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 "A gung-ho Candide with a taste for places it is wiser to avoid. . . the reports collected in 'I Wouldn't Start From Here' are graphic, comic, bemused and properly contemptuous of faith and ideology."
- Jonathan Meades, Books of the Year, Evening Standard
"An utterly sui generis report from the world's plague-spots."
- Michael Bywater, Books of the Year, New Statesman
"I can think of no more entertaining companion on a perilous journey than the ever hopeful, wildly optimistic yet clear-thinking Andrew Mueller."
- Rory MacLean, The Guardian
"A tour-de-force of hilarious, harrowing and ultimately enlightening reportage that will remind readers of the work of P.J. O'Rourke, Jon Ronson and David Foster Wallace."
- The Washington Times
"Unafraid to portray the world's warring people not just as victims and sufferers of legitimate grievances, but also as bloody-minded bastards and ill-informed fools."
- The Kathmandu Post
"A mix of dark humour and incisive political discourse."
- CNN Go
"His sardonic, self-deprecating perspective makes for unstuffy company."
- The Los Angeles Times
"Peppered with trenchant observations that reflect a nimble, cut-to-the-chase practicality, Mueller's interviews with everyone from terrorist warlords to international peacemakers are refreshingly irreverent yet astute."
- Booklist
"Travel writing in the danger zone that maintains its hipness and humanity."
- George Dunford, Books of the Year, Readings Monthly
"An addition to the genre founded by P.J. O'Rourke's 'Holidays In Hell', but it is one that pushes the boundaries."
- The Australian
"Mueller is the embodiment of what can happen with a fire in the belly and a desire to write out loud."
- Australian Book Review
"Mueller's travel writing is as incisive and entertaining as anything he's ever written about music."
- TNT
"A joy."
- Financial Times
"Delightfully laconic."
- The New Statesman
"Alternately chilling, funny and surprising, there's some great reportage here as Mueller struggles to reach an understanding of the world, quizzing the highest minister and the lowliest peasant."
- The Glasgow Herald
"His acerbic wit is matched by true empathy. . . we need this kind of gonzo journalism more than ever."
- Wanderlust
"Mueller spins what could have been the grimmest geopolitics into the finest black comedy. Like a print version of 'The Daily Show'."
- FHM
"Lively reporting from a gently humorous narrator."
- Chris Ayres, The Times
"Touching, often blackly comic reportage."
- GQ
"Brilliantly observed, articulate, often funny and immensely readable."
- The List
"Snappy, self-deprecating and sometimes outright hilarious."
- The Age
"Indelibly humorous and heartfelt."
- Sydney Sunday Telegraph
"An instructive ricochet between cities and continents and war zones."
- Time Out
"He brings to his material the mixture of rage and earthy irony that is the mark of a great satirist
. . . rewarding, thought-provoking and ludicrously funny."
- PopMatters
"Mueller's book is an excellent example of why today's brave, lucid hacks are forced to admit fear and confusion."
- South China Morning Post
"His reporting is sharp, his experiences terrifying and funny."
- Melbourne Herald-Sun
"If you enjoy your international affairs and politics with a good dose of cynicism and black humour, then this book is one to read."
- Brisbane Courier-Mail
"Often laugh-out-loud funny, the writing is utterly engaging."
- Launceston Sunday Examiner
"Mueller's irreverent reportage from abroad is fundamentally a clever cover for the author's ruminations on race, religion, revolution, rock'n'roll and other important issues since September 11, 2001."
- The West Australian
"As hilarious and sardonic a host as this ridiculous world of ours demands."
- Shortlist
"Mueller busies himself with finding the odd, the surreal and the laughable as much as the shocking and upsetting."
- New Zealand Herald
"A real eye for surreal moments of black humour. . . Mueller's work here digs much deeper than the standard newspaper travel essay."
- Sydney Sun-Herald
"His best story, about his brief, bizarre jailing in Cameroon, reads like a 21st century 'Goon Show' script."
- Good Reading
"A rollicking ride through some of the world's scariest scenarios."
- Kalgoorlie Miner
"A strikingly funny book about some seriously unfunny places."
- Perth Sunday Times
"Not bad for a guy from Wagga Wagga."
- The Wagga Wagga Advertiser
 "Andrew Mueller's piece about my band's tour with The Hold Steady is my favourite thing ever written about us. The fact that he is a war correspondent (though he claims otherwise) and music journalist and
approaches both with a similar slant makes him one of the most interesting
writers out there to me."
- Patterson Hood, Drive-By Truckers
"The most important critical anthology on popular music from a single author in a long time, its humour and insight equal with collections by Nick Tosches or Robert Palmer."
- KEXP Seattle
"Take one part P.J. O'Rourke, a healthy dose of Lester Bangs and a dash of Hunter S. Thompson, and you've got Andrew Mueller."
- Bookgasm
"Sharply observed and wittily constructed."
- Honolulu Star-Advertiser
"New edition of the rock classic."
- NY Press
"Mueller's humour makes for some enlightening reading."
- Biloxi-Gulfport Sun-Herald
"Sharp, witty and sarcastic."
- Chicago Tribune
 "Really rather good, in a barnstorming, country-punk sort of way. . . a highly capable ensemble."
- The Quietus
"A more than capable debut - allusive country-tough songs."
- Uncut
"The Blazing Zoos are undoubtedly fun, but they also have depth. . .
everything from Mueller's extensive use of brackets to the band's loving
recreation of classic country riffs bespeaks sincerity."
- Americana UK
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A WRONG FOR EUROPE
The politics of Eurovision
The Guardian, March 2005
SVANTE Stockselius is not a name likely to endure in infamy. This is because few will remember it, and fewer still be able to pronounce it. However, Mr Stockselius deserves all the opprobrium that can be heaped upon him. It was he, as Executive Supervisor of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest, who decreed that Ukraine’s entry, Greenjolly, had to rewrite their song, or face expulsion from the competition. Mr Stockselius, it may reasonably be concluded, is a pompous, humourless jobsworth. He has also fumbled a glorious opportunity to render watchable the wretched spectacle over which he presides.
Last December, Greenjolly’s song, “Rasom Nas Bagato!” (“Together We Are Many!”) was the anthem of Ukraine’s revolution. Given that this year’s Eurovision is being held in Kiev – following 2004’s victory by leatherclad thunder goddess Ruslana – it would have made a rousing addition to what is doubtless an otherwise routinely dismal lineup. However, Mr Stockselius took exception to the song’s lyrics, which big up Victor Yuschenko, the mottled survivor of a bizarre poisoning attempt who is now Ukraine’s president. Eurovision, declared Mr Stockselius, is “non-political”.
Maybe Mr Stockselius has never watched Eurovision, but “non-political” does not figure among the many names that the contest can rightly be called. Eurovision is legendary as an arena for settling diplomatic scores, venting ethnic grievance, baiting national rivals and undermining governments – and, what’s more, these moments are almost always the highlights.
Portugal’s 1974 entry – Paulo De Carvalho’s execrable “After Goodbye” – was used as the signal to launch the coup that unloaded a decades-old dictatorship. Throughout Franco’s rule, Spain’s entries were often thinly-veiled paeans to freedom (“I’m changing tomorrow, there’s no turning back,” warbled Karina in 1971’s “Tomorrow I’m Coming Your Way”). In April 1982, to demonstrate that democracy had not dampened their sense of humour, Spain’s Lucia came to the contest, held in a Britain at war with Argentina, and performed a tango.
The dismemberment of Yugoslavia was reflected in Bosnia-Hercegovina’s first entry, in 1993: an appropriately shell-shocked and reproachful ditty called “The Whole World’s Pain”. Even the Middle East imbroglio had a turn – in a gesture demonstrating commendably rock’n’roll disregard for career prospects and personal safety, 2000’s Israeli entrant, Ping Pong, rounded off their number by waving Syrian flags and demanding peace.
More of this sort of thing should be encouraged, not less. If Mr Stockselius has his way, viewers will be left only with whatever amusement they can wring from the shamelessness of the Greek and Cypriot publics, who consistently swap top marks, however diabolical their entries. It’s these cultural and political subtexts – as well as the ludicrous hair, cretinous hosts, painful scripted banter and sensationally dreadful clothes – that make Eurovision worth enduring. Greenjolly are themselves splendidly dubious ring-ins: at the prompting of Ukraine’s new government, they and their rabble-rousing tune were ushered past Ukraine’s national heats straight into the final run-off, where there were mutterings that the phone-vote was as rigged as the election which prompted Ukraine’s revolution in the first place.
Or does Mr Stockselius seriously think we’re tuning in for the music?
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