Customer Reviews

Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste (33 1/3)

5 star:		(9)
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3 star:		(2)
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1 star:		(2)

 

 

When I took Introduction to Aesthetics in college, I wish we had a text as smart, accessible, funny, and just plain awesome as this little book on Celine Dion to introduce us to the material. What Wilson has done here with his approach to the subject of taste and tackiness is nothing less than stunning. It is a must read for people who write about music and those that love to read about it.

Nota bene: You need not be a fan of Celine Dion to love this book.

It took over a year of hearing about this book before I finally caved in and bought it, and now I'm kicking myself that I didn't buy the book when it first came out! It's hard to do Carl Wilson's book justice when it has so much to say, and says it so beautifully. So let's start with the obvious: DO NOT LET THE SUBJECT MATTER TURN YOU OFF! Yes, it's a book about Celine, but it's so much more than that. It's warm, erudite, smart, funny, insightful, provocative, kind, approachable, and ultimately moving. Sure, I can see the argument that the whole concept is a bit of a stunt ("Look, everyone, I'm going to write a book about something I hate!") but when it's done this brilliantly, who cares? This is the kind of book that should be a best seller, and I really hope the author publishes another book soon.

Why is someone like Céline Dion so popular? What does her popularity say about those who love her music, and more importantly, those who are critical of her career? Carl Wilson takes on these subjects and others in thoughtful, appreciative look at taste, criticism, and almost incidentally her 1997 best-selling release, featuring "My Heart Will Go On".

This is thoughtful, erudite reading, one of my favorite books I've read this year. I'd recommend it for anyone who is into music of whatever kind. Sure, Wilson throws big words around. If that bothers you, get a dictionary and look them up.

I've read all of the 33 1/3s, and most of them are great books, each in their own way. So when I say Let's Talk About Love is my new favorite, you should trust me, b/c I know what I'm talking about. And I don't care one whit for Celine Dion... can't stand her. But Carl Wilson is an amazing writer. Maybe the best music critic we've got (visit his blog, Zolius!) and this book is truly a brilliant piece of work that waaaaay exceeds the parameters of its subject.

Check it out - you'll be glad you did, I swear.

Conversational and contemplative, this book inspired so many wonderful conversations between me and my girlfriend that we fired our couples' therapist and became Carl Wilson's Facebook friends instead. With 'Let's Talk About Love', Wilson has brought me and my gal closer and helped me to better explain my soft spot for certain Celine Dion songs. Slightly embarrassing! Highly recommended!

This is an interesting, thoughtful, and humane book with a touch of humor by a prominent music critic. Carl Wilson takes his best shot at redeeming Celine Dion from the critical consensus that she is supremely kitsch and uncool. He does this as an exercise, in order to demonstrate how that seemingly solid judgment can actually rest on snobbery, nationalism, ignorance, and class anxiety. The details are very interesting: we learn about the political history of Quebec, the turn against sentimentality in art, and how improvements in microphone technology led to the denigration of "big voice" style.

Wilson's fresh summary of Pierre Bourdieu's *Distinction* and some more recent empirical work is very good and benefits greatly from his pop-culture examples. I was surprised to learn of the survey results demonstrating that people with greater musical tolerance easily learn to appreciate the music associated with racial minorities (jazz, latin, etc.), but only extremely tolerant listeners do not shun heavy metal, gospel, and other music associated with low education. I suspect Wilson is on to something when he suggests that critics' extreme distaste for Celion Dion is partly motivated by a desire to distance themselves from low education / "white trash" culture.

The author also name-checks Hume, Kant, and other deep thinkers on the nature of taste, but these philosophical parts of the book are the shortest and least enlightening.

Later in the book Wilson meets with some fans of Dion to discuss why they like her music and what she means to them. This section cashes out the more speculative, sociological/philosophical passages. Wilson displays a deep humanity in these chapters. The fans have their own complicated backgrounds, as everyone does, and their admiration for Dion rings true in the context of their convictions, affiliations, bonds, heritage, and ways of living. These portraits make apparent how easily a critic could denigrate their musical tastes in the course of thoughtless social jockeying.

The book ends with a review of the album *Let's Talk About Love*, informed by what Wilson has learned in the course of his research. It's very charitable, but it wouldn't convince me to buy the album. Almost, though.

Carl Wilson's "Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste" is among the best books ever written about popular music and its aesthetics.

For a short book, it covers significant ground, deftly drawing insights from academic cultural theory, while remaining engaging, personal, and easily comprehensible throughout.

The discussions of cultural capital and anger schmaltz alone are worth the price of the book.

It's no accident that some reviewers encountered this book in a college class, for it's a great introduction to the discourse around aesthetics. If I was teaching such a class, I'd assign it for sure.

It's a shame some of these undergrads didn't like Wilson's book. But don't let their opinions deter you from reading it. Maybe I'm a snob to say so, but I suspect they're not the sharpest tools in the shed.

This is a great book. Wilson calls himself out for being a snob and asks why Celine can't get the love, challenging his readers to open their minds. Good stuff from an excellent writer.

This was a really great book - short, funny and I totally agree with the author. He starts on a bit of a rant about why Celine Dion sucks so bad - but if she's so bad, why does she sell so many albums? With an open mind (sorta) he investigates and returns the results - trying to figure out why so many people think she's so fabulous. The book is merciless and hilarious!

Relative to the rest of this excellent series (just search "(33 1/3)") one thing screams out: Celine Dion simply does not belong in a list with U2, Public E., Nick Drake, Beastie B's, Rolling Stones, Zep, The Who, etc., etc. For the premise that is described here I think The Shaggs' "Philosophy of the World" would have been a more effective choice (and probably more entertaining to write about and would have posed the question in more stark, philosophically problematic light). The Shaggs have a place in the weirdo, record-store-alternative-geek Hall of Fame. At the store I worked at we always had a copy on hand though rarely sold one. The album was a stand-in for some of the absurdity of "alternative" music which ceases to be alternative if it is both pleasing to the ear and sells well. (Try to make sense of that one.) The Shaggs were simply god-awful and apparently unaware of their lack of skill. Now, as you can see, we are getting closer to the Celine Dion idea of this out-of-place book and her breathy self-importance though I'd take the stumbling laugh-inducing The Shaggs any day over the multi-bajillion-dollar star that is...drum roll Anton...Celine Dion: (head-shake and hair-toss and hand-to-the-sky, with a strong back-light).