Jeremy Tuman’s incandescent novel Stereo Killer makes a joke out of the joke, "Let’s get the band back together, man." When the main character’s cynical former front man calls to see if Chet Screamer wants to take a respite from his job as a part-time high-school teacher, head to Europe for a reunion tour, set his SG on stun, and risk screwing up a potential new relationship, even before his undesired stint of celibacy gets broken, he reluctantly says yes. And so, the garage punkers the Stereo Killers are off on a low-budget summer blitz through dive bars, a journey on which the only sure things are dodgy-to-no sleeping accommodations, unpredictable audiences, too much boozing, and searing, primitive rock 'n' roll. This ain’t some rock-star return; this is the ear-busting reality of a band blasting back into the underground of trashy tunes and moments of jagged ecstasy.

This audiobook is fierce, true, hilarious, beautiful, tragic, and heavy with earned wisdom. Tuman’s prose is as in-your-face as a kid flung from a mosh pit or a guitar solo thrashed out while the guitarist is falling down. Tuman knows his characters, their musical salvation stories, and their hardships. He also knows what it’s like to be the best kind of losers, meaning those who find what they weren’t even sure was lost.