Mystery Train: Images of America in Rock ‘n’ Roll Music

In 1975, Greil Marcus’s Mystery Train changed the way readers thought about rock ‘n’ roll and is to this day justly regarded as one of the most accomplished examples of contemporary music writing. Looking at recordings by six key artists-Robert Johnson, Harmonica Frank, Randy Newman, the Band, Sly Stone, and Elvis Presley-Marcus offers a complex and unprecedented analysis of the relationship between rock ‘n’ roll and American culture.

This fiftieth-anniversary edition features new introductions by both the author and the New York Times’ critic and editor Dwight Garner, alongside completely rewritten discographies. The result is an invigorating and wholly original study that remains a high watermark in cultural criticism.