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<< Previous   of   Next >> Associated Press  (click to enlarge)   ADVERTISEMENT   CONTACT THE HERALD Melanie Munk, Features Editor munk@heraldnet.com   Published: Sunday, November 8, 2009 ‘Dinosaur’ compiles Klosterman’s pop culture musings By Michael Hill Associated Press Chuck Klosterman has a theory. A lot of them, actually. He has a theory about why grunge rock icon Kurt Cobain was like the late cult leader David Koresh, why the read-option offense signifies something deep and meaningful about football, why ABBA will never reunite, and why Garth Brooks created that goofy alter ego a decade ago. “I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time searching for the underrated value in ostensibly stupid things,” Klosterman writes in “Eating the Dinosaur” ($25). So true. Klosterman’s trick is to use stupid-sounding subjects as grist for smart, funny essays. Klosterman has built a career on this, gaining early attention for defending ’80s hair metal bands and later writing about popular culture for Spin and Esquire. Klosterman performs literary high-wire acts with his essays: They’re great when he succeeds, but things hit with a thud when he missteps. He mostly succeeds in this book. Klosterman has more insights per page than most cultural critics and he really does think these things through. His riff on the different ways major sports leagues market themselves is dead-on and funny. His quirky takes on laugh tracks and Unabomber Ted Kaczynski’s manifesto are worth reading. And while many people have written about the cultural impact of H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine,” Klosterman is probably the first critic to compare it to Keith Richards’s guitar playing and Snidely Whiplash’s mustache. In the same sentence. Klosterman is so entertaining that readers might gloss over his tendency to pepper his arguments with ridiculously broad statements and the occasional sophistry. Consider this assertion: “People who follow politics closely cannot comprehend people who aren’t partially lying.” And his argument tying the late Nirvana frontman Cobain to infamous Branch Davidian sect leader Koresh based on some similarities in their personalities is clever, but silly. By his same rules, you could argue Cobain was like Bill Clinton (talented with strong appetites, peaked in the ’90s). Here’s another comparison in the spirit of Klosterman: The essays in this book are like guitar solos by his beloved Eddie Van Halen. They show exceptional talent and are original. They can soar and part of the fun is trying to guess where they’ll end up. The difference is that Van Halen didn’t record the occasional bum note. READER COMMENTS Be the first to comment. You must be a registered user and verify your e-mail address to post comments to blogs or articles on HeraldNet. To register, click here. To read other terms and conditions, click here. Log out

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