One of the best books we've ever read on any sort of creative scene and cultural moment – a superbly-penned account of the rise of underground comix in the 60s, and the growth and changes of the movement in the decades that followed! Author Brian Doherty makes the scene come alive in ways that are even more powerful than most music books that try to do the same – tracing the disparate roots of key figures like Robert Crumb, Gilbert Shelton, Trina Robbins, and others – as they end up converging in San Francisco in the late 60s, finding a way to express themselves through new styles and new means of production and distribution – then spread out as the 70s move in, and underground comix provide the building blocks for the graphic novel generation to come. The book is insanely well-researched, but also written with a lively style that really gets at both the creative talents and individual personalities of each of the folks involved – all at a level that makes for a hell of a read that goes way past the usual book on comics, music, or any other sort of cultural creative scene! Hardcover edition is 439 pages. Book

Maybe the largest book we've ever seen to focus on the artwork of Robert Rauschenberg – a huge volume that's overflowing with full color images – and which traces a lineage of creative activity that's much longer than we would have guessed! The book's divided up into chapters on so many different eras in the career of this groundbreaking visual artist – and also contains a good deal of history and writings on his artwork along with the images – served up in a super-heavy, hardcover book that's over 350 pages in all – stuffed with paintings, collages, photographs, and plenty more! Book

Writer Paul Steinbeck has already given us a great book on the Art Ensemble Of Chicago – but this time around, he looks at the larger scene from which they came, the groundbreaking AACM moment in jazz, which emerged in Chicago in the late 60s! Steinbeck provides some cultural and historical context, but also focuses in on key recordings that helped to define the special genius of AACM musicians and their united vision – with an approach that's build around different records on a chapter by chapter basis – even leading up to a few more recent recordings that show the continuing influence and growth of the organization. Along the way, Steinbeck provides some musical notations and deeper analysis of the sounds from his perspective as a musicologist – very illuminating to us, as we tend to have much more of a visceral response to these records – a lineup that includes Air Time by Air, Levels & Degrees Of Light by Muhal Richard Abrams, Sound by Roscoe Mitchell, Voyager by George Lewis, Nonaah by Roscoe Mitchell, Composition 76 by Anthony Braxton, Ten Freedom Summers by Wadada Leo Smith, and Mandorla Awakening II by Nicole Mitchell. The hardcover book features many charts and scores throughout – and is a total of 272 pages in length. Book

A really well-done document of a pretty amazing time in the Chicago music scene – a huge early 90s burst of creative activity – one that gave the world a handful of famous groups, and a much bigger number of even better acts who really made the city great! Writer Bruce Adams issued some of the music on his label Kranky – but the book here goes way past that imprint, and instead presents a really vivid portrait of the scene at large – clubs, labels, bands, writers, and all the other forces that helped really make Chicago great back then – a city that was bubbling over with new energy right at the same time we started Dusty Groove on the south side. Adams definitely has plenty of his own opinions throughout, but those are also balanced with his insider perspective – which comes forth with a well-balanced explanation of so many intricacies, at a level that's so different than the usual sort of book of this nature, especially from the coasts. And if you're worried that the book is too rock-heavy, don't – because players in the scene here also include Dusty Groove stalwarts like Ken Vandermark, Fred Anderson, and Joshua Abrams. Hardcover edition is 288 pages. Book

A beautiful combination of words and image – as the poetry of Patricia Smith is combined with vintage 70s photographs by Michael Abramson – the same sort of material that was featured in the Light On The Southside book/album from the Numero Group! This presentation is quite different than that one, though – as Abramson's images from Chicago nightclubs are presented on stark full pages, often with Smith's words as a sidebar – as if she's writing lyrics to his music, in a collaboration that comes off beautifully. As with Light On The Southside, the photographs here were taken at Chicago clubs that include Pepper's Hideout, Perv's House, and The High Chapparal – but they seem nicely different here, and include a number of images that were not in that book. 190 pages, hardcover, and filled with striking images and black and white. Book