Why read Machers and Rockers?

Book cover of Machers and Rockers

Book description

A tour-de-force history of Jews, blues, and the birth of a new industry. On the south side of Chicago in the late 1940s, two immigrants, one a Jew born in Russia, the other a black blues singer from Mississippi met and changed the course of musical history. Muddy Waters electrified…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Machers and Rockers as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Rob Miller

Author

Often written in the crude, frequently profane, street lingo of mid-century Chicago, I could smell the cigar smoke and cheap likker, and hear the crackling amps and heated arguments in the recording studios and street corner bars.

I was totally immersed in the Nelson Algren vibe as the book described the bare-knuckle, world-changing events surrounding one of the great American music labels EVER, as some of the greatest music—the linchpins of rock and roll—were being birthed in a figure-it-out-as-you-go Chicago way.

From Rob's list on why the weird underbelly of American music is more interesting and important than pop music.