In what may be one of the most thoughtfully written and insightful accounts on the life of Tom Waits, Lowside of the Road meticulously explores one of America’s most phenomenal music icons. Throughout the book, we learn how Waits shaped and evolved his singular persona as well as what artistic influences and colorful personalities surrounded him in key moments of his incredibly prolific career.

Back in 2004, Tom Davis was watching Jeopardy! when the board revealed a curious clue: “He was the comedy partner of Al Franken.”

David Wild doesn’t do a whole lot of worrying, but does a whole ton of loving in this celebration of Neil Diamond’s life and work.

Veteran music critic Dave Thompson’s angry little book is a sometimes mystifying, often hilarious journey through “rock’n’roll…not rock AND roll…or rock & roll” from the late ’60s to the mid-’70s.

For many ’90s music fans, Blind Melon represented much more than just “No Rain” and the Bee Girl that propelled the band to fame.

From its shoestring beginnings as an online zine riddled by runaway word counts and ostentatious, themed reviews, Pitchfork Media has emerged as arguably the preeminent music criticism source of its time while fashioning itself into a multimedia powerhouse, with an empire that includes a major music festival, an online TV station, and now a book, The Pitchfork 500, a hefty slab of text in the same vein of Rolling Stone’s many bathroom readers.

Sleevefacing is where a person covers a part of his or her body with a record album cover, creating a larger picture beyond what the album art portrays.

After four books of nonfiction (including Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs), Chuck Klosterman’s fiction debut can’t match the wit and cultural insight of his previous efforts.

Vertigo was founded in 1993 by Karen Berger. Taking a cue from the gritty superhero storylines of the ’80s, the new DC imprint prided itself in fashioning tales for mature readers.