Piero Scaruffi

Scaruffi in 2016

Piero Scaruffi (* 1955 in Trivero , Italy ) is an Italian-American music journalist . He has also published volumes of poetry and books on artificial intelligence and cognitive science .

Education and professional career

1974 Scaruffi made his computer science - diploma with honors at ITIS Giuseppe Peano in Turin . He then worked as a software consultant at SofTec in Italy until 1982 . At the University of Turin, he completed his mathematics studies summa cum laude in 1982 , during which he had dealt with general relativity . From 1982 to 1995 he worked as a software engineer , manager and consultant for Olivetti in Cupertino and Ivrea . During this time he was visiting professor for artificial intelligence at Harvard University (1984) and Stanford University (1995).

Scaruffi was President of OmniwareE in Redwood City from 1995-1998 and then until 2003 senior systems engineer at Intellicorp in Mountain View . At the same time he was a member of the Governing Board of Directors of the Leonardo Journal 2000-2003 . From 2003-2006 Scaruffi worked as an independent consultant. In June 2008, he chaired the first Big Bang Conference at the University of California, Berkeley .

journalism

Piero Scaruffi wrote books on the history of rock , of jazz , of pop music and the avant-garde , all of it since 2003 self-published were. These books are also available on his website, which was the subject of a 2006 New York Times article .

• 1974: First (unpublished) version of his major work A History of Rock Music
• 1989: The first of six parts of A History of Rock Music are published in Italy
• 2003: The first edition of A History of Rock Music is released in the USA
• 2005: Piero Scaruffi's History of Avantgarde Music (not published)
• 2007: A History of Jazz Music and A History of Popular Music before Rock Music
• 2009: A History of Rock and Dance Music (second edition of A History of Rock Music )

Controversy

Piero Scaruffi's view of the history of rock music differs considerably from that of almost all other music journalists and thus deviates significantly from the generally accepted view (for example with regard to his appreciation of rather unknown bands from the Canterbury school of British progressive rock and krautrock ), which on the one hand earned him great fame and a lot of recognition, but on the other hand also a lot of criticism.

His assessment of the position of Elvis Presley and, above all, the Beatles in rock history has been causing heated controversy and hostility towards him for years. Scaruffi describes Elvis Presley as the first big swindle of rock 'n' roll and the ultimate predator of black hits and he sees the Beatles as a really good pop group (also due to the achievements of George Martin ), but nothing more. Because of the enormous difference between their skills or achievements and their popularity, he calls them the most overrated band of all time.

Influential		Overrated		Underrated
#	Interpreter	#	Interpreter	#	Interpreter
1	Chuck Berry	1	The Beatles	1	Tim Buckley
2	The Velvet Underground	2	Elvis Presley	2	Red Krayola
3	The Rolling Stones	3	Prince	3	Robert Wyatt
4th	Neil Young	4th	David Bowie	4th	Captain Beefheart
5	Ramones	5	U2	5	Pere Ubu
6th	Bob Dylan	90s		6th	fist
7th	Captain Beefheart	1	Radiohead	7th	Fetus
8th	Can	•	Pavement	8th	Sandy Bull
9	Pere Ubu	•	Guided by Voices	9	Nico
10	Bruce Springsteen	•	Beck	10	Jim Steinman
11	Pink Floyd	•	Moby	11	Vampire Rodents
12	Byrds	•	Aphex Twin

His assessment of the Beatles:

• The Beatles were neither good songwriters nor good composers nor good musicians.
• The Beatles' music had no technical innovation and no creative depth. They only wrote 3-minute pop songs and later albums like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band or The Beatles , on which the band experimented with other genres, consisted only of pop songs (which were also completely outdated at the time). (He sees this "faux avant-garde", ie pretending to be avant-garde but actually playing lovely pop music, in the work of Radiohead .)
• The “ Aryan ” music of the Beatles erased any trace of black rock 'n' roll music and replaced African rhythms with linear western melodies.
• They represented the complete reaction against (black) rock 'n' roll, against an imminent musical revolution and beyond that against the social and political revolution ( student protests , Bob Dylan , hippies ).

The best rock albums

For a better understanding of Scaruffi's view of rock history, the following is a table with what, in his opinion, the 42 best rock albums of all time (rating from 9) and in comparison the top 42 (excluding jazz and live albums) on the Acclaimed website Music (A), a database that compiles as many music leaderboards as possible. (Note: 3000+ means that this album is ranked between 3001 and 4781; 4781+ means that this album does not appear in the database.)

Piero Scaruffi

Rating	year	Interpreter	album	A.
	1969	Captain Beefheart	Trout Mask Replica	54
	1974	Robert Wyatt	Rock bottom	196
	1971	fist	fist	1787
	1967	The Velvet Underground	The Velvet Underground and Nico	4th
	1966	Bob Dylan	Blonde on blonde	7th
	1968	Van Morrison	Astral Weeks	15th
	1967	The Doors	The Doors	24
	1991	My Bloody Valentine	Loveless	74
	1977	Suicide	Suicide	184
	1967	The Velvet Underground	White light / white heat	190
	1984	Hüsker Dü	Zen arcade	204
	1978	Pere Ubu	Modern dance	226
	1980	Bruce Springsteen	The River	289
	1991	Slint	Spiderland	294
	1984	Minutemen	Double nickels on the dime	297
	1973	New!	New!	533
	1990	Fugazi	Repeater	609
	1970	Soft machine	3	650
	1979	The Pop Group	Y	678
	1990	Nick Cave	The Good Son	778
	1969	Frank Zappa	Uncle Meat	822
	1981	The Gun Club	Fire of Love	924
	1970	Third Ear Band	Third Ear Band	1802
	1991	Mercury Rev	Yerself Is Steam	1861
	1972	Klaus Schulze	Will-o'-the-wisp	2047
	1967	Red Krayola	Parable of Arable Land	2057
	1971	Nico	Desert Shore	2322
	1990	Royal Trux	Twin Infinitives	2565
	1984	Butthole surfers	Psychic powerless	2970
	1973	John Fahey	Fare Forward Voyagers	2977
	1973	Popol Vuh	Hosanna mantra	3000+
	1994	Lisa Germano	Geek the girl	3000+
	1985	Fetus	Nail	3000+
	1978	The Residents	Not Available	3000+
	1992	Red House Painters	Down Colorful Hill	3000+
	1970	Tim Buckley	Lorca	4781+
	1992	Morphine	Good	4781+
	1993	Vampire Rodents	Lullaby Land	4781+
	1984	Diamanda Galás	Diamanda Galás	4781+
	1981	Jon Hassell	Dream Theory In Malaya	4781+
	1997	Hash Jar Tempo	Well Oiled	4781+
	1991	Type O negatives	Slow, deep and hard	4781+

Acclaimed Music

Rating	year	Interpreter	album	A.
	1967	Velvet Underground	The Velvet Underground and Nico	4th
	1966	Bob Dylan	Blonde on blonde	7th
	1968	Van Morrison	Astral Weeks	15th
	1967	The Doors	The Doors	24
	1972	The Rolling Stones	Exile on Main St.	8th
	1965	Bob Dylan	Highway 61 Revisited	11
	1967	Jimi Hendrix	Are You Experienced?	12
	1988	Public Enemy	It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back	17th
	1968	Jimi Hendrix	Electric Ladyland	22nd
	1977	television	Marquee Moon	25th
	2004	Arcade Fire	Funeral	34
	1966	The Beach Boys	Pet sounds	1
	1991	Nirvana	Nevermind	3
	1967	The Beatles	Sgt.Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band	5
	1971	Marvin Gaye	What's going on	6th
	1979	The clash	London Calling	9
	1977	Sex pistols	Never Mind the Bollocks	10
	1997	Radiohead	OK computer	13
	1975	Bruce Springsteen	Born to Run	18th
	1975	Patti Smith	Horses	19th
	1969	The Beatles	Abbey Road	20th
	1987	Prince	Sign "☮" the Times	26th
	1986	The Smiths	The Queen Is Dead	28
	1968	The Rolling Stones	Beggars Banquet	30th
	1971	Led Zeppelin	Led Zeppelin IV	31
	1971	The Who	Who's next	33
	1980	Talking heads	Remain in Light	35
	1976	Ramones	Ramones	37
	1987	U2	The Joshua Tree	38
	1980	Joy Division	Closer	41
	1973	Stevie Wonder	Innervisions	42
	1972	David Bowie	The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust	16
	1973	Pink Floyd	The Dark Side of the Moon	21st
	1975	Bob Dylan	Blood on the Tracks	23
	1982	Michael Jackson	thriller	27
	1991	Massive attack	Blue lines	32
	1969	The Rolling Stones	Let it bleed	36
	1968	The Beatles	The Beatles	14th
	1966	The Beatles	revolver	2
	1965	The Beatles	Rubber Soul	29

bibliography

• 1987: L'Intelligenza Artificiale. (Artificial Intelligence), Muzzio (Italian)
• 1989–1997: Storia della Musica Rock. Arcana
• 1991: L'Ultimo. (The Last One), Il Salice (Italian)
• 1991: La Mente Artificiale, (The Artificial Mind), Angeli, Italy.
• 1991: Guida alla Musica d'Avanguardia. (A Guide to Avantgarde Music)
• 1994: La Fabbrica del Pensiero. (The Factory of Thought), La Stampa (Italian)
• 1996: Il Terzo Secolo. (The Third Century), Feltrinelli (Italian essays on the USA )
• 1998: Dialogo degli Amanti. (Dialogue of the Lovers), Lacaita (Italian)
• 2003: A History of Rock Music 1951-2000. Iuniverse , ISBN 0-595-29565-7
• 2003: Thinking About Thought. Iuniverse, ISBN 0-595-26420-4
• 2006: The Nature of Consciousness. Omniware, ISBN 0-9765531-1-2
• 2007: A History of Jazz Music 1900-2000. ISBN 978-0-9765531-3-7
• 2007: A History of Popular Music before Rock Music. ISBN 978-0-9765531-2-0
• 2008: A History of Rock and Dance Music. ISBN 978-0-9765531-5-1 (Volume 1: 1950–1989), ISBN 978-0-9765531-6-8 (Volume 2: 1990–2008)
• 2009: Synthesis - A Book of Nothingness Poetry. ISBN 978-0-9765531-7-5

Web links

• Piero Scaruffi's homepage
• Article of the New York Times about Scaruffi
• Piero Scaruffi Page at Stanford University

Individual evidence

1. ^ Page of the Leonardo Journal with new members of the Governing Board (December 2000)
2. ↑ Leonardo / ISAST: Leonardo Day at the Berkeley Big Bang 2008
3. ^ Scaruffi's music reviews, Musica
4. ^ Dan Morrell : The Greatest Web Site of All Time . In: The New York Times: Arts . The New York Times Company . October 15, 2006. Retrieved January 30, 2011.
5. ^ Piero Scaruffi: Piero Scaruffi's History of Avantgarde Music
6. ^ Piero Scaruffi: A History of Jazz Music
7. ^ Piero Scaruffi: A History of Popular Music before Rock Music
8. ^ Piero Scaruffi: A History of Rock and Dance Music
9. ↑ The History of Rock Music: Canterbury 1968-73 (PDF; 56 kB)
10. ↑ The History of Rock Music: Cosmic Music 1969-72 (PDF; 82 kB)
11. ↑ Piero Scaruffi: Beatles
12. ^ Piero Scaruffi: Elvis Presley
13. ^ Piero Scaruffi: Radiohead
14. ↑ Piero Scaruffi: Best Rock Albums of all Times
15. ↑ Acclaimed Music: The All Time Top 3000 Albums. Retrieved June 3, 2011 .