A very light-hearted, personalized look at the author's late night forays into pop music via his transistor radio (which left him partially deaf in the ear he and his radio slept on). Hadju covers every historical base - race music, punk, blues, folk, swing, disco, rap, rock, soul, cowboy ballads, American Songbook. He gives props and credit where it's due. Love For Sale reads as though you were speaking with an old friend who grew up when you did, and each 45, every album mentioned, evokes the thrill and the passion of the sounds, times, and places. ( )

David Hajdu’s “Love For Sale: Pop Music in America” is an insightful and enjoyable survey of the key genres and aspects of American popular music and its surrounding culture. It is neither a chronological treatise nor a fully comprehensive study, but rather a series of essays, generally light in tone, infused with good humor, and filled with anecdotes and insights from the author’s perspective over the years as a music journalist as well as his childhood recollections. Hajdu’s title premise that all popular music has been basically selling love and sex is only loosely and sporadically woven through the essays; overall, he paints a much broader picture of the evolving role of popular music and its continuing significance. Rather than a dry scholarly approach, this instead is a fun and refreshing take on the history of pop music aimed clearly at the casual music lover. ( )

3/5 ( )