The interplay between music and place is one of the most discussed subjects in academia. The literature is filled with narratives of specific places giving birth to music genres, often in association with the idea of authenticity. However, more and more studies challenge this association and rampant globalisation constantly gives rise to new questions, among others: do we live in an era of cultural homogenisation or heterogenisation (Appadurai Reference Appadurai1990, p. 218)? Following the premise brought up by Tony Mitchell (Reference Mitchell2011, p. 2), where ‘music is, perhaps, the most “globalized” of global cultural forms’, this book aims to rethink the relation between music and cities. Their review of the literature is rather succinct, but it offers an interesting glimpse of the research in different fields, including cultural geography of popular music and ethnographic studies.

The first part of the book is a re-examination of some cities as stated birthplaces of music genres. In the first two chapters Diane Pecknold explains how naming Nashville as the birthplace of country was done after the facts as a mean to defend economic interests, and Deena Weinstein dissects how the socio-economic context of Birmingham caused the growth of metal. Then, Anthony Macías looks at the representation of Chicano identities in Los Angeles punk and hip-hop and how it influenced local music in general. The last chapter is, in my opinion, the most interesting of this section: Steven Lee Beeber reveals in a enthralling manner how most of the first punk bands in New York tried to hide their Jewish roots behind a representation of Italian machismo. This chapter lightens the particular meaning of punk in New York City and leaves a door open for future investigation, namely regarding the reception of their representation outside the city.

With nine chapters, the core of the book resides in its second part, which deals with hybridisation, consumption and globalisation. Jeremy Wallach's well-documented essay about the reappropriation of punk in Indonesia stands out as one of the most interesting chapters of the volume. He explains how the punk scene developed without the intervention of Westerners but on the basis of imported objects (fanzines, recordings, patches), and that it does not bear any contradiction to religion or Indonesianness, a concept that is often wrongly understood by strangers. This idea leads Wallach to propose a new concept – indieglobalisation: ‘The most crucial aspect of this separate and distinct mode of globalization is not its structural difference from the globalization strategies employed by corporations, but its difference in cultural sensibility and priorities … often non-profit or even anti-profit’ (p. 156). For Wallach, indieglobalisation opens the possibility of bounded serial identities becoming unbounded. He also underlines that punk shows no sign of backing down in Indonesia.

The concept of shared identities is also explored in Chapter 12, where Brett Lashua and Joseph Minadeo analyse the results of their collaboration on the participatory documentary ‘One Day on Earth’ (ODOE). In one section of the film, introduced by the sentence ‘On 10.10.10, there were over 1,300 known styles of music’ (p. 211), Minadeo used participants' contributions from all over the world to create a collage in which they are performing together. This relates to Doreen Massey's idea that space is not a flat landscape, but ‘a myriad of stories going on’ (p. 215).

Quoting Appadurai (1990), Lashua and Minado note that ‘cultural homogenization and cultural heterogenization’ can both be seen in ODOE's soundtrack, but that it also represents ‘a global society becoming remarkably similar, in which neoliberal forces wipe out local distinctiveness’ where ‘sounds have become more familiar, similar, and harmonious (e.g. musicians' increasing use of the European harmonic system)’ (p. 218).

Lashua and Minadeo's report is a great contribution to the subject, but it seems like just a first step. It would perhaps have been relevant to provide further details on this supposed homogenisation, considering that they also produced an interactive map with pinpoints showing the location of each contribution that would have been of interest for further analysis. They also consider ODOE to be afterglobalist in its aim, ‘interested in reforming or transforming the processes of globalization’ (p. 219).

Finally, Hilary Pilkington's story of punk in Russia's Arctic is a great ethnographic research of the link between an ‘extreme’ location and music production. As an ancient gulag situated more than 2000 km to the north-east of Moscow, without any road connection to other cities and a place with a crumbling economy, Vorkuta is loosing huge sections of its population and is seen as a place with ‘too much past and very little future’ (p. 164). Her research shows that Vorkuta's punk scene did not develop a distinctive sound, but that it ‘provided a cultural strategy out of the “grey mass” of territorial gangs’ and is seen as having an ‘authentic hardness’ (p. 180).

The third part of the book deals with heritage and urban policy. John Connel and Chris Gibson's chapter about the Parkes Elvis Festival in rural Australia is a relevant reflection about how a little town with no link to Presley invented and maintained an artificial relationship without any claim of authenticity or cultural heritage. It is rather the enthusiastic participation of locals that makes it an essential destination for Elvis aficionados (p. 297).

In their conclusion, Connel and Gibson write: ‘Heritage can be created, invented, reified, and commodified. Cultural capital can be created and actively deployed. Music can be transferred across continents, embodied with new meanings, and successfully embedded in the fabric of improbable location’ (p. 299). This reflection could pretty much be applied to the entirety of the book.

Almost a third of the book consists of meticulous historiography of musical genres, but there is some lack of academic reflexion. For example, Spracklen's chapter on the second wave of Black Metal offers a history of the origins of the genre but does not expand on the way Norway's scene has been mythologised elsewhere, despite the fact this was its announced objective.

Neverthelss, this book is another brick in the wall covering the vast topic of the relation between places and sounds and is well worth reading.