In 1978, Greil Marcus asked 20 rock writers which album they would take to a desert island. The result was Stranded and, almost 20 years later, this new edition feels like peering into another world of music journalism. Robert Christgau explodes New York Dolls’ debut into an essay about sexuality, metal and the 70s; Lester Bangs writes one of his most beautiful rants on Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks and Simon Frith argues for the cleverness of Beggar’s Banquet. It’s verbose, dense rock criticism that now seems charmingly overambitious, but remains as poetic as ever.
While Stranded gives scant reference to the “desert island” device, its updated cousin, Marooned, feels in thrall to the format. Laina Dawes’ baffling choice of Skunk Anansie’s Stoosh is awkwardly prefaced by a paragraph about a plane crash, but generally it’s a worthy update. Simon Reynolds’ take on John Martyn’s Solid Air is predictably excellent, fulfilling what is surely the aim for retrospective music writing: making you want to dig out the album and give it another listen.
While Marooned’s more restrained tone makes it a marginally worse collection, both books are great to dip in and out of. Ideal toilet reading, in the nicest possible way.
