Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Snubs

Originally posted on the Tree.com Arts Channel

So every year about this time every rock writer or critic gets riled up over the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame inductions. Who is in, who isn’t, and who needs to be?

The ceremony was just held. The inductees for 2011 included Alice Cooper, Neil Diamond, Dr. John, Darlene Love, Tom Waits, Jac Holzman, Art Rupe, and Leon Russell.

According to the official Rock Hall website, “The 2011 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame performer inductees were chosen by more than 500 voters of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.  Artists are eligible for inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 25 years after the release of their first recording.”

I’m actually not a huge fan of the whole concept, but the debate is interesting. Plus I like to see who shows up and who doesn’t, who buries the hatchet, and who still holds a grudge.

I think in the past I was happiest to see The Ramones and The Clash inducted, sadly after the deaths of Ramones front man Joey Ramone and Clash front man Joe Strummer.

The “rock n roll” definition seems to be broad. There’s been an argument against rap bands, and pop singers like Madonna. This year the big uproar was over Neil Diamond. I suspect the issues are slightly over the question of rock n roll credibility, but more so that certain artists have been inducted before certain other more rock-n-roll artists.

Yes, some of the obvious are already inducted: The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Elvis Presley, The Who, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie. Pioneers like James Brown, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Robert Johnson, Sam Phillips. The list does go on…

But who should be there who is not? Who should just have been let past the velvet rope without a ticket?

Kiss and Rush always top the list of who should be in. The travesty of Alice Cooper not being in was rectified this year. Few bands may have been more influential and groundbreaking than Kiss. I saw them on TV on the Paul Lynde show in 1976 and it may have warped me for life.

Rush are probably the most well known “prog rock” band with a legion of rabid followers, and huge influence. Who doesn’t love “Tom Sawyer,” the Canadian “Stairway to Heaven?” Who hasn’t air drummed to it at least once in their life?

Now of course we’re venturing down a dangerous highway here, open for heated debate. After a little research though, I’ve found some bands that have been snubbed for years. I’m going more based on influence and lasting impact than anything else.

If you look at the 70’s alone, how about Styx, Chicago, Boston, and the Moodie Blues? I mean the epic guitar solos alone helped launch the punk movement, but certainly these bands are giants of their decade. Where’s Cheap Trick, Deep Purple, ZZ Top? T Rex and Roxy Music, along with Bowie basically launched new wave. What about Chic?

Speaking of new wave and the 80’s, what about bands like Duran Duran, the Cure, Depeche Mode, The Smiths? Don’t worry, U2 are already in. Bono kept showing up to the all-star jams so they got rushed through the process.

As far as punk, where are the Runaways, Dead Kennedys, Bad Brains, Devo, and X? Talk about bands that launched 1,000 other bands!

Where are metal gods like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Motorhead, and Dio? At least Black Sabbath, AC/DC and Metallica are in.

Well it’s obviously not a popularity contest, so what is the process? According to the Rock Hall site, “One of the Foundation’s many functions is to recognize the contributions of those who have had a significant impact on the evolution, development and perpetuation of rock and roll by inducting them into the Hall of Fame.”

I think a lot of artists see the Rock Hall as kind of a sham, but many of those same artists will still show up if inducted. I suppose the recognition is nice, however late it comes.

Let’s start with Kiss and Rush, maybe next year?

I Never Met a Bigfoot Docudrama I Didn’t Like

Originally posted on the Tree.com Arts Channel

The earliest movie I can remember really scaring me was a 70s documentary called “The Legend of Bigfoot.” I was 5 or 6 years old, and oddly enough, someone took me to see it in a movie theatre. The impression this film had on me has lasted to this day. I would say I have a mini-obsession with Bigfoot on film.

What stood out to me was that there was this creature in the woods that watched. We could be playing in some forest meadow, and he’s watching. Perhaps we’re on our Boy Scout trip, and he’s there watching. Maybe we’re hiking down a piney path and he’s there watching. “The Legend of Bigfoot” featured this creepy flute music that for some reason terrified me. I recently found this move on Netflix and watched it, and the music still gives me the chills.

What “Jaws” did to me for the ocean, and “Psycho” did to me for showers, “The Legend of Bigfoot” did to me for forests. Ever since seeing that movie, forests have creeped me out. I can drive by a stretch of woods to this day, and wonder if a Bigfoot is there, just within the line of trees, watching. When I was a Boy Scout, on many a camping trip, I would nervously look into the woods for any sign of Bigfoot watching. The few times I’ve stayed in cabins, I would peer out the windows towards the woods, looking for Bigfoot watching. Oddly enough, I’d feel better if I couldn’t see the line of trees. If I zipped the tent, or closed the blinds, I felt better. Strange, considering my near-encyclopedic knowledge of Bigfoot’s propensity to attack at any moment, rip apart tents, or attack cabins in packs of his Bigfoot friends with boulders.

There was more than one 70s Bigfoot film, and they all had many common elements: Strange music, the skeptical narrator who became a believer after his chance encounter in the woods with the creature, the reenactments of all the old Bigfoot legends, the cute animals playing in the woods scene (possible stock footage from Disney nature movies), despite the presence of the missing link, and last but not least, the expedition to find some evidence that proves the existence of Bigfoot once and for all, which comes so close yet so far from doing so.

Several years after I saw  “The Legend of Bigfoot,” another Bigfoot docudrama reached the theaters. “Sasquatch” was largely the same storyline, and may actually be the same movie. I think the skeptical narrator and the music were different though. This one has the distinction of ruining a Super Bowl for my father. He had promised to take me to see “Sasquatch,” despite his beloved Denver Broncos’ Super Bowl appearance. Unfortunately for him, we didn’t have a VCR then. Being a man of his word, he took me to see the Bigfoot movie.

No discussion of 70s Bigfoot docudramas is complete without a mention of perhaps the Holy Grail of the genre, “The Legend of Boggy Creek,” which is about the Fouke Monster, the legendary creature living in the swampy border lands of Florida and Arkansas. This gem features all the common elements, but is a little more twisted. The narrator isn’t so skeptical, and the Bigfoot here is a monster. He doesn’t just attack when provoked, he attacks regularly...and smells bad. By the way, go to Google and type in “Fouke.” See how “Fouke Monster” comes up right after “Fouke Arkansas?”

I’ll watch any of the many Bigfoot documentaries on the Discovery, Wildlife, or Travel Channel. At this point, I can turn down the sound and narrate each of them myself. But they’re all a bit science-y for me. They’ve taken the drama out! Where’s the showmanship? Despite all our scientific advances, we can’t come to a consensus. Evidence is inconclusive. No human in a costume could move like that…that fecal matter and those hair samples are not animal…OR human…

Bigfoot is still elusive to this day. Despite the fact that we’ve got high-def video cameras in our phones now, we’re still not able to capture a steady non-blurry shot of Bigfoot in his natural habitat.

In the 70s, we’d be convinced by that chance encounter. 

John Hughes: The Music and the Movies

Originally posted on the Tree.com Arts Channel

Few films are as quintessentially ‘80s as John Hughes films. The holy troika of Hughes–“Sixteen Candles,” “The Breakfast Club, and “Pretty In Pink”--are epics of ‘80s culture. No pop film conversation on the ‘80s is complete without a mention of the films of John Hughes. What is odd is how films that are so much a time capsule of ‘80s fashion, culture and music can be so universal, resonating with teens to this day.

The films in the Hughes canon are not just universally ‘80s. They’re universally teenage and universally high school. The fashions and the music may have changed, but the struggles of teenagers in high school are largely the same. Just as integral to these themes that still resonate is the music in the films. Hughes got that music is as much a part of the teenage landscape as angst and alienation.

I think it was through the music to his films that I first discovered John Hughes. I owned the “Pretty In Pink” soundtrack before I saw the film, and it changed my musical landscape and, in turn, my life. For the first time I heard bands like the Psychedelic Furs, New Order, The Smiths, Echo and the Bunnymen, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, and INXS.

The soundtrack to “Sixteen Candles” featured Oingo Boingo, The Thompson Twins, Billy Idol, General Public, and the Stray Cats. “The Breakfast Club” soundtrack brought us Simple Minds’ unforgettable “Don’t You Forget About Me.” The soundtrack to the too-often overlooked “Some Kind of Wonderful” featured Flesh For Lulu, Stephen Duffy, and The Jesus and Mary Chain.*

“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” continued the trend with bands like Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Yello, Big Audio Dynamite, General Public, and The English Beat. “Weird Science” emphasized its fringe nature with the likes of not only Oingo Boingo, but also Wall of Voodoo, Lords of the New Church, and Killing Joke.

Arguably, many of the bands got their biggest exposure due to inclusion on the soundtracks of John Hughes movies. Where else would my Mom have heard Sigue Sigue Sputnik? These songs were not only the music of the time, but music Hughes listened to himself. These were not mainstream artists, at least in most of the U.S. Hughes wrote his screenplays while listening to the music, and “Pretty In Pink” was inspired by the Psychedelic Furs song of the same name.

Hughes not only showed us what we should be listening to, but also captured how teenagers talked, what they had to say, what they struggled with. Everybody wants to be liked (“Some Kind of Wonderful”); everybody wants to be cool (“Weird Science”). We all come from different backgrounds (“Pretty In Pink”), but we need to find common ground (“Breakfast Club”). We all need some time to blow off some steam (“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”).

And we all need something to dance to.