Do not:

1. try to convince me that Elvis “invented rock and roll,” and that I should believe you because you read it in a Rolling Stone history of rock. He didn’t. He popularized it, and embodied it in North American culture, and was able to bring the genre to a wide audience, but to say that he invented it is a rather offensive fallacy that marginalizes the musicians who were part of the subcultures that led to the development of rock. Like, how could one dude single-handedly invent a genre? The closest thing I can think of is maybe Schoenberg who actually sat down and was like, “And for my next trick – I shall invent twelve-tone, and then have a building named after me,” but even so, stupid old twelve-tone was significantly transmuted by other composers who adopted the technique. Also – please consider your sources. Rolling Stone is, after all, the bastion of white dude rock criticism. So . . . there might be a wee bit of ideology (some of us might call it . . . white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy) that, consciously or subconsciously, will inform whom they choose to canonize.

2. assume that because I want to critique the rock music canon, I am condemning it. Please, do listen to Elvis, he was important, I will grant you that. But there were other musicians who were important too, that we don’t get to hear much about (most of them black, many of them women. Interesting). I’m not trying to piss on a sacred cow. Well, maybe I’m trying to piss on it a little bit. But who wouldn’t want to piss on something that basically upholds a discourse of musical snobbery, while discounting the work of significant musicians, and marginalizing the people who listen to that music?

3. make me feel shitty for not knowing intimate details about record sales and for not being able to name drop important musicians from this period, or put pressure on me to know these things because I study musicology. First of all, I am not interested in that kind of positivist approach to music history. Facts have their place, but do not stand up on their own. We need to query the source of those facts. We need to understand those facts in their cultural and political contexts. Do a little research into what’s going on musicology, and you’ll find out that the field has moved pretty far away from constant recitation of fact. Secondly, Rock did not develop linearly. There are a lot of stories and narratives that constructed rock as we know it today. I was thinking hard about this, and I realized that I do know a narrative of rock, and I know the facts of that narrative rather intimately, and it’s not the same as yours, or the same as anyone’s, and that’s fine, because nobody’s stories of rock will be identical. But each one is valid. I simply do not relate to the Elvis-Presley-What-A-Guy story. The rock narrative that resonates for me includes but is not limited to stories of Big Mama Thornton; of rockabilly gals like Rose Maddox, Barbara Pittman and Wanda Jackson; of girl groups like the Ronnettes, and little known all-girl garage acts like the Ace of Cups and Goldie and the Gingerbreads; of soul and jazz and Annisteen and Ella and Aretha; some fucking awesome, ear-splitting punk and post-punk from the Slits and the X-Ray Spex and the Au Pairs and the Delta Five and the Raincoats; sparkly, bright B-52s New Wave; a little gothic dalliance with Siouxie; angsty, grungy, underground explosions from Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch and every Riot Grrl you could possibly think of; and post-riot, post-modern Sleater-Kinney, Le Tigre, and Madonna. This is the story I relate to. I do not claim that it supercedes anyone else’s. I want it to stand side by side and intertwined with other stories of rock. And as for Elvis Presley? He sounds a lot to me like a male version of Wanda Jackson . . .

4. decide to conclude the argument by saying that our differences stem from the fact that I am interested in the political, while you are interested in the aesthetic. First of all, don’t make assumptions as to my interests. And secondly, to divorce aesthetics from politics is irresponsible and dangerous.

5. interrupt me. I already doubt my own authority enough. I already question my authority to speak about ANYTHING, including the thing that I have been studying for years, the thing that I’m getting a doctoral degree in, and I think it’s really fucked up that after all these years, I still feel like I have no right to speak authoritatively about music. I don’t need to be interrupted when I’m trying to assert myself, especially when I have a history of not being able to assert myself.

6. tell me that I believe “polite lies.”

7. diss the Mariah. She’s a pretty fantastic musician. Case closed.