Summer 2010- read up to today- entry 6

Tricia Rose, The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk About When We Talk About Hip Hop--and Why it Matters, 2008- finished
Elijah Wald, How The Beatles Destroyed Rock 'N' Roll: An Alternative History of American Popular Music, up to p. 137

The Hip Hop Wars is incredible, perhaps even indispensable for those interested in hip hop and larger cultural debates surrounding it.
How The Beatles Destroyed Rock 'N' Roll seems more of an alternative piece of historiography than one of history--it points to larger assumptions made by traditional critics and historians about popular music, which makes it quite useful for those with a strong background in American music history. However, it so far doesn't seem as useful to general readers who might want a consumer's guide to "the greats" of American popular music; it takes up a much larger, more daunting task of attempting to reconstruct what people actually listened to at various times, and how they listened to it (like through recordings and other technological developments).