Rating: 
Summary: Often brilliant, funny, and never dull
Review: This book of various essays on pop culture is nearly priceless. Klosterman finds so much relevance in so many throw away items in items in pop culture at times its astonishing. And hilarious. I never thought Saved By the Bell or MTV's Real World could inspire even an interesting paragraph, but Klosterman finds a way to show the significance of these items at the same time conceding their banality in two excellent essays. It's very impressive.
The essay on breakfast cereal was completely mindless, and completely laugh out loud funny, especially the descriptions of the socialogy and psychology of various cartoon characters in breakfast cereal ads.
Klosterman will take positions you'd never think he'd defend, like describing the brilliance of Billy Joel. I can barely tolerate this artist, but Klosterman has made me reconsider him, and frankly, he was about the last person I'd expect to do this. Nor does he take himself too seriously, as he describes his attendance at a Pop Music Conference for academics and music critics, which he totally skewers, even though he readily admits the conference is made for people like him.
And sprinkled through the book are some very insightful comments and insights about the human experience. And Klosterman clearly exposes his personal weaknesses throughout.
Is it perfect? No. There are moments where Klosterman comes across like somebody drunk or stoned at a party who thinks he knows it all, and clearly doesn't. Not all of the essays are great. A comparison between Marilyn Monroe and Pamela Anderson as the representative sexpots of their generation isn't anywhere near as profound as Klosterman thinks it is, and is about twice as long as it should be. And the chapter slamming soccer is a pointless, claiming that his experience as a youth baseball coach made him realize how soccer has failed in America. Uh-huh.
Let me digress that in the United States, many go to endless lengths to say why soccer in un-American, or fails to capture are collective interest, or will fail as a sport, when the fact of the matter is, the just don't get it. In other countries, people will freely admite they "don't get" baseball or American football, but Americans feel we need to go to endless lengths to avoid saying "I don't get soccer". You might say Klosterman inspired me to write this commentary on his commentary.
But ANYWAY, read this book, laugh a lot, look at the world a different way, and enjoy a few nuggets of wisdom.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm More of a Sex, Alcohol, and Golden Grahams Man Myself
Review: This is an interesting book for people in their twenties. Though taking pop culture references and tying those to societal behavior is nothing new, Klosterman sometimes intelligently places real and intense thoughts about subjects that weren't meant to be dissected socially. He goes into how the Sims, Saved by the Bell, the 80s Lakers-Celtics rivalry all represent or influence society in one form or another. This book contains 18 disjointed, unrelated chapters explaining Klosterman's view of random popular culture phenomenons.
The good part about this book is that at some points it's smart and hilarious at the same time. Klosterman's view on Soccer and why neither he nor America will ever accept is worth the price of the book alone. The first half of the book is far superior in that you'll find yourself laughing at loud (like I did on a plane). If you had part of your life influenced by random and useless things like toys or television shows when you were a kid, then this sort of sheds light on how minute items can influence anyone.
There are two bad parts about this book though. Since he devotes a chapter to a random idea based on an aspect of culture, you'd be somewhat interested in that aspect. He went on a giant tirade about how classical country music is better than modern Nashville country music. Not only did I not care about that genre of music, I was unaware of the division of classical and modern country, nor did I really want to know about such a division. The worst part of this book is that he does a lot of useless explaining of random facts in detail that really aren't intriguing, funny or interesting, and doesn't incorporate these long winded details to anything noteworthy. In the chapter where he describes religious fanatics, he gives a boring and long summary of a religious movie for almost no reason. The second half of the book is really chalked full of such useless information and provides nothing interesting, funny or thought provoking at all.
By the way, there is hardly any mention of Sex, Drugs, or even Cocoa Puffs in this book.
All in all, it's interesting and unique, but the latter chapters were so dull that it left a dull taste in my mouth. There were some great chapters, but the inconsistency just makes it an average book at best.
Rating: 
Summary: A Sold, Entertaining Look at Pop Culture
Review: While this book may not be the "best" book I have ever read, I would say it was the most entertaining. There is one problem though. To fully enjoy it you must think like the author. Klosterman tackles a different topic in each chapter and looks at it in a humrous light each time. While I personally found it hysterical, I could easily see someone else finding it to be nothing more than a set of annoying journal entries. If you are familiar with Klosterman's work and are a fan of his I would no doubt reccomend this book to you as I have to all my friends already. If you are not sure about him yet however, you may want to pick up a Spin magazine and check him out beforehand.
Rating:
Summary: Sex, Drug and Cocoa Puff-a-rific
Review: Yeah, that title pretty must covers it. Klosterman's essays are chock full (and I hate to use this term) of Gen-X references to everything we've grown up loving. Now, these aren't essays ON Saved by the Bell and Pamela Anderson, but rather, he uses cultural icons as a jumping off point for rambling, funny and (uh-oh) thought provoking discussions. Klosterman is the kind of guy that you would want to hang out with at a party. Look. You're either going to love this book or you're not. You're either to find the tangential, rambling essays endearing and interesting, or simply tangential and rambling. So what kinds of subjects are you in for? How about the Tori Paradox in which Klosterman deconstructs the idea of Tori on Saved by the Bell? One season, after Tiffany Amber Thiessen and Elizabeth Berkley had left for more naked pastures, Tori shows up. And then, just before a graduation special that was to air on NBC, Tori was gone. And Kelly and Jessie were back. Klosterman argues that Saved by the Bell is a lot like life. First people are there, and then they're not - gone. Only to be forgotten and at the most, vaguely remember. Of course, Klosterman explains much better than me. Just the pure assault of pop-cultural references was enough for me. It's not uncommon for Klosterman to reference such diverse items as the music of Radiohead, Who's the Boss and Trix cereal all in one essay. And I wouldn't be exalting his references if he was just throwing them out. They actually mean something to the people that grew up in the post-Boomer era...
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