/The Love Below and a bullet next to a couple of Josh Groban albums. And maybe next time we'll get critics more like Dave Marsh and less like Rob Sheffield.