• 1 For instance, in “Rock Music” on the Pixies’ Bossanova album, Black Francis does not rumble pseudo- (...)
• 2 ‘Blue note’ is the name given to the seventh, and, to a lesser extent, third degrees of a scale whe (...)
• 3 A complementary online index could be relatively easy to implement, Cf. Frederic Martel, Mainstream(...)

2In Une histoire musicale du rock (i.e. A Musical History of Rock), rock music is approached from the point of view of the people – musicians and industry – behind the music. Christophe Pirenne endeavours to examine that field from a musicologist’s perspective. He chooses to define rock as a generic term designating recorded music “encompassing the legacies of African-American music in North America, ie rock in the strict sense of the word, but also a myriad of related genres, such as soul music, funk, rap, electronic music or reggae” (11-13). The passages describing the modus operandi of the music industry are quite illuminating and shed light on the numerous and concise musicological analyses of songs which punctuate this quasi-comprehensive history of numerous types of music, ranging from early rock ’n’ roll to techno, hip-hop and even doom metal. Pirenne’s knowledge of the subjects he deals with is nothing short of impressive. Popular music fans, who will enjoy the accessible style of the author, will at – very rare – times question Pirenne’s assertions1, but Une histoire musicale du rock will prove an invaluable reference book to music lovers and researchers alike. However, both types of readers will lament an editorial work which is not always on a par with the quality and the scope of the author’s research. The index is limited to names of musicians and song titles, but entries like ‘blue notes,’ ‘power chords’ or – to choose an admittedly less common phrase – ‘skank beats’2 would have made such an ambitious and expansive work much easier to use.3