What Wred's Reading: The Fourth Edition Of The Trouser Press Record Guide Edited By Ira A. Robbins

  

This book dates from 1991 and early that year before Nirvana and alternative music in general started selling millions of records (the Nirvana entry mainly covers Bleach).  As a result, it's a treasure trove of 1980s college radio, filled with fun bands and cool music.  It's mainly punk rock and new wave, but it covers reggae and hip-hop as well, generally anything cool and underground from the mid-1970s, when Trouser Press started as a zine, to the publication date.  Covering 2,500 musical artists, the book is a great resource for music if you're looking for something new (albeit that it's old now if it's in this book) to listen to that is likely pretty good or at least interesting.  One nice thing about having this book in 2026 is that it's a lot easier to hear this music than it would have been back then when one had to track down an obscure and possibly out of print record.  Today, you can find most of this music on the Internet somewhere.  I've been getting rid of most of my books because I was tired of dragging them around with me, but this is one I'll be keeping.  When I can't find anything new worth listening to, I'll dip into it and check out some old band that's new to me.  The book is out of print (though available used and even reasonably priced if you dig a bit), but you can probably find the reviews from it at TrouserPress.Com, and they have all the issues of the magazines that predated the record guides there which is very cool of them.  They still publish books today, though the last record guide like this was a volume back in the 1990s covering that Nirvana/alternative music goldrush.

If you want to hear some music made since 1991 that might have fit into Trouser Press's editorial scope also, then give my latest album a listen or download at your favorite digital music site such as Soundcloud, Spotify, or Bandcamp!  And if you want to read some more, then please read my latest novel!