Robert Christgau
Rock critic since 1967, ain't stopping now. Consumer Guide reborn at robertchristgau.substack.com.
- As I hope you already know, there's a new Springsteen song called "Streets of Minneapolis." I'm going on my fifth listen myself. If it's your first, you may well be saddened but you won't be sorry. youtu.be/wWKSoxG1K7w?...
- As the kids say, some news: www.thelastcriticfilm.com
- A rave review not about an album praises the Langone emergency room at 30th Street, which beset by 80-something urinary difficulties I dared visit on a mobbed Saturday night, where many cordial, gifted, efficient MDs spent hours fixing me up. Home around 230, slept well all night. Thanks so much.
- FKA Twigs vs. Madonna, Phish as feh, hail to Joe Boyd, editing classical, and wanking is better than nothing in the Xmas 2025 Xgau Sez robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-d...
- Several readers have written wondering how they might perhaps obtain the new Moby Grape album I just Consumer Guided with the band's Facebook page I recommended insufficient. I hope Alice Langdon, who suggested this path, won't mind if I provide her email address: Laluna43@hotmail.com
- I admit it—the big kahuna in the Xmas 2025 edition of the Consumer Guide came out circa 1990. So don't put off a quick read. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- A curious Christgau, a futile cassette dig, live versus recorded, tuneful versus melodic, remembering Pulnoc, and the lineaments of delight are all addressed in the Thanksgiving edition of Xgau Sez at my irrepressible Substack And It Don't Stop. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-n...
- The outpouring of mourning for the great and hilarious "alt-country" genius Todd Snider seemed an excellent reason to devote this month's Big Lookback to a Barnes & Noble Review appreciation I wrote about Snider more than a decade ago. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/the-big-lo...
- I'm very sorry to report that the great alt-country singer-songwriter Todd Snider has died at 59 of undiagnosed walking pneumonia. I stick by what I wrote about him in 2012. www.robertchristgau.com/xg/bn/2012-0... Here's Rolling Stone's coverage. www.rollingstone.com/music/music-...
- The November Consumer Guide now up on my Substack addresses this despondent political moment directly only once but I may cheer you up in otherways robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- Union man Tom Smucker, my friend for 57 years and upstairs neighbor for pushing 50, read a lot of books about the 2024 election and then wrote 4000 words about them. A politically savvy overview you shouldn't skip. And he melded some music in there too. www.firstofthemonth.org/author/tom-s...
- Paging through the Times as I downed some coffee, I glanced casually at Penelope Green's obit of Marlene Dietrich's daughter Maria Riva, who just died at 100. Couldn't stop reading. Researched mostly in secondary sources, it proved an absolutely devastating reflection on the perversions of fame.
- A well-timed way for someone of my religious beliefs to celebrate Mahmdani Day was provided by my sister Georgia, who devoted a UK sojourn to a portrait of Pete Seeger's younger sister Peggy in a nation where socialism is at least respectable. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/at-home-wi...
- Even scarier (I hope) than Trump's third-term dreams, ProPublica (via TPM) outlines how the North Carolina Supreme Court has been rejiggered to turn it sharply right, with special attention to those uppity nonwhite voters. talkingpointsmemo.com/news/biblica...
- I'm not webwise enough to follow or fully comprehend the ins and outs of online election trolling. But this Marcy Wheeler piece on rightwing information distortion posted by Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo is recommended to those capable of fully grasping it talkingpointsmemo.com/tpm-25/witho...
- I watch Lawrence O'Donnell a lot, but his first 20 minutes tonight was breathtaking: an out-and-out attack not just on Trump but on the media he manipulates INCLUDING NOT JUST CNN BUT MSNBC ITSELF. Carola's under the weather and I'm a tech doofus. But if anybody's taped it let me know.
- Having chosen to watch a documentary to help my wife and I go to sleep a week or so ago, I ended up so moved and impressed that I felt compelled to spread the news about the late anthropologist Jane Goodall's "famous last words." robertchristgau.substack.com/p/a-compelli...
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- We have only one child, an adopted Honduran-born daughter who has somehow just turned 40. To our amazement she was weeping by the time it ended. Reason: it reminded her of her beloved grandma Hope, a Mayflower descendant who I adored myself and who believe it or not did evoke Goodall's goodness.
- Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo asked his readers to send him No Kings Day photos. Lighten your spirits for a few minutes by checking them out. However temporarily, we do still have a sense of humor. talkingpointsmemo.com/gallery/phot...
- Sixty years of great music, the statistically decisive rise of the CD, francais vs. anglais, grading A-to-E, Gratitude, and Geese inspire me to fill out the October 2025 edition of Xgau Sez in my Substack whosawhatsis And It Don't Stop robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-o...
- The October Consumer Guide is more about love than about the onslaught of fascism, which I wish I could tell you bodes well for a loving future. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- This month's And It Don't Stop hands the ball to my wife Carola Dibbell, who as a transplanted Londoner way back in 1968 was knocked out of her socks by this American singer she'd never heard of named Janis Joplin. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/the-big-lo...
- Chagrined to report that the new Xgau Sez is marred by an oversight — failed to name the greatest Samuel R. Delany novel: Dhalgren. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-s...
- This month's edition of Christgau's Consumer Guide features a link to Peter Stampfel's 23 pages of notes to "Song Shards," his highly recommended single-disc assembly of 66 jingles, some of which also count as hymns. I strongly suggest you check it out. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- I just wrote at some length about the highly recommended Ed Sullivan doc Sunday Best. Awkward occasionally, but it holds up. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/a-really-g...
- Looking forward to what that immaterial motherfucker AI has to say about the August 2025 edition of Xgau Sez robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-a...
- Kentucky troubadour explores the world, New Zealand ingenue explores Canal Street, and Greenwich Villagers can't stop won't stop in the August '25 edition of the unstoppable Consumer Guide robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- Dug out some early not actually hyperbolic contextualization of the insufficiently legendary Mekons for this week's Big Lookback at my Substack newspiece And It Don't Stop. open.substack.com/pub/robertch...
- And here's my review of the Mekons at the Bowery Ballroom on July 17th. “The fascists lose. They always lose.” robertchristgau.substack.com/p/the-horror...
- "The fascists lose. They always lose," and other jaunty sayings grace my reflections on the magnificent Mekons show at the Bowery Ballroom this past Thursday. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/the-horror...
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- I have no recollection of that name.
- "The fascists lose. They always lose." and other jaunty sayings grace my reflections on the magnificent Mekons show at the Bowery Ballroom this past Thursday. mail.aol.com/d/list/refer...
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- Nothing is certain, obviously. But I wouldn't call that an especially propitious doubling of "only" and "always" myself.
- Revisiting genius, recalibrating the A plus, the country and the city, the colloquial connubial, CDs as progress, and lost dreams of TV stardom are topics addressed in the July 2025 edition of Xgau Sez at my Substack whatchamacallit And It Don't Stop. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-j...
- Revisiting genius, recalibrating the A plus, the country and the city, the colloquial connubial, CDs as progress, and lost dreams of TV stardom are topics addressed in the July 2025 edition of Xgau Sez at my Substack whatchamacallit And It Don't Stop. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- Old oldtimers Neil Young and Chuck D vocalize their well nigh undiminished way onto the July 2025 Consumer Guide. Seasoned newcomer Adrianne Lenker smokes both of them off what sometimes sounds like the top of her head. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- Pulled out an old John Lennon album last week and decided it was a lot better than I thought when it came out--a lot. Get the revised story here and if you're tempted order one for yourself sooner rather than later. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/john-lenno...
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- Did that work while Cohen was still alive and swear there was nothing uncharitable about it. He was more credible as an old man, end of story. See the LC piece in Is It Still Good to Ya? or link to "Our Man the Sophisticate" from the LC page on my site. Also: Google "Trump Killed Leonard Cohen."
- Vibrations on 10th Street, Clay Felker on Mott Street, Leadbelly or is it Lead Belly, Michael Hurley mourned in Bombay, '80s CGs, and various, duds, bombs, and plusses are all addressed via the latest Xgau Sez in my And it Don't Stop Substack thingamajig. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-j...
- Who better to send Brian Wilson off to a suitably iconic yet fun fun fun reward that comprehends his seldom acknowledged political relevance than my old friend and neighbor Tom Smucker in the latest edition of my Substack screed And It Don't Stop. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/brian-wils...
- NYC Comptroller candidate Justin Brannan is sending out a well-conceived notice that the a shitload of NYC investment money in Tesla isn't just funding the chickenshit division of the Heil Trump! crew but could well end up costing New Yorkers millions. secure.actblue.com/donate/brann...
- This may seem sacriligious to some, but Wussy's show at the Mercury Lounge last night, which climaxed their first tour in years, was for me even more enthralling than Gof4. New steel player somehow filled the gap left by John Erhardt. Do this more guys, please. Made me forget Trump for an hour.
- The June 2025 Consumer Guide comes with an add-on: my transcription of the entirety of the Bruce Springsteen speechifying that renders his aptest commercially released live album a piece of history and a finger in Trump's eye. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/consumer-g...
- This month's Big Lookback at my And It Don't Stop Substack revisits a still findable and indeed streamable Grateful Dead documentary from their good old days. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/the-big-lo...
- Hours on the phone with the great Tom Hull and the greater (in her way) Carola Dibbell, both of whom though especially Tom are so much better than me at That Computer Stuff it's not funny except when it is, a rare event. So now it seems my site is up and running. Take that, ELP.
- Several friends have alerted me to the fact that my site has been "suspended," as the online gods told me when I checked. No idea why. My webmaster, Tom Hull, is based in Wichita so this may take a while. Will post here again when there's further news. Damn.
- On a whim I dipped into a slim book of poems by Ramon Guthrie, a fondly remembered Dartmouth prof of mine sixty-plus years ago. Turns out they proved so remarkable that I didn't stop and haven't stopped yet. So just for the fun of it start here yourself. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/graffiti-a...
- Gospel meets matrimony, Carola gets a cameo, the Turkey Shoot in history, A albums revisited, A albums recalibrated, and my very own documentaries rise up from the May Xgau Sez in my Substack thingamajig And It Don't Stop. robertchristgau.substack.com/p/xgau-sez-m...
