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I wish you could hear the shrieks of delight I made the first time I read this. I laughed so hard I lost weight.
In other words, “Graph Out Loud,” compiled by online site GraphJam.com, is the bees’ knees. The book, which converts pop culture references into pie charts, bar charts and Venn diagrams, had me roaring from start to finish. It certainly isn’t important, meaningful or useful in any practical sense, but its creative geekiness is narcotic.
You don’t read this book so much as decode what its graphs represent. Every page features a scholarly-looking graph, chart or checklist that deconstructs popular songs, TV shows and other ephemera. It takes a little while to understand what the charts mean at times, but once you wrap your brain around each concept, a wave of gut-busting explosions is inevitable.
From the pie chart demonstrating “Amy Winehouse’s Possible Responses to Rehab”—three equal-sized pieces that all say “No”—to the line graph “Appropriateness of Move Busting (As per the dictates of Young MC),” “Graph Out Loud” is simultaneously cerebral and hilarious. It takes pop references that are already funny and improves upon them, while also reinvigorating musty, oft-used ones. For example, I’ve heard enough people butcher Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” to last infinity lifetimes, but the book’s word-by-word deconstruction of the song, measuring each vocalist’s pitch and volume relative to the time elapsed, gave the song a freshness that I thought was impossible.
As I went through this book and examined each individual chart, I would first feel mentally stimulated; then, as I decoded their meanings, the song or theme music it referred to would play in my head, and I would feel elation.
As it is with most things pop culture, I found this book almost at random. I was at the bookstore, scanning the humor section for something quirky, when I discovered this beauty. It felt like kismet.
But things didn’t start out that way. I remember hearing Norah Jones ooze out of the speakers, or something similarly awful and “tasteful,” as I skimmed through some “Bro Guide” that teaches men to be douchebags around women. After a few pages of this manifesto for plaguing society, I found a funny “female crazy/hotness ratio” chart, and I wanted more. I’d always liked humorous graphs, but now I wanted a whole damn book full of them.
I searched until this lovely package of useless facts caught my eye, like a crossword puzzle on crack. Don’t ask me why finding this book was important; I just wanted to get my geek on and the only way to do so was with more pie charts. I was so certain it was worthy I bought it after glancing at one page.
Some of my favorite charts are the map depicting “Geographical Regions Of The World Favored By Totos Of Pop-Cultural Note” (i.e. Kansas and Africa), or the map that illustrates “The Migratory Patterns Of Fresh Royalty,” which refers to Will Smith’s 1990s TV show “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” In my world, that’s comedy gold.
One weakness of “Graph Out Loud,” besides the fact that it freshly spritzes a culture already saturated with trivial information, is some of the references may be difficult or impossible to decipher. This is especially true for younger readers who aren’t aware of—or don’t care to know—anything that happened before they were born.
Another weakness is that it loses almost all of its readability after the first time through—once you figure out what the charts mean, they’re no longer surprising or intellectually rewarding. This is a minor flaw, though, since books like this are intrinsically fluffy and light and never intend to compete with the works of Immanuel Kant or Ayn Rand. Also, it might make you feel smarter, but in reality it turns your brain into mush. But again, the reader expects this going in.
So if you’re the kind of pop culture fanatic who watches VH1’s “I Love the 80s” marathons like Rain Man watched Wapner on “The People’s Court,” then you’ll want to grind this book into a paste and shoot it into your veins. It will be a revelation, I promise you.
If you only have a normal interest in TV and music, then some parts will baffle you and some will amuse. And if you’re Amish you’ll probably hate this book, though if you’re allowed to read college newspapers and you love “Graph Out Loud,” then the Old Order’s standards are really slipping.
Anyway, this is the literary equivalent of a mix tape, made by people who wear pocket protectors and ironic knee-high stripey socks, or at least want you to think they do.
There’s so much potential here for a sequel. There’s the obvious possibilities like a 1990s-themed book, or niche markets like indie rock songs and 1970s movies. Since this was an online phenomenon first, one of these ideas is probably already in the works.
OK, here’s my last sell. If you’re a geek in the Seth Rogen sense of the word, a corporate underling with a sense of humor, or even if you have a latent nerd streak, this is for you.
The only people “Graph Out Loud” can’t possibly entertain are humorless business types or elderly, crotchety folks who remember when a dollar bought you a new car and stopped following popular culture when Milton Berle went off the air.
For everyone else, read this and graph your ass off.
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