Hard to write about, as I liked Rock and Hard Places by Andrew Mueller so much I almost immediately gave my copy away to someone I wanted to share it with. So all the usual pages with folded corners to remind me of things that struck me as I read have now gone. Mueller is a fine writer who somehow manages to pull off the trick of being even-handed yet partisan and opinionated in equal measure. Luckily those opinions, cynical, sharp and humorous, are what gives this writing so much of the sense of personality and experience that makes it such a delight. As someone who loves music the subject matter here appealed to me also – in Mueller's company I now feel that I too have sat outside a caravan and shot the breeze with Eddie Vedder and experienced the monotony of the tour bus with assorted bands from Radiohead to Def Leppard (well, ok, a plane and a cave) and all the ones I'd never heard of in-between.
This isn't the first book of Mueller's journalism I've read. I Wouldn't Start from Here crossed my path at the end of last year and I spent three weeks cheerfully anticipating that last half an hour, late at night, when I'd get to curl up and read it in bed. I liked both books very much but for me I Wouldn't Start from Here is the better one – a sharp, cohesive body of work that is darkly funny, politically acute, vivid, insightful, real and unexpected. I read it and felt inspired to be better informed about the world, to have more understanding of the places he visits, and be more concerned with the problems he highlights. And I enjoyed his company every step of the way. He manages to pull off Bill Bryson's trick of being incredibly informative at the same time as making you smile, but there's always an underlying bite and an edge to his writing that I relished.
So anyway, if you're interested in taking a recommendation from me, I'd say read I Wouldn't Start from Here, then Rock and Hard Places, and then anything else of his you can get your hands on, because you'll find you won't want to stop. (As I read and enjoyed both these books I had the dark thought that this is the sort of journalism that may be dying out along with our printed magazines and newspapers. I hope not, though.)
There's a piece by Mueller himself on The Quietus that gives a good sense of his style, with music videos too.
