UNSUNG HEROES OF ROCK ’N’ ROLL by Nick Tosches (Scribners)

THE BEST OF COUNTRY MUSIC by John Morthland (Dolphin/Doubleday)

by Mitchell Cohen

Crisp, Texas; Mount Olive, Alabama; Locust Ridge, Tennessee; Binkly, Arkansas; Winchester, Virginia; Maud, Oklahoma. The names that tumble through these two books are the stops on the winding trail of American music, the mutant music of the disenfranchised rednecks, blacks, hillbillies, and outcasts of no particular category who made sounds that could curl the hair

on the back of your neck. Rhythm & blues, honky-tonk, rockabilly, western swing, jumpin’ jive, doowop: Nick Tosches and John Morthland tell how they were hatched on the fringes of polite society, about the characters that shaped this glorious noise.