by Daniel Colussi | I like rock books even though I understand that they’re a lowly form of literature. Too often they’re so poorly written as to be kind of a snooze (like Keith Richard’s much hyped memoir), but 2011 was kinder than usual. This year, I spent many lazy afternoons on the couch enjoying stories of intoxication and inspiration in the pages of the following fine rock bios. And you know, any of these titles would make a fine gift for that music nut in your life who seems to already have every album from every band that’s ever been released. Check them out after the jump…

Sammy Hagar “Red: My Uncensored Life In Rock.” Yes, Diamond Dave-era Van Halen is the band at its best, but Sammy’s life travails still make for killer reading. From his early days fronting Montrose through to the heady days of VH, right up to his current, horrible band Chickenfoot, Hagar has a lot of awesome stories. Like when he recollects how his life long interest in numerology began (he was asleep one night when aliens told him through a dream to study numbers, and then the next day he randomly found a book about numerology in his backyard that he’d never seen before. For real). This is the perfect Xmas gift for that long-haired, hesher-Uncle in your life.

Duff McKagen’s “It’s So Easy, And Other Lies.” Overshadowed by Slash and Axl, Duff was very much a part of GnR. And, in fact, his roots stretch to the very beginnings of Seattle’s punk rock scene. He’s got cred and character. Part of the book’s appeal is that Duff is a classy guy, so when recalling Axl’s ridiculous behaviour and GnR’s overblown drug use, everything is recounted in a loving and charitable tone. The sordid tales of Sunset Strip debauchery are cool, but the second half of the book is even better, when Duff gets clean and obsesses over physical fitness and healthy living. Duff, you are so rad.

Greil Marcus’ “The Doors: A Lifetime Of Listening To Five Mean Years.” Marcus’s writing kind of pisses me off most of the time. His obsession with writing Dylan books is on par with Kevin Costner’s obsession for making terrible baseball movies. But when covering The Doors, Marcus is right on because he was in the middle of the fiery LA psychedelic rock milieu from which the band emerged. He attended their first shows, and even though Marcus’s inner fanboy can be a bit much as he zeros in on every Morrisonian vocal nuance, it makes for great reading. And I don’t even like The Doors.

Simon Reynolds’ “Retromania: Pop Culture’s Obsession With It’s Own Past.”  For the last twenty years, Reynolds has written intelligently about all kinds of music, from punk rock, rave, and hip hop t0 musique concrete and soul – pretty much anything that any of us listen to. In Retromania he tries to understand why pop music can’t look beyond itself and why it can’t look beyond its most immediate past. As always, Reynolds writes with an appealing mix of accessibility sprinkled with academia. For those who like some Deleuze with their Dream Theater!

Patti Smith’s “Just Kids.” This memoir limits itself to just the transitional period when she first moved from small town Illinois to the thrills of early 70’s New York when the glamour of the 60’s was gone, the city was bankrupt, and the lofts were cheap. Smith artistically and romantically fell in with Robert Mapplethorpe and against a backdrop of NY in total disrepair. Just Kids is a kind of love story of the two unknowns when they were still inventing themselves. The shadows of Ginsberg, Warhol and Dylan lurk everywhere, and Smith completely brings to life an era of NY that’s long gone, making for some of the best rock prose of the year.

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Zulu Records veteran and tunage aficionado Daniel Colussi is the Music Editor of Scout Magazine.