A veteran songwriter presents a selection of sixty of rock music's greatest songs in their original, hand-scrawled rough drafts, accompanied by interviews with the songwriters who reveal the stories behind the songs.

Poetry. Latinx Studies. Women's Studies. Translated by Carlos Lara. It's hard to believe that the books of Blanca Varela (1926-2009), considered one of Peru's greatest poets, as well as the first woman to win the Federico García Lorca International Poetry Prize, have not been translated into English until now. Originally published in Spanish in 1978, this new publication of ROUGH SONG, heralds the long overdue introduction of a major Latin American poet to English-language readers. Born into a family known for advancing art in Latin America, Varela lived briefly in Paris in the late '40s and '50s where she quickly became friends with Andre Breton, Jean-Paul Sartre, Henri Michaux, Simone de Beauvoir, Alberto Giacometti, and in particular, Octavio Paz, who called Varela "the most secret, timid and natural of them all." Returning to Lima in the '60s, she established herself as one of Peru's key literary intelligentsia. The poems in ROUGH SONG, these "flowers for the ear," range wildly in form, from two lines to seven pages long, and each presents a world of intense precision in language, fully conscious of reality and its metaphysical limits--"yes / the dark matter / animated by your hand / it's me." Varela's deceptively simple poems hold a mysteriously delicate weight far beyond their length. A formidable voice in Latin American literature, Blanca Varela is destined to inspire awe and summon new readers for years to come. "These haunting songs unfold with the mysterious precision of fractals, bending their interiors into pliant, living forms. As I get to know Blanca Varela's work, in Carlos Lara's beautiful translation from the Spanish, my ear becomes attuned to the smallest moving gradations, the spider that 'doesn't dare descend one / more millimeter toward the ground,' a surrealism I associate with Alejandra Pizarnik, Henri Michaux, and I'm so grateful to have come to it."--Alexis Almeida "What a surprise to find in the work of this mid-century Peruvian poet a mind and style that so resonate with my own. Varela's poems are almost violent in their suddenness, their brevity. Unsentimental and often bleak, they are always surprising. Discovering her enlarges my picture of the world."--Rae Armantrout "In ROUGH SONG, Blanca Varela uses language to create 'on the empty plate' and cuts reality open. Originally written in the '70s, this work remains both unpredictable and surprising. In these pages she condenses and transmutes the world into text and texture so that what emerges is legible and sharp. Here 'the word / slithering / will be your footprint.' Let us follow."--Gabriela Jauregui

This second edition of the Rough Guide Book of Playlistscontains more than 500 lists of which 50 are new to this edition. The lists are recommendations of ten songs (sometimes a couple more, sometimes a couple less), covering artists (Rufus Wainwright to Thelonius Monk, Al Green to Manu Chao, Glenn Gould to Julie Andrews), genres (Bebop Classics to Reggae Toasters to Punk Originals to Hot Club jazz), songs (10 best Dylan covers; 8 classic versions of Summertime; 10 love songs that don't cloy), quirks and silliness (Songs about Chickens and Insects; Who let the frogs out?; Big Pizza Pie crooners; Take this Job and Shove it!). There's even a literary edge with playlists like '10 songs raved about in Murakami novels'. Each of the Playlists has a nugget about the song (why you want it on your iPod), and a listings of where it's from (remember CDs?).

lxxi + 527 pp.The MUSA series is copublished with the American Musicological Society.

Country music grew up in Tennessee, drawing from sources in the white rural music of East and Middle Tennessee, from the church music of country singing conventions, and from the black music of the Memphis area. The author traces the vital role played by Tennessee and its musicians in the development of this unique American art form.