Roadrunner: A Song by Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers

Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers' 1972 song "Roadrunner" captures the freedom and wonder of cruising down the highway late at night with the radio on. Although the song circles Boston's beltway, its significance reaches far beyond Richman's deceptively simple declarations of love for modern moonlight, the made world, and rock & roll. In Roadrunner, cultural theorist and poet Joshua Clover charts both the song's emotional power and its elaborate history, tracing its place in popular music from Chuck Berry to M.I.A. He also locates "Roadrunner" at the intersection of car culture, industrialization, consumption, mobility, and politics. Like the song itself, Clover tells a story about a particular time and place--the American era that rock & roll signifies--that becomes a story about love and the modern world.

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 10/12/2021
ISBN: 9781478014393
Pages: 144
Weight: 0.45lbs
Size: 7.10h x 7.00w x 0.40d

Review Citations: Library Journal 07/01/2021 pg. 73
Kirkus Reviews 08/15/2021