Recommended Reading: Nick Hornby's Songbook

Nick Hornby wrote the music lover's book that was made into the music lover's film High Fidelity. Hornby wrote a collection of essays about 31 songs.

Songbook is not a critique of the songs, but a celebration. He writes about how they make him feel, what they inspire in him, or simply why he loves them. The writing is witty, sharp and so very enjoyable. I often laughed out loud. Sometimes I had to read a piece over again just because it was so much fun.

He takes on some of the sillier tropes in music criticism such as the idea that music must be "edgy" to be noteworthy. He defends pop music with humor, vigor and persuasiveness.

He also recommends several albums at the end and most of them are one's I love.

To celebrate this lovely book, I am going to play his 31 songs for my Monday set, so I will be starting a bit early - at 4:30 PM on Monday, January 27th.