The Encyclopedia of Popular Music » (4th Edition)

First published in 1992, The Encyclopedia of Popular Music is the largest project ever undertaken for the subject. This authoritative biographical encyclopedia of rock, pop, and jazz artists covers popular music from 1900 to the present, including folk, blues, world music, rock, heavy metal, techno, reggae, and hip hop. Edited and largely written by Colin Larkin, it is exhaustive, meticulous, authoritative - and incredibly fun to read.

Critically lauded in its previous three editions, the Fourth Edition will not disappoint fans seeking authoritative and reliable information about popular music from around the world. Expanded to ten volumes, the new edition contains 6,000 new entries, and extensive revisions and updates throughout, yielding 50% more material than the 1998 Third Edition.

In addition to thousands of biographical entries, this A-Z reference also includes entries covering popular music genres, trends, styles, record lables, venues, and festivals. Key dates, biographies, and further reading are provided for artists covered, along with complete discographies that include record labels, release dates, and a 5-star album rating system. From Grateful Dead to The Killers, from Whitesnake to White Stripes, from R.E.M. to Blink-182, from The Jazz Singer to Jerry Springer - The Opera, and from Bye Bye Birdie to Rent, The Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Fourth Edition has something informative and clever to say about everyone's favorite band.

Larry Lipkis - Library Journal

Originally published in 1992 as a modest four-volume set, this remarkable compendium of facts about all manner of popular music and culture, edited and largely written by Larkin (All-Time Top 1000 Albums), has in this fourth edition been fully revised and expanded to a ten-volume set with 6000 new entries. The first eight volumes feature alphabetical entries, the ninth volume presents an exhaustive bibliography and a discography, and the tenth is made up of indexes (by song and album title as well as a general index). There are entries on jazz, country, folk, reggae, rap, rock, film scores, musicals, world music, and other genres. Classical crossover composers, e.g., Leonard Bernstein and Philip Glass, are generously covered. A welcome addition is the inclusion of a five-star album-rating system. Larkin explains this rating system, as well as other editorial decisions, in an informal and witty but persuasive introduction to Volume 1, which also includes an excellent introductory essay. Larkin and his "small band of contributors" are based in the United Kingdom, thus, many of the obscure British pop musicians may be unknown to American readers. But to Larkin's credit, he is remarkably inclusive of little-known pop figures from the United States, Europe, and the rest of the world.