Customer Reviews

TV-a-Go-Go: Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol

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4 star:		(2)
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2 star:		(1)
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This is an extremely well-researched book, although not every subject covered here appeals to me (PARTRIDGE FAMILY, MAKING THE BAND, AMERICAN IDOL). Nevertheless, there's something here for every rock music/TV fan, including a whole chapter on rock `n` roll cartoons! I enjoyed the coverage of Elvis Presley and The Beatles -- two subjects that have been covered to death, but in this case the author offers perceptive insights. While I'm not a fan of Michael Jackson (though I respect his stature in rock music history), the chapter on him is one of the strongest entries in the book. I also appreciated the author's defense of the underrated contributions of The Monkees, as well as his on-target appraisals of TV hosts Steve Allen, Ed Sullivan, Dick Clark, Mike Douglas, Don Cornelius, and Carson Daly.

In time, rock `n' roll music thrived on television, despite the uneasy alliance between the two. Television has repeatedly sabotaged and diluted the very essence of this rebellious art form. Television has also been responsible for presenting us with many moments of pure gold. TV A-GO-GO does a commendable job of chronicling this facet of music history, examining the legendary, the surprisingly good, the idiosyncratic, and the awful acts (and programs that showcased these acts) that have flashed across television screens for the past five decades.

I just finished reading TV A-Go-Go and don't recall any "claims of being the definitive book on its subject," as Mr. Rector claims. In fact, Mr. Austen's introduction states "Obviously,a comprehensive overview of all rock on TV is imposible... No one writer could cover everything and nobody would want to read a book that did."
Apparently Mr. Rector wanted an encyclopedia of rock on TV, rather than a series of entertaining essays with thought-provoking theses. I'm sorry he didn't get what he wanted, but this was a very worthwhile read.
Further, I could find no claim in the book "that punk rock only became popular after Fear appeared on Saturday Night Live in 1981." In fact, Austen writes: "After polling more than a hundred musicians, zine editors, and fans active in hardcore, none of them cited Fear's Saturday Night Live appearance as their point of entry into the scene (the most frequently cited TV moment that led pollsters to punk/hardcore was actually Devo on Saturday Night Live in 1978)... One reason may be that very few people were watching SNL at that point... the evidence of its realness--the downtime between songs, the lack of distance between audience and artists, and the imperfect performance--may have been unappealing to those not familiar with the hardcore experience."
Mr. Rector should talk about the book that exists, not the book he's (for better as well as worse) imagining.

Essential, witty and thoughtful guide to the history of televised rock and pop, from regional dance party shows to Ed Sullivan, punk's invasion of the SNL set to Michael Jackson's metamorphosis into a pop icon. Jake Austen, who oversees the brilliant obsessives who make up the staff of Roctober Magazine, both loves and understands the mass media, and subjects it to an incisive yet affectionate analysis that's as entertaining as it's rare. The result is an enormously entertaining and informative book, recommended for anyone who's curious about the intersections between music and the idiot box.

I'm three-quarters of the way through this thing and I still don't know where this author is coming from. Sometimes he seems to embrace the tastes of the supposed masses, other times he puts them down and embraces the aesthetics of the fringes.
The author also reaches some downright offensive conclusions: according to him, the reaction of the baby-boomer generation to the killing of the four students at Kent State "exposed much of the peace-and-love generation as bandwagon jumpers whose dissidence was merely a fad that they were not willing to die for. Excuse me?
Plus Mr. Austen, Fanny was not "a lesbian rock group". I don't know where the hell you got that from.

My older siblings were into Kenny Loggins and Bread, and when they wanted to rock, it was Elton John, or maybe Queen. But as a wee `un I knew better than to be unduly influenced by their example. Fortunately, I was under the able, personal tutelage of Television (not the Richard Hell kind, the other kind)-Scooby and the gang running from werewolves to a bubblegum soundtrack; 60s superhero rock gods The Impossibles; the Mosquitos on Gilligan's Island and the Bedbugs on F-Troop: if I'd lived above CBGB's in the late 70s, I still woulda yelled down to cut out that noise, the Banana Splits are on! And now, Austen has penned the definitive tome on all things Rock TV. His prose crackles like a man in awe of his subject, and rightfully so; lucid and engaging, TV-A-Go-Go not only has everything and then some inside, but includes-rather than a mere detailing of who-was-on-what-all manner of interesting, cogent theses on culture woven into the text. As important as bubblepop and sillypunk are to the brain (Austen's chapter on punk rock is spot-on, especially his detailing of Fear's 1981 Saturday Night Live performance), most pleasing is the enormous gamut he covers, from early TV to our American Idol age, with chapters on dance shows, fake bands, 70s TV rock, video programs, international stuff, an investigation into how Michael Jackson and TV shaped each other, and my favorite chapter, on black music television, which describes über-rarity The !!! Beat. Plus appendices on international rock TV and a "Rock N' Roll TV Guide" that'll make you drool and shiver. This is one to buy.

Jake Austin (publisher of "Rocktober," the finest retro-Rock & Roll magazine since the death of "Kicks") has really done us all a great service with this book. Most of the other reviewers here have already detailed the enlightening and fun to read contents, so I won't belabor the point--except to repeat that it's well-written, extremely entertaining and informative, and an essential addition to any serious Rock & Roll fan's music library. Buy this book now, and if you're lucky enough to ever run across some back issues of "Rocktober," pawn whatever is necessary to get them into your greedy hooks.

Jake Austen not only captured what was important in the partnership between television and rock music down through the years, but he does so in entertaining fashion. His soundly expressed theories and crisp, no-B.S. writing style, shed a whole new light on the sometimes deluded expectations of both the genre and it's fans. Filled with detailed information, sly wit, and unique insights, TV-a-Go-Go is the best book ever written on this subject.

TV-a-Go-Go : Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol by Jake Austen is about the history of rock music on television from the 1950's to the present day. It covers the rock music TV scene from Dick Clark's "American Bandstand" show through the troubled "American Idol." Its author is Jake Austen, producer of the popular Chic-A-Go-Go show on Chicagoland Public Access cable channnels, so he is in a position to know about this subject.

Unfortunately, TV-a-Go-Go : Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol falls well short of the mark. It is one of those "quickie" books that takes only a superficial look at its subject. Many of its assertions are questionable. For instance, Austen claims that punk rock only became popular after the band Fear was on "Saturday Night Live" in 1981. Actually, punk rock was popular before 1981 and it was the result of that popularity that Fear made it on the show.

Austen claims that many classic cartoons such as "Alvin and the Chipmunks" and "The Banana Splits" were examples of rock TV. Well, this writer grew up watching those shows and the only way that you can classify those shows as rock music oriented is if your definition of rock music is so broad as to include everything from the William Tell Overture aka the "Lone Ranger" music to Garth Brooks. In other words, its a ridiculous assertion.

There are other problems with this book. There is practically nothing about the sleazy likes of Alan Freed and the payola scandals that shook the rock music scene during the late 1950's and the early 1960's. There is also nothing about the spread of perversion and immorality into rock music, which began as clean music. There is little about the local and regional rock TV shows, which is strange since the author is the producer of one such show.

The basic problem with TV-a-Go-Go : Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol , is that for all its claims of being the definitive book on its subject, there really is little new about its subject. Almost everything in it was originally published in other, better books. You would be much better off hunting down those books in your local public library rather than plunking down your hard earned money for this book.

TV-a-Go-Go : Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol is a book about an interesting subject that is in itself less than interesting.