If this book isn’t really a book about music and is instead a straight-forward academic analysis, then what is it an analysis of? The second half of the title gives a clue: A Journey to the End of Taste. Besides being pretentiously hilarious, that phrase tells the real focus of the book. The concern is not with the Celine Dion album per say but with the very notion that people like it and think that it’s good music. Beyond that, it’s a book about why anybody likes what they do, and why some things are considered to be of “good” or “bad” taste, “good” and “bad” art. Furthermore, just as the title implies, it’s a “journey”, definitive claims are saved until the end. Keeping with the academic theme, it’s a traditional, Montaignian essaying of a topic.

By placing an emphasis on the word “journey”, the word “taste” loses its meaning as a sense or feeling that something is aesthetically worthwhile and instead defines it as a place, an attainable destination. “Taste” is used as if this mythical Land of Good Taste exists somewhere, and each one of us can potentially live there, if only we’re willing to take the journey, if only we’re willing to move along with the author. Wilson refers to this idea of movement, writing: “This book is an experiment in taste, in stepping deliberately outside one’s own aesthetics” (18). And move outside the comfort zone Wilson does, not only thematically but personally, particularly when he uses his failed marriage as a sort of barometer for his appreciation of the album. “Shame has a way of throwing you back upon your own existence,” he later writes, “on the unbearable truth that you are identical with you, that you are your limits” (150).

Early on, Wilson hedges his bet, defining his book as being, “about reasonable people carting around cultural assumptions that make them assholes to millions of strangers” (2). Now that’s a modus operandi that I can get behind! Just check the byline of this very website: “The music that will change your life tomorrow.” What the hell is that all about? Surely, ours is a comment on taste, a nearsighted play on the idea that all people, on some level, want to like “good” music.

A large portion of the book addresses music criticism en masse, attempting to figure out why some artists are critical favorites and others are not. “It arises every time a critic makes a top ten list: Am I just naming the movies or books or albums I liked most in the preceding year, or am I asserting these ten works somehow were in fact the best or most significant? Do I dare to say the two claims are related?” (73). These self-reflexive rhetorical questions must be asked by music critics not just at the end of the year, but every time they sit at their keyboards. Many writers dodge answering them by adding the caveat that they are choosing their “favorite” albums (songs, books, whatever). This is a safety measure if nothing else, designed to cover the writer’s ass in the face* of true academic scrutiny. I will venture that any self-respecting, and I would hope that includes every professional, writer believes that his or her own taste is in-line with what is actual, irrefragable truth. If not, all of music criticism, and by extension, all of art criticism, is reduced to a mere battle of witty explanations. If there is no inherent hierarchy of art, then there is in actuality no good art and there are no experts, one artist is no greater than any other; it’s all just matters of personal preferences.

Unfortunately, deferring to an expert’s opinion, particularly when it comes to music, is something that most of us are uncomfortable with. “It’s always other people following crowds, whereas my own taste reflects my specialness” (79), Wilson writes, and his point goes beyond indie rock snobs and professional music critics. I can count on my hand the number of people I’ve met who genuinely ask to be told what good music is, and I’m not one of them. This strikes me as odd because in other areas of skill and preference, people tend to be less defensive. I don’t argue with my mechanic very often; I consider our nanny an authority on when and what I should feed my child. Music is different though. Perhaps enough people have bought into the notion that music is a personal experience that it has become truth. As a result, music criticism has largely become a politically correct exercise in handsome writing.

Here, at least, I will not be so gutless. Like her songs or not, to deny that Celine is anything but a tremendous talent is flat-out wrong, a notion Wilson addresses: “It’s not uncommon for musicians to bypass taste categories when they hear technical achievement, and Celine seems to be such a case” (64). Wilson had that, at least, as a foundation to build his argument. To that point, enjoying this book has little or nothing to do with whether or not you enjoy Celine Dion’s music; it could have been about nearly any other album and had been just as enjoyable and thought provoking. As a music book, it is better than most; as an analysis and criticism of taste, it is essential.

But don't just take my word for it. Here, Carl Wilson addresses, among other things, the balance of power in the North American indie landscape, and the possibility that one-hundred million (+!) Celine Dion fans can't be wrong:

Randall Monty: Of all the books in the 33 1/3 series, your book really sticks out from the crowd – and not just because it's about Celine and some "cool" musician or band. I'm referring to the fact that it reads more like an academic text than any quote-unquote music book. Was this intentional, or did it just sort of end up that way?

Carl Wilson: I was definitely approaching the book as kind of a "case study" - it could have been about any popular music star who doesn't have the respect of critics and other self-styled music snobs. As such, it's not the kind of "behind the scenes" story that some of the 33 1/3 books are, and neither is it mainly a critical analysis just of the "text" in question, Dion's Let's Talk About Love album, although there's one chapter late in the book that is kind of like a mini-version of a typical 33 1/3 book, going song by song through the record.

So it's really a book about social, aesthetic and philosophical issues - which I hope are made much more fun by being thought about through the figure of Celine Dion. And it's also a document of a personal exploration: If millions of people enjoy this music and I don't, mightn't there be something wrong with me instead of something wrong with them?

RM: Are there any other artists you think would be appropriate for a treatise like, "journey to the end of taste?" Not necessarily ones that you would want to write about, but perhaps ones that you would be interested in reading? What the heck would somebody do with an artist like Kid Rock or Tony Orlando? (No reason for these two, they just popped into my head.)

CW: Yes - as I say, it's a case study, an experiment, and I could have put a lot of other people under the same kind of microscope. Because I'm Canadian, Celine is just one that particularly hit home with me. I was especially sensitive about her because she was so over-exposed in Quebec, where I lived when she was at the peak of her popularity, and because she's used as a punchline or an example when people make fun of Canada, for instance in the South Park movie song "Blame Canada": "When Canada is dead and gone, there'll be no more Celine Dion."

But I thought afterwards that it would be even timelier to write about Nickelback, who definitely come in for constant mockery and critical drubbing these days (and are also Canadian). You could do it about someone like Barry Manilow, or even Billy Joel, who's more on the borderline between acceptability and outcast status to music snobs. You could certainly write such a book about Mariah Carey, who divides people into lovers and haters much the way Celine does, though Mariah has a lot more defenders among critics.

You could write a book like that about teen pop, too - about, say, somebody like Ashlee Simpson - but I think the set of arguments would be different.

So in some ways I do feel like Celine is the perfect case for the aspects of taste battles that I most wanted to address.

RM: Do Celine Dion fans know that their taste in music sucks? Or, put a little less condescendingly, do Celine Dion fans try to rationalize why her music is good, like, say, the way a Beatles fan will defend the Lennon/McCartney canon or a classical music aficionado will defend one of Mozart's violin concertos?

CW: Yes, they'll defend her music just as passionately and sincerely as anyone else. The fact that they like Celine means they LIKE Celine. It's not an act. There might be a little campiness about it among some of her gay and lesbian following, and people might be conscious that sometimes she can be over the top, but they enjoy that. And they're discriminating of course - they generally have favourite and least-favourite albums, and so on - just like any other fan base.

What would be the advantage, after all, of having a musical taste that exposes you to teasing (not to mention the public scorn of the media, etc) if you didn't really hold it? If anybody's rationalizing or pretending, it's more likely to be people who claim to have high-status, refined tastes, right?

But do they know a lot of people think their taste in music sucks? Some do and some don't - like most things about taste, it depends on what circles you move in. They know a lot of critics and others dislike her but often they just dismiss that as jealousy.

RM: In an interview with Nation Public Radio, you (jokingly, I assume), refer to Canadians as "second class citizenry in North America", yet the balance of power has clearly shifted in the world of indie music, at least. (I'm thinking acts like Wolf Parade, Arcade Fire, et al.) Does this changing tide have any impact on Canadian citizens? Are people particularly proud, or is there even an acknowledgment of the current trend?

CW: Lots of Canadians are excited about the fact that Canadian bands are getting international attention. I'm not sure I'd say the balance of power has shifted, even in indie music - when an American band can't get noticed unless they're popular in Canada, then we can talk about role reversal. But it's nice that people who consider themselves "indie" listeners think of "from Canada" as a positive attribute now.

And there's a little bit of acknowledgment too - it was slower to come, the mainstream media will pay some attention to the Arcade Fire, etc. This year at the Junos - Canada's equivalent of the Grammys - it felt like there was more attention to independent-label bands (or people who used to be independents, such as Feist, who's become a very huge deal here) than ever before for that music-biz lovefest.

As well, a rival prize for Canadian album of the year, the Polaris, was started a couple of years ago - and it's decided by a jury of critics and broadcasters, no industry. That's pretty much a direct effort to give recognition to the kinds of bands you mean, although all Canadian albums are eligible.

RM: Changing gears a little... It's easy to see who some of your academic influences are (Such as the writers you refer to in your book). What other writers are you reading these days?

CW: I spent so much time reading music criticism in the time I was writing the book that I've been on a bit of a break from it. Right now I'm reading the late Chilean novelist Roberto Bolano's The Savage Detectives, though I do want to get around to Howard Hampton's collection of criticism too. I read a lot of poetry, I read a lot of magazines (though not so many music magazines anymore), I read the Internet. I finally started Simon [Reynold's] Generation Ecstasy a couple of weeks back. Probably the most influential on me was Greg Tate when he was writing regularly for the Village Voice, and Greil Marcus's Lipstick Traces was a big deal too.

RM: There is a lot of animosity between newspaper sports journalists and sports bloggers, yet this sort of schism doesn't seem to be happening in the word of music writing. For instance, music magazines will frequently cite websites in their stories while websites don't engage in the sort of media bashing that you can find on sports sites. Even you write for an established publication as well as for your own website! Why do you think that the elitist divide that separates traditional sports writing from fan writing doesn't really apply to music?

CW: I think among music critics the line between "fan" and "critic" is drawn more on the basis of quality of prose (and sometimes depth of knowledge) than by what job you hold, and that's partly because there are a lot fewer music reporting jobs than there are sports reporting jobs, so a lot of great writers have at one point or another done their music writing while also holding a day job or doing other kinds of freelancing and so forth.

Also, music blogging was partly invented by professional critics, so there's no presumption that blogs are necessarily just done by "fans" or "the kids." The exception is with mp3 blogs, however - and there I think you do find critics looking down on bloggers some. However, the information about what mp3 blogs are popular and who they're touting is all part of the arsenal music writers need -- because for most artists, there are no real stats of "wins" and "losses" or earned runs or whatever, nothing objective to measure the top performers. There are the charts, but early in an artist's career, they're irrelevant and they might always be irrelevant.

So we need a lot of metrics to convince editors and readers alike that an artist we're profiling is worth their attention, to back up our own opinions. Blog buzz has become one of those, even if in the next article that buzz starts getting used against them - that bloggers liked them but no one else ever did is an even worse charge than being a "critics' darling."

And again, this question of where the objective basis lies for taste evaluations is very much what the book's about. You'd have a hard time writing a Moneyball-style set of statistical predictors for musical success.

Carl Wilson is a writer and editor at the Globe and Mail (link). He is also writes for his own music blog, Zoilus.

Wilson, Carl. Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste. New York, NY: Continuum International Publishing Group, Inc. 2007.