A bare-chested Kid Rock, with chainsaw in hand, sculpting nude women out of tree stumps.

A crowned P. Diddy, sitting on a gilded throne in the middle of Times Square.

Kurt Cobain, leering into a camera with a T-shirt that reads, "Corporate Magazines Still Suck."

These are just a few of the evocative, glossy images contained in Mark Seliger's new hardbound coffee-table book, Mark Seliger: The Music Book.

From 1992 to 2002, Seliger was chief photographer for Rolling Stone, where he shot more than 135 covers, more than any other photographer. Since he left, he is under contract at Condé Nast, shooting exclusively for Vanity Fair, GQ and Italian Vogue.

But aside from a photo book revolving around his friend Lenny Kravitz, Seliger had never collected some of his most notable Rolling Stone images. "I kind of made the decision to do a music retrospective," said Seliger in an interview with The Tribune.

The 100-page volume features some of the most famous images of the past 20 years.

Included is the controversial Rolling Stone cover of the naked Red Hot Chili Peppers, each band member cradling his genitals in his hands. There's also the iconic black-and-white portrait of a pensive and stubbly Cobain, which landed on the magazine's cover immediately after his 1994 suicide.

Seliger excels as a portraitist, even if he hasn't obtained the celebrity stature of his colleague Annie Leibovitz, who also established her career at Rolling Stone. Aside from a foreword by Tom Wolfe and a brief index at the end of the book, Seliger's images creatively document sweeping changes in popular culture during the past 20 years - without text or behind-the-scenes gossip.

"In these pages Mark Seliger gives us, in pictures, the entire history, the entire evolution of popular music in America," Wolfe writes. "Rock, out-from-under-the-rock (sometimes called alternative), country, hip-hop, rap, gangsta rap."

Most revealing are pictures from the late 1980s, as a new sound moved from the streets to Rolling Stone. "It was an important period in music," said Seliger, then a staff photographer. "I was fortunate to work at a time when hip-hop was coming into our consciousness."

There's a photo of a young Ladies Love Cool James - or L.L. Cool J. - in Queens, N.Y., in 1987, with his red track suit, gold chains and striped Adidas sneakers. Also, there's Dr. Dre and a baby-faced Snoop Doggy Dogg - before he shortened his name - sitting on the back of a Chevy Impala in 1993, with Dre holding a liquor bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag.

And because Seliger is perhaps the best photojournalist of hip-hop, there are also portraits of Public Enemy, Kanye West, Nelly, OutKast, Beastie Boys, Alicia Keys, Jay-Z and Beyoncé.

Seliger had a hard time describing his eye, or how his photos could be identified without a credit. "I don't think in terms of legacy," he said. "I want to have some good pieces at the end of the day. That would be fantastic. The story's not over yet."

A spokeswoman for the publisher, TeNeues Publishing, described the photographer's work this way: "Like a great piece of rock music, an artful photograph is part harmony and part unexpected chaos. [His] images crackle with life and - dare one say it - beauty."

dburger@sltrib.com