I once wrote a letter to the editor (published, and I was young enough to be excited by that) of ROLLING STONE complimenting them on their hiring of Sheffield, whose excellent, passionate and informative music criticism I had been introduced to via his "Spin Record Guide" entries, as a full-time staff critic. Decades later, I'm reminded why I was such a fan of this particular professional fan: This book is impressively knowledgeable, affirming Sheffield's self-confessed nerd/Bowie-geek status; but he saves himself from the usual obnoxious-seeming nerd-insularity/exclusiveness of name-dropping, lyric-quoting, and obscure fact-referencing by doing it all in such a clearly generously, enthused spirit; he's looking to initiate you into his subject, not remind you that he's initiated and you're not, or at least not as fully as he. He's a true, unabashedly obsessive fan for whom being right or wrong about anything (and he's wrong at least about THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH, but he argues his anti-Roeg position well) takes second place to sharing how wonderful an experience the music is, whether you take him up on his open invitation to hear it from his very sensitive, articulate perspective or not.