Chuck Klosterman IV: a decade of curious people and dangerous ideas Chuck Klosterman Faber & Faber, 260pp, £12.99 ISBN 0571233996

A lot of people sincerely believe that American journalism is far better than British journalism. What they have in mind when they tell you this is undoubtedly the ever brilliant New Yorker, because no one, surely, can think that American newspapers are much cop. Factually accurate they may be; interesting and well-written they most definitely are not. American journalism is a bit like Henry Longfellow's girl with a curl: when she is good, she is very, very good; when she is bad, she is horrid.

Chuck Klosterman, formerly of the music magazine Spin and now of Esquire and the New York Times, is the living, breathing embodiment of this weird dichotomy. When he's good, he is pretty damn good. You think: this guy's great - why don't British men's magazines have any decent writers? But then you turn the page . . . uh-oh. Chuck! Come on! That last sentence doesn't even make sense.

Klosterman, who was born in 1972, grew up on a farm in North Dakota. He worked first as a music writer in Fargo, then as "cultural critic" for the Akron Beacon Journal in Akron, Ohio. Finally, in 2002, he moved to New York. He has, however, hung on to his Midwestern sensibility; his style continues to be notable for its dry wit, and he is not easily impressed, even in the face of extreme celebrity.

A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas, a collection of his journalism, is his fourth book. Previously, he wrote a memoir about hair metal in North Dakota, and another about a road trip that took in places where various rock stars had died. I want you to be totally in the picture, so let me add that he has an Andy Warhol fringe, regulation black-framed spectacles and a strangely girlish face. His fans include Bret Easton Ellis and Douglas Coupland. And his favourite band is Kiss. Seriously.

This book is divided into three sections: interviews and features; columns; and, floating alone just before you reach the index, a short story that began life as a novella. The columns are best ignored, as Klosterman just can't hold an argument. He'll start writing a piece about "cultural betrayal" and how ridiculous it is - as in: "I felt so betrayed when Sarah Jessica Parker married Mr Big at the end of Sex and the City" - but then, unsure where to go with this, he ends up telling his readers that, just as it isn't worth getting too worked up about what a fictional character does for the sake of a series finale, it is a waste of energy being angry about whether or not, say, people voted differently from you in the election. This is just dumb; the two things are entirely different.

Klosterman is better at stunts and interviews (though it's maddening when he gets amazing access - a stay on Val "Lizard King" Kilmer's ranch; several hours driving around Long Island with a depressed Billy Joel - and then seems unable to pin his subject down, butterfly-style). His pieces about The Streets, Metallica and The White Stripes are funny and telling. Even when he's interviewing someone whom he takes too seriously, such as Bono or Thom Yorke, he'll redeem himself with some sarky little quip ("I guess we're lucky this is a Quattroporte," he writes, as Bono invites four teenage fans for a ride in his Maserati) or one of his brilliant retrospective footnotes (this book makes the wittiest use of footnotes since Jonathan Coe's novel The House of Sleep). And he can be really mean. "Go ahead and call me sentimental if you must," he writes, half a day into a tortuous 24-hour stint of watching VH1. "But I will always prefer the Def Leppard videos where the drummer still has both his arms."

Still, I'm not ready to join a swooning Coupland and acclaim Klosterman as "the real thing" just yet. What does the statement "American culture is nothing more than a pastiche of fixations" mean? Is McDonald's really "the vortex of American society"? A Decade of Curious People is full of stuff like this: assertions that look flashy, but crumble like cake if you read them slowly. I'm intrigued by the idea of Klosterman writing fiction - "You Tell Me", in which our film-critic hero smokes PCP, eats Chinese and finds that a dead woman has fallen on to the roof of his car, contains some hilarious sentences - but he's going to have to put his back into it if that's where he's headed. No matter. I would still buy this book for one piece alone. It's called "That 70s Cruise". In 2005, Klosterman went on a "Rock Cruise". The boat headed out from Miami and on to the Caymans, loaded with 2,500 passengers and the usual heaving brunch buffets. But also on board were three bands: Styx, Journey and REO Speedwagon. Yes, it's poodle rock on sea. And he can't even swim! This isn't a work of genius; its targets are just too easy. But it is delightful - as bouncy, and as tragic, as a bubble perm.

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