Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll

A wild trip through the fascinating nexus of the occult and rock and roll. From the rumors of Robert Johnson's devilish dealings through the Stone's majestic Satanic tomfoolery, Black Sabbath's heavy doom metal, and the postmodern chaos magick of bands like Psychic TV and Coil, Season of the Witch covers all the important territory. It's not encyclopedic, but more like a smoky, meandering late-night conversation with the archetypal oddball friend who turned us on to all of the atavistic secrets and occult mysteries hiding in his record collection (the same guy who likely read Tolkien and played D&D).

A lot of this has been covered before but never collected into one volume. And as with all good books about music, I discovered plenty of bands I'd missed along the way. Top notch rock journalism for those with an interest in the esoteric subtext of some of our greatest popular music.

My one criticism is that there's not a lot of occult theory here—for that you'll have to look elsewhere.