This seemed like a book that my brother would love so I figured I would read it first and see if it would be an appropriate gift for a music lover like him. It was far more interesting than I was expecting, since the subject matter is not really the kind that usually appeals to me. He has a birthday this spring and I think he will love digging into this!

Explores the weird world of lo-fi music to investigate its revolutionary potential and its ability to subvert what we think music can do.

Homemade records, tape-hiss worship and a taste for a very peculiar kind of psychedelia have carved themselves a weird niche in the contemporary musical landscape under the name of lo-fi.

This genreless genre, characterized by poor recordings and rough sounds, spanning from the most extreme heavy metal to the sweetest ear-candies pop can offer, has become a solid presence in our collective sensibility. And yet, it has largely been neglected: this staunch refusal of anything hi-fi and hi-tech has fallen under the radar of the categories we use to analyse ourselves and our times.

The Great Psychic Outdoors, dedicated to the most interesting and controversial artists in this movement, will rectify this injustice and vindicate the revolutionary potential of lo-fi music, engaging with this weird genre on its own terms and facing head on the contradictions and possibilities of this multi-faceted phenomenon. Confronting the aesthetic and conceptual stakes of this sonic craft, The Great Psychic Outdoors shows what lo-fi says about us, our lives under capitalism and the strange ways we cope with pain, madness and beauty.

In our increasingly digital and detached culture, more and more people are turning to physical media to counteract the sort of psychic malaise which accompanies the always-on, forever shifting digital world. This book is an exploration of the analog world, and the re-enchantment of media through tactile, imperfect media.

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Repeater Books for an advanced copy of this book on music, politics, corporate greed, and the need to create even when everyone around you can't understand why.

When I worked in a music store, back before the new century began, our store had numerous customers who were audiophiles. Their stereos were made of components from 7 continents, each one chosen to work with the next in order to find the perfect sound. Their shopping habits corresponded with this. Gold Mobile Fidelity compact discs, Japanese vinyl and more. There talk would always be about the recording of the mediums, DDD, ADD, AAD, always looking for remasters on CD, Family Bear collections from Germany, tricks to get the highest possible sound. They were fun, but could get boring after a while, but still time passed, and honestly they spent a lot of money, so being nice was expected. I never knew though, if they even liked music, or if they just liked the way things sounded, clear as a bell, all soul removed. I envied their equipment, and yet getting into my Jetta, throwing a cassette into the player, that was how I liked my music, and to a certain extent still do. Lo-fi music would have driven these men, and it was mostly men, crazy. Hearing a mistake, a cough, a sorry while playing. Not every band can be Steely Dan, and thank god for that. The Great Psychic Outdoors: Adventures in Low Fidelity by writer, editor and lo-fi enthusiast Enrico Monacelli is a look at the artists who record well off the beaten path, with thoughts about why, the politics of low fidelity music, and why this genre is so important, and ever changing.

The book begins with the author discovering the band Smog, which was mostly Jim Callahan and his song Teenage Spaceship. The rawness, the feeling of alienation, the recording all spoke to Monacelli and introduced him to the genre of low fidelity music. Lo-fi is genre with a lot of different sounds, jazz, death metal, experimental, scream, but recording with the least amount of studio trickery, usually on cassettes with the mistakes left in, or even made on purpose. Lo-fi to Monacelli can be a form of rebellion against the corporate masters who control music, like the Beach Boys, who Monacelli considers a precursor to the lo-fi movement. They owed an album to the label, and Brian Wilson just couldn't deal with it anymore. So Wilson took the band back to their roots, and magic to a certain extent happened. Monacelli looks at some of the other pioneers in lo-fi, the late great Daniel Johnston, who never wrote a song that didn't make me want to sigh at the end. R. Stevie Moore whose father was close to the King of Rock n' Roll, but has recorded more songs than I have eaten potato chips. Five other artists are explored, along with some thoughts about the future of lo-fi.

A book that challenges readers with a lot of questions and thoughts that usually don't appear in music books. Normal books about a genre would lists songs, studios and Billboard charts. Monacelli asks bigger questions, and mostly answers them. Can one be an artist, if no one hears the songs that are being recorded? Is lo-fi a reaction to corporate music, or just a marketing scheme. Monacelli like, no loves music, and loves to think about music as bigger and better that we care about it now. The writing is very good, a bit academic in some spots, but Monacelli makes a lot of good points. Plus the writing is funny, which helps a lot.

An interesting look at a musical genre, one that might be for a more particular crowd. I worked in record stores and independent bookstores, and I know a lot of people who would love this book. That and the fact there is a lot of bands mentioned that are really worth listening to. For fans of lo-fi music, music fans and for readers interesting in the philosophy of making music that matters to maybe only the artist.

Enrico Monacelli's book about lo-fi music manages to be entertaining, informative and carefully informed by theory throughout, offering an overview that is both comprehensive and partial, which seems appropriate. Beginning with a convincing case for Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys inventing lo-fi when Smile fell apart, chapters follow on R. Stevie Moore, Daniel Johnston, Marine Girls (my favourite), Ariel Pink, Perfume Genius, and Phil Elverum. Some of the use of theory (e.g. the use of Theweleit and Deleuze & Guattari in the Marine Girls chapter) is a little fanciful, but that is a lot of the fun and like lots of Repeater's recent publications, draws on and extends the legacy of Mark Fisher without making a big deal about it. Monacelli has a lightness of touch that is much harder to achieve than it looks and there's lot to learn, admire and get worked up about here. The academic in me would have liked references or a bibliography, but that also seems fitting in a book with this focus.