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Rockin' Out: Popular Music in the U.S.A, Updated Edition, 6th edition

Published by Pearson (August 2, 2016) © 2017

  • Reebee Garofalo University of Massachusetts at Boston
  • Steven Waksman

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For courses in Introduction to Rock Music.

Examine the social and business sides of rock history

Rockin' Out: Popular Music in the USA analyzes the music and business of rock and roll. Taking readers from the invention of the phonograph to the promise of the Internet, this comprehensive text covers the rise of television idols, the proliferation of alternative sounds, the influence of digital production techniques, and more.

For the 6th Edition, longtime author Reebee Garofalo is joined by co-author Steve Waksman, a professor at Smith College and a heavily published rock scholar. Professor Waksman has thoroughly revised each chapter to reflect recent research and scholarship.

Hallmark features of this title

  • The first 3 chapters provide a historical framework that helps students understand music in context by examining the pre-history of rock and roll. These chapters cover musical influences, technological advances, industry developments and more.
  • Coverage of rock music’s political context and of the power of consumer preferences shows students how music fans and artists are an important social force.
  • Discussion of race and gender issues helps students see how these issues impact the development of music.
  • The text highlights how technology has shaped the production and consumption of popular music. Chapter 12 emphasizes changes in technology and the organization of the music business from the 1990s to the present.

New and updated features of this title

  • NEW: The 6th Edition includes significant contributions from new co-author Steve Waksman, a professor at Smith College and a heavily published rock scholar.
  • NEW: Engaging contemporary material, especially in punk, rap and metal, explains recent developments in the genre and explores where rock may be headed next.
  • UPDATED: Listening guides in the final chapters enhance discussions of key contemporary artists like Lady Gaga and influential genres such as electronic dance music.
  • UPDATED: An updated song index provides students with a useful study tool for locating song titles in the text and placing them in their historical context.
  • UPDATED: The final chapters have been significantly reorganized to help students better understand the arc of recent popular music history.
  • UPDATED: Music for this title is available as a playlist on Spotify.

Introduction: Definitions, Themes and Issues

  1. Constructing Tin Pan Alley: From Minstrelsy to Mass Culture
  2. Blues, Jazz and Country: The Segregation of Popular Music
  3. “Good Rockin’ Tonight”: The Rise of Rhythm and Blues
  4. Crossing Cultures: The Eruption of Rock ‘n’ Roll
  5. The Empire Strikes Back: The Reaction to Rock ‘n’ Roll
  6. Popular Music and Political Culture: The Sixties
  7. Music Versus Markets: The Fragmentation of Pop
  8. Punk and Disco: The Poles of Pop
  9. Are We the World?: Music Videos, Superstars and Mega-Events
  10. Rap and Metal: The Voices of Youth Culture
  11. Repackaging Pop: The Changing Mainstream
  12. Changing Channels: Music and Media in the New Millennium

About our authors

Reebee Garofalo is Professor Emeritus at UMass Boston, where he taught for 33 years. His most recent book is Rockin' Out: Popular Music in the USA. He has written numerous articles on popular music for popular as well as scholarly publications and has lectured internationally on a broad range of subjects relating to the operations of the music industry. Garofalo has been active in promoting popular music studies internationally, as a member of the Executive Committee and past Chairperson of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (US), and an editor for several popular music journals, including the Journal of Popular Music Studies. At the local level, Garofalo serves on the organizing committee for the HONK! Festival, an annual gathering of activist street bands. For relaxation, he enjoys drumming and singing with the Blue Suede Boppers, a fifties rock 'n' roll band, and marching with the Second Line Social Aid and Pleasure Society Brass Band, an activist New Orleans-style brass band.

Steve Waksman has turned a lifelong involvement with music as a player and listener into a career as a scholar of rock and pop. Professor of Music and American Studies at Smith College, his works include the books Instruments of Desire: The Electric Guitar and the Shaping of Musical Experience, and the award-winning This Ain’t the Summer of Love: Conflict and Crossover in Heavy Metal and Punk. He has contributed essays to several journals and edited collections, including the Cambridge Companion to the Guitar, the Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World, Listen Again: A Momentary History of Pop and Metal Rules the Globe. In 2008, Waksman was the keynote speaker at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s American Music Masters event honoring the legacy of musician and inventor Les Paul. He is co-editor, with Andy Bennett, of the Sage Handbook of Popular Music, and is currently researching a new book on the cultural history of live music and performance in the US from the mid-nineteenth century to the present.

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