How do you land a sweet six-figure marketing gig at the hallowed record label known for having signed everyone from Led Zeppelin to Stone Temple Pilots? You start with a resume like Dan Kennedy's:

• Dressed up as a member of Kiss every Halloween
• Memorized Led Zeppelin IV at age ten
• Fronted a lip-sync band in junior high
• Worked as a college DJ while he was a college drop-out

In his outrageous memoir, McSweeney's contributor Kennedy chronicles his misadventures at a major record label. Whether he's directing a gangsta rapper's commercial or battling his punk roots to create an ad campaign celebrating the love songs of Phil Collins, Kennedy's in way over his head. And from the looks of those sitting around the boardroom, he's not alone.

Egomaniacs, wackos, incompetents, and executive assistants who know more than their seven-figure bosses round out this power-ballad to office life and rock and roll.

"Kennedy, a McSweeney's contributor, offers an entertaining explanation of how, after years of stumbling through adulthood, he landed an improbable gig writing and producing ads for Atlantic Records. For a kid who grew up dressing like Gene Simmons each Halloween in the 1970s, this should be a dream job — hobnobbing with rock stars and industry legends while making more money than he ever had before. The trouble is that, by the early 21st century, he finds that Atlantic is more corporate than rock. Kennedy's run-ins with rock stars involve helping Jewel sell razors and mistaking Duran Duran's manager for a member of the band. When he's not inadvertently insulting aging rockers, Kennedy worries incessantly about office politics — whether he's made a permanent enemy of a co-worker by asking what kind of muffin she's eating, which executives to greet in the hallway and which to ignore. Kennedy's style — hilarious, paranoid and vulnerable — captures wonderfully the absurdity of the corporate music industry. Readers will appreciate the many lists that pepper the book, including 'Inappropriate Greetings and Salutations for Middle-Aged White Record Executives to Exchange: #1. Hello, Dawg.'" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Seeing the world through Kennedy is like smoking some magical drug that makes everything hilarious in ways that cannot be explained." Scot Armstrong, screenwriter of Old School

"Dan Kennedy is the laugh-out-loud Proust of American post-youth strivers. In Rock On, he cements his status as master of the hysterical inner monologue, laying bare the music biz with an effortless, beyond-hip immediacy that is impossible to resist." Jerry Stahl, author of Permanent Midnight

"The music business isn't pretty, but it's pretty funny. Humor writer and McSweeney's contributor Kennedy recounts his short career as a marketing executive for Atlantic Records.... Hilarious.... A fitfully funny, ultimately sad look at the continuing decay of our popular culture." Kirkus

"Kennedy's self-deprecating wit is highly appealing." Booklist

In his outrageous memoir, Kennedy chronicles his misadventures at a major record label. Egomaniacs, wackos, incompetents, and executive assistants who know more than their seven-figure bosses round out this power-ballad to office life and rock and roll.

A regular contributor to McSweeney's and host of the popular Moth StorySLAM in New York, Dan Kennedy is the author of the widely acclaimed Loser Goes First.