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Rolling Stone Album Guide

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The Rolling Stone Album Guide, previously known as The Rolling Stone Record Guide, is a book that, along with its sister publication Rolling Stone magazine, contains professional reviews of popular music and is commonly used by both musicians and casual listeners.

Contents

First Edition

The Rolling Stone Record Guide was the first edition of what would later become The Rolling Stone Album Guide. It was edited by Dave Marsh (who wrote a large majority of the reviews) and John Swenson, and included contributions from 34 other music critics. It is divided into sections by musical genere and then lists artists alphabetically within their respective genres. Albums are also listed alphabetically by artist although some of the artists have their careers divided into chronological periods. The first edition also included black and white photographs of several of the covers of albums which received five star reviews, although they were not listed in a separate section of the book. The edition also included reveiws for many comedy artists including Lord Buckley, The Firesign Theatre, Richard Pryor, and Bill Cosby.

Table Of Contents

Rating System

The guide employs a five star rating scale with the following descriptions of those ratings: [#endnote_1sted]

Reviewers

Second edition

The New Rolling Stone Record Guide was an update of 1979's The Rolling Stone Record Guide. Like the first edition, it was edited by Dave Marsh and John Swenson. It included contributions from 52 music critics and featured chronological album listings under the name of each artist. In many cases, updates from the first edition consist of short, one-sentence verdicts upon an artist's later work.

Instead of having separate sections such as Blues and Gospel, this edition compressed all of the genres it reviewed into one section except for Jazz titles which were removed for this edition and were later expanded and published in 1985 Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide (ed. Swenson).

Since the goal of this guide was to review records that were in print at the time of publication, this edition featured a list of artists who were included in the first edition but were not included in the second edition because all of their material was out of print. [#endnote_2nded]

Table Of Contents

Rating System

The second edition uses the same rating system as the first edition. The only difference is that in addition to a rating, the second edition employs the pilcrow mark (¶) to indicate a title that was out of print at the time the guide was published. [2]

Reviewers

Third Edition

The Rolling Stone Album Guide was a complete rewrite of both the 1979's The Rolling Stone Record Guide and the 1983's The New Rolling Stone Record Guide. The title change reflects the fact that by the time this edition was published in 1992, records were almost completely replaced by CDs. This edition employs three new editors and reduces the number of reviewers from more than 50 as seen in previous editions to a mere four. This edition also included reviews of Jazz albums, which had been removed from the previous edition for the sake of publishing a separate Jazz guide. Unlike both previous editions, this edition did not include comedy artists.

Table Of Contents

Rating System

Like the first edition, it employed a five star rating scale but this edition had new definitions of what the number of stars meant and this edition employed the use of 1/2 stars in the reviews. The descriptions of the markings used in the third edition of the guide are: [#endnote_3rded]

Reviewers

Fourth Edition

Approximately 70 writers contributed to this edition. Here is a quote from the back cover of the fourth edition:

"For the first time since 1992, Rolling Stone's definitive classic returns to the scene, completely updated and revised to include the past decade's artists and sounds. When it comes to sorting the truly great from the merely mediocre, the enduring from the fleeting, The New Rolling Stone Album Guide provides music buffs and amateurs alike with authoritative guidance from the best voices in the field. Filled with insightful commentary, it not only reviews the most influential albums of all time, but also features biographical overviews of key artists' careers, giving readers a look at the personalities behind the music."

Artists omitted from the fourth edition

Some of the artists who were included in the previous editions but were omitted in this edition include:

  1. Louis Armstrong
  2. Nat King Cole
  3. Crowded House
  4. Deep Purple
  5. Duke Ellington
  6. Ella Fitzgerald
  7. George Harrison
  8. Robert Johnson
  9. Wynton Marsalis
  10. Metallica
  11. The Alan Parsons Project
  12. Tears for Fears
  13. Toto

Artists not included in any edition

Some of the artists who have never been included in any edition of this guide include:

  1. Fatboy Slim
  2. Édith Piaf
  3. Bic Runga
  4. Vengaboys

Citations

  1. ↑  The Rolling Stone Record Guide. Ed. Dave Marsh and John Swenson. New York: Random House, 1979. (Note 1, see p xiii) (Note 1a, see p xv-xvi)
  2. ↑  The New Rolling Stone Record Guide. Ed. Dave Marsh and John Swenson. New York: Random House, 1983. (Note 2, see p 645-648) (Note 2a, see p xv) (Note 2b, see p xvii-xix)
  3. ↑  The Rolling Stone Album Guide. Ed. Anthony DeCurtis and James Henke with Holly George-Warren. New York: Random House, 1992. (Note 3, see p vii) (Note 3a, see ix)

    4.  

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