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Joe Murphy of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, complains that the term "axe," [p. 6] can describe other instruments besides an electric guitar. "Yeah, I know, it's a 'rock' snob's dictionary, not jazz or country, but the term 'axe' can also apply to saxophones and other non-electrified instrumentation. You knew that." Indeed, we did, Joe. One of us even used to play the alto "axe" before getting into more serious pursuits like writing satire. It might behoove Joe, and other nitpickers, to visit the Nitpicker's Archives to see if their nitpicks have already been addressed before writing in. Had Joe visited these archives, he would have seen that Greil Marcus of Berkeley, California, had brought up the "axe" issue in this nitpick.

That said, Joe makes a persuasive, if over-the-top-Snobby, case that the Pixies [p. 95] aren't truly a "Boston-based" band in the vein of the Cars or the J. Geils Band. Joe cites the fact that only the drummer, David Lovering, is a Boston native, and quotes at length some interview where Pixies frontman Black Francis/Charles Thompson says, "We just ended up in Boston... and got out as soon as we could!"

And though the Rock Snob brain trust was on the fence about including Robert Pollard's recently dissolved band Guided by Voices in the book, Joe has us reconsidering for the next edition with this smart assessment: "When it comes to masturbatory esotericism in the pursuit of 'dadaist' rock with a kind of Warholian mass-production ethic, I think GbV and Rock Snobs are utterly bound to each other."