Dec 172010
To celebrate the holiday season, Rock Town Hall will be posting a couple of holiday-themed jams. We’ll kick things off with this video, featuring perhaps the fourth member of Townsman hrrundivbakshi‘s Holy Trinity of Rock, Ted Nugent. Happy holidays, HVB—and all of you!
Has the latest class of R&R HOF inductees – Tom Waits, Neil Diamond, Alice Cooper, Dr. John and Darlene Love – been noted at RTH yet?
I’ll agree with Waits, Diamond, and Love. Darlene Love deserves it if only for Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), that’s how good that song. One of the highlights of each Christmas season for me is her annual appearance on Letterman to do that song. Dr. John, no way. And Alice Cooper is stretching things taut.
Left to wait another year – Bon Jovi, Donna Summer, Chic, Laura Nyro, the Beastie Boys, Donovan, the J. Geils Band, LL Cool J, Joe Tex and Chuck Willis. Donovan is the most aggrieved here. I don’t think we’ve had a Donovan discussion since the days of RTH v1.0. The fact that he’s pretty much fallen off the face of the earth – and the deep end as well – for the last 40 years doesn’t change things for me.
No, this year’s class had not been noted yet, as far as I can remember. Personally, I’m disgusted by how bad each year’s new crop of inductees becomes. Just put everyone in who’s ever had Paul Shaffer lick his or her butt already! Tom Waits, at least, is an Artist, so even though he’s got his industry connections, more power to Art. Neil Diamond? He’s OK, but come on! I always go back to sports Halls of Fame, but that’s because their inductions usually make some sense. In Cooperstown terms, Diamond is like a consistent 14-game winner on losing teams. He’d be a good late-season acquisition for a contender, but no one to build a staff around.
The bad holiday anthem thread made me realize that I’m not a big fan of Darlene Love’s Christmas song! I don’t know why, exactly. It’s pretty exciting in many ways, but maybe its enthusiasm wears on the Scrooge in me. Other than that I don’t know I could name a Darlene Love song if you put a gun to my head. Spector and the Ronettes already got in. Shouldn’t that have covered that entire scene? (I’m honestly not a big Wall of Sound guy. I find my Spector box set, for instance, to be a real hit-or-miss affair.)
Dr. John? He’s OK, but again, in Cooperstown terms, we’re talking George Foster material – a guy who had a couple of great years surrounded by mediocrity. Maybe the same could be said of Alice Cooper, even whose big hits I’ve usually found severely lacking, but that could be me.
The Beastie Boys should make it, probably Chic, too, for the musical foundation their hits set through the ’80s. Bon Jovi’s only fit for our Foyer of Fame, at best.
I’m willing to talk Donovan, a pleasant, toe-tapping, stylish artist, if you ask me, but on the same level as Marc Bolan, whom I know you also like a lot more than I do.
Put a gun to my head and I’d have a hard time deciding who is more deserving of entry into the HOF, Donovan or Bolan, but would probably settle on Bolan.
Mascara aside, I think Bolan was punk before punk, in the sense that (once he transformed from Tyrannosaurus Rex to T. Rex) he stripped everything back to basic Chuck Berry rock & roll – simple chords, a boatload of hooks, and songs about boys & girls & sex & love. He was just a half-decade ahead of punk. I think his second coming was right around the bend; unfortunately, that tree was there first.
I think you give Dr. John too much credit.
And I know my view of Darlene Love is warped by that one song.
And sometime I’d like to see some real explanation for all the RTH hate for Paul Shaffer.
Darlene Love recorded under her own name with Spector but also sang lead on tracks credited to the Crystals, in other words immortals like “He’s a Rebel”, “Da Doo Ron Ron” and “Then He Kissed Me.” She’s certainly the equal of the Ronettes. Plus she sang back-up on “Basketball Jones.”
I’m not a big Neil Diamond fan, but I’m fine with his selection, if I can just ignore his career after 1970 or so. A while back I was reading an interview with Paul Simon. The interviewer said he should get in touch if there was anything he wanted to add, and Simon called back the next day just to say that the one thing he forgot to say was that Neil Diamond ought to be in the R&RHoF. I thought that was interesting.
Tom Waits’ selection makes about as much sense as Leonard Cohen’s. I’m looking forward to his acceptance speech.
Duh! For her work with The Crystals, let the Crystals in, if they’re not already. I’m not a big fan of double-entry HoFers unless they really earned it as solo artists (eg, John and Paul – maybe George – but, sorry, not Ringo).
The world will note that *my* holy trinities have *four* members. I’m awesome!
And speaking of artists who should be in the R&RHOF, let’s raise a toast to Don Van Vliet. Captain Beefheart, RIP.
Ah, that’s too bad! I was just thinking of Beefheart on the drive back from my company party tonight.
What’s not to like about the Alice Cooper Group? They had a killer blast, just like Creedence Clearwater did. I know it only lasted a month, but those albums from Love it to Death trhough Billion Dollar Babies are above average lyrically and rock as hard as anything that was happening from 71 to 73. When Alice decided to go out on his own and change his name to Alice Cooper, he lost Michael Bruce’s great songwriting and turned into a teenybopper kind of thing, but I was a teenager and he was a fuck of a lot cooler than Kiss.
Haven’t you guys ever listened to School’s Out? Man, that’s a terrific album. I’d rather listen to those old albums than anything Tom Waits has put out, no matter what my kid says about how great Tom is.
I don’t think Uncle Ted would settle for being 4th in anything….
RRHOF worked for the 50’s and 60’s but the whole trying to cover every genre thing is kinda lame.
I’m happy for Alice Cooper, but if he had never gotten in I don’t think I would loose sleep over it. Same with Tom Waits, and I have no passion for Neil Diamond (although my 81 year old grandmother loves him and will want me to set my VCR (ha!) to record his speech for her.
I think it’s time to embrace the 80’s (although many of these had a 70’s start)
RUSH, ELO, Hall & Oates, Duran Duran, Peter Gabriel.
And I would actually say that Duran Duran should get in 1st. Yes I know that they were often style over substance, but their style had more effect on the 1980’s music sound and look than any other artist (Sorry MJ). From 1981 – 1985 every artists had some Duran Duran in them, and by Live Aid, every single artist had the John Taylor italian sport coat with the huge shoulder pads. Look at the backstage band pics from live aid, even Dylan has one on.
The rap/hip-hop stuff is going to get ugly. I think the RRHAF can agree on RUN DMC, LL, Beasties for nominations, but do you see ICE CUBE, ICE-T, PE, Wu-tang getting in? Tupac? Snoop?
I can’t stand Duran Duran and the music they inspired, but that’s a tremendous argument for their inclusion!