This is a truly excellent book, seamlessly melding technological, social, and marketing histories, tracing the path that the music industry followed in the twentieth century, marking both the dynamism and the exploitation that characterized the industry. Suisman details how hits were made, giving a prehistory of payola that I never knew—there was a tradition of paying vaudeville etc. performers to sing particular songs to spur sales of sheet music. There’s a great chapter on the Black Swan label, an African-American-owned and -run music label, and why it ultimately went out of business. And every chapter is like that—some central concept like the use of performers’ images to sell records, with all its complexities in terms of economics, social effects, and political background explored, all feeding into the story of how music came to be ubiquitous in American life. ( )