An electrifying collection of essays from legendary cultural critic Greg Tate, with an introduction by Hanif Abdurraqib and a foreword by Questlove From one of the most original, creative, and provocative writers on American culture comes a now-classic collection of essays, delving 'far and wide into Black music, into film, into the beats and rhyme of culture' (Questlove). These pieces orbit social, pop cultural, political and economic subjects -- from the rise of hip-hop, the art of Jean-Michel Basquiat, the music of Miles Davis, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Bad Brains and many others, to the crisis of the Black intellectual and the irony of the GOP recruiting Black Americans. With unrivalled flair, Tate writes in a voice that is at once angry, joyous, self-critiquing, and dazzlingly witty. Tate teaches us 'it is not too late to say too much, to be so dissatisfied with the world as it is that we throw far too many words toward the sky, and see what the heavens throw back' (Hanif Abdurraqib).

Details

ISBN13: 9781837314027
Format: Paperback / softback
Number of Pages: 368
Edition:
Publication Date: 20 Oct 2026
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Publication City, Country: United Kingdom
Dimensions (cm): 19.7(H)x13.1(L)x2.2(W)292
Weight (gm): 292

Author Biography

Greg Tate (Author) Greg Tate (1957-2021) was a music and popular-culture critic and journalist whose work appeared in many publications, including the Village Voice, Vibe, Spin, the Wire and Downbeat. He was the author of three books of cultural criticism, winning a posthumous Pulitzer Prize in 2024 in recognition of his pioneering work. Tate, via guitar and baton, also led the conducted improvisation ensemble Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber. Questlove (Introducer) Questlove is a six-time Grammy Award-winning musician, Academy Award-winning filmmaker, drummer, DJ, producer, director, culinary entrepreneur, and New York Times-bestselling author. Hanif Abdurraqib (Introducer) Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio. He is a recipient of the MacArthur Foundation \"Genius\" grant and the author of There's Always This Year, a New York Times bestseller and winner of the National Books Critics Circle Award; A Little Devil in America, winner of the Carnegie Medal and a National Book Award finalist; The Crown Ain't Worth Much; They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us; Go Ahead in the Rain; and A Fortune for Your Disaster, winner of the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize.

Reviews

One of the most captivating and original collections of arts criticism ever written. * Orion *
Truly seminal * Jazzwise *
Required reading for music criticism fans. * Chicago Reader *
One of the godfathers of hip-hop journalism. * The Source *
A clinic on literary brilliance. -- Jelani Cobb
A singular voice, a fount of bravura essays on the fantastical creativity, determined resilience and wry paradoxes of Black creativity and life ... he affected every writer I cared about and learned from — we’re all Tate’s children * The New York Times *
Restores a blueprint for criticism in the 21st century. The cultural gravity of this book makes it an essential part of any library on Black aesthetics, music criticism, and art criticism. -- John Rodzvilla * Library Journal *
One of a handful of books I regularly pull off the shelf just to soak in a few paragraphs and juice the brain up into writing mode . . . Flyboy is a handbook for preserving your own wild sanity under the terrordome. You should pilfer it from your best friend’s bookshelf posthaste. -- Carl Wilson * Bookforum *
Hits hard with the truth, again and again. -- Sasha Frere-Jones * 4Columns *