Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

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Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

So with the annual arguments over the HoF let's start our own and see what happens. Here's how I see it; we start by decade active, bandy some names around and eventually come up with a voting thread. I'm open to suggestions after that on how to tally it and pick inductees. Lots of knowledge here I'm curious to see what we come up with. Basically every decade will have a thread where we discuss, nominate and come up with candidates. After we leave that active for a while, maybe a month, then we do the voting thread fro that decade. Based on that I think this will take us at least 6 months to complete and might be fun. Let's kick around criteria for a while and then start with the fifties. Everyone game? Here are some ideas for criteria just to start:

Influence
Originality
Sales

others?
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by tinnitus photography »

hair styles.
number of 4 star reviews in the Rolling Stone.
amount of drugs ingested, in kilograms.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Iowan »

tinnitus photography wrote:hair styles.
number of 4 star reviews in the Rolling Stone.
amount of drugs ingested, in kilograms.


The last one for sure. But let's leave the second one on the cutting room floor. I'd prefer to limit the amount of post '95 Bono here.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by beantownbubba »

I like the idea of an alternative HoF but I'm not sure we can sustain the effort you outline. But I'm happy to try.

I'd add Quality.

No, I don't know how to define that but it seems important. Call it the "Styx test." They surely have the sales; I don't know about their influence and inventiveness but for argument's sake let's say they were both influential and inventive. But they still suck and if they make our cut the whole effort will be in vain.

I'd also divide influence into 2 parts: Influence musically and influence beyond the music world, in the larger culture.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by beantownbubba »

And a question: is this Hall just for musicians or does it include songwriters, producers, journalists and/or others connected to the biz but not music makers themselves?
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

beantownbubba wrote:And a question: is this Hall just for musicians or does it include songwriters, producers, journalists and/or others connected to the biz but not music makers themselves?


Bands and solo artists to start. As you said this is pretty ambitious and I want it to be fun. Starting in the fifties probably makes it start pretty easy too.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Flea »

We have to take groupie shagging into account. What's rock & roll without boinking the random stranger?
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by dime in the gutter »

not to further muddy the waters......but....

why have any criteria?

folks nominate a band/artist and then justify their position. if justification is good enough, 3dd will vote accordingly and said nominee gets in.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Duke Silver »

Can influence hurt a band? Just thinking of all the godawful bands that came after Nirvana and Pearl Jam, who would otherwise be shoe-ins, IMO.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Bill in CT »

Duke Silver wrote:Can influence hurt a band? Just thinking of all the godawful bands that came after Nirvana and Pearl Jam, who would otherwise be shoe-ins, IMO.

Nirvana got in quickly and Pearl Jam will too. I think Pearl Jam is eligible 2 years from now.

Led Zeppelin influenced many awful bands and they're in the Hall. I don't think it's much of a factor.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Iowan »

Duke Silver wrote:Can influence hurt a band? Just thinking of all the godawful bands that came after Nirvana and Pearl Jam, who would otherwise be shoe-ins, IMO.


I don't think it should. It's not their fault that the people who ripped them off suck.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

dime in the gutter wrote:not to further muddy the waters......but....

why have any criteria?

folks nominate a band/artist and then justify their position. if justification is good enough, 3dd will vote accordingly and said nominee gets in.


Works for me. I mean we're probably not qualified to judge some of the criteria anyway. You dig 'em you nominate 'em. Thoughts?
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by beantownbubba »

Tequila Cowboy wrote:
dime in the gutter wrote:not to further muddy the waters......but....

why have any criteria?

folks nominate a band/artist and then justify their position. if justification is good enough, 3dd will vote accordingly and said nominee gets in.


Works for me. I mean we're probably not qualified to judge some of the criteria anyway. You dig 'em you nominate 'em. Thoughts?


It doesn't really matter: In order to have a meaningful discussion (as opposed to everyone just listing their favorites), these criteria will inevitably be utilized. Otherwise, what can you talk about? I'm indifferent to whether the criteria are "official" or not.

Another way to approach the criteria issue is to set a theoretical bar: the Hall is reserved for only the top 1%, 10% or whatever. While there's no standard measurement as to who's in or out at any percentile, it does provide a general frame of reference in the way people think about the process.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by RevMatt »

There are a few things new Rock and Roll HoF would need to avoid that plagues the other HoF.

1) Accept the fact that African American musicians by and large stopped playing rock or rock and roll after the 1970's. Pop, disco, R&B, hip hop, club music are largely producer driven. Perhaps I would include hip hop as rock or rock and roll because it is more of a collaboration between the mc, dj and producer than some producer finding a talented singer and giving that singer a bunch of songs to record. But it is white liberal guilt that has put forward the idea that there should be at least two African American inductees every year. Bill Withers is a great artist but he did not have a career that came close to Marvin Gaye or Stevie Wonder in terms of longevity, sales or influence.

2) The RRHOF is not explicit as to what criteria a band or artist meets when their names are put forward for induction. This leads to people bitching that Bon Jovi is snubbed while Joan Jett gets in. I think there should be a list of criteria that is considered that is more explicit than the general, undefined things that are put forth. For example The Velvet Underground and The Stooges are in because 1) their music was so radically different than anyone else at the time that it had an influence that went well beyond their paltry sales and 2) their small discography (three or four studio albums each) is so overwhelmingly good on several aesthetic points that they are "timeless"; Louded and Funhouse never sound dated and had they been released in 1990 they would have sounded just as current. Van Halen is in because they were so overwhelmingly popular that their music was part of the soundtrack of their era.

3) Make sure that every major musical development in rock is represented by two or three artists. Prog rock only has Genesis and Peter Gabriel and that has more to do with what those guys did in the eighties than the seventies. Jazz/Rock fusion has nobody in the HOF. Neither does mid 60's era psychedelic/garage rock despite that genre being considered historically significant by rock critics ever since Lenny Kaye compiled the Nuggets record. The new wave of British heavy metal? Nothing. If this is not done the hall is making aesthetic judgments on entire genres just because they believe the fans of such genres are not as cool or knowledgeable as they are. That kind of aesthetic snobbery is the reason why Rush was snubbed for years (unlike rock critics, Rush fans had the nerve to continue being geeky, dungeon and dragon playing nerds after freshman orientation instead of growing their hair, buying an all black wardrobe and cranking Meat is Murder instead of Moving Pictures.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by tinnitus photography »

you can add Rush to the prog category, as far as I'm concerned.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

What a can of worms I've opened. The different categories of Rock makes my head hurt. How in the world are a bunch of music geeks qualified to do this? Short answer; we're not. Here's a proposal:

- As I said before we go by decades
- Everyone lists their nominees in the thread.
- The top nominees (pick a number here, do we do 10, 15, 20?) become finalists for whom we vote. Depending on the number that's chosen we decide a % of the vote that gets in. ie. you have to have at least 10% of first place votes to get in. This is tricky but doable.

Here are the issues I see getting in the way and might decide if we do this crazy thing to start with (again I said lets have fun):

- Too many nominees. By the time we get to the seventies we're going to have nominations for everyone from Black Oak Arkansas to Donna Summer to T Rex. I don't know how to solve this but I'm open to suggestions.
- If we're too split on the vote there might be decades where no one get in. Is this OK if not what do we do to fix it?
- People will decide that all genres have to be represented. Sorry Rev but this hurts my head.

Have it it. Is this just too nuts? 10 posts in and we have total chaos which was not my intention.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by beantownbubba »

RevMatt wrote:
3) Make sure that every major musical development in rock is represented by two or three artists. Prog rock only has Genesis and Peter Gabriel and that has more to do with what those guys did in the eighties than the seventies. Jazz/Rock fusion has nobody in the HOF. Neither does mid 60's era psychedelic/garage rock despite that genre being considered historically significant by rock critics ever since Lenny Kaye compiled the Nuggets record. The new wave of British heavy metal? Nothing. If this is not done the hall is making aesthetic judgments on entire genres just because they believe the fans of such genres are not as cool or knowledgeable as they are. That kind of aesthetic snobbery is the reason why Rush was snubbed for years (unlike rock critics, Rush fans had the nerve to continue being geeky, dungeon and dragon playing nerds after freshman orientation instead of growing their hair, buying an all black wardrobe and cranking Meat is Murder instead of Moving Pictures.


Re jazz rock, isn't Miles Davis in?

Re garage rock and presumably other genres that I'm not going to take the time to think about, the reason why the Nuggets album was so important is that almost by definition, garage rock consists of one shots by obscure bands, not bands that have developed a HoF type resume. It's not clear how one addresses that. I assume the actual HofF does it by having occasional exhibits featuring various under-represented genres, but I don't know.

TC, enough. Just start. We'll see what happens. If it's good, great. If it's got potential we'll make adjustments on the fly. If it flops, it flops. I'll nominate a few in a short while if nobody else has started.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by beantownbubba »

OK, let's get this party started.

The 1950's:

Chuck Berry
Elvis Presley
Jerry Lee Lewis
Carl Perkins
Buddy Holly
Ray Charles
Hank Williams
The Coasters
The 5 Royales
The Drifters (first incarnation)

Hey, I go first, I get the low hanging fruit.

(I'm leaving the electric blues giants to the '60's, which may or may not be historically accurate but which seems right to me.)
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

OK, I'm changing the name of the thread to get this going.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

Richie Valens
Bo Diddley
Fats Domino
Little Richard
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by dime in the gutter »

not to further muddy the waters....but....

why not have a dedicated thread for each decade? seems to be the simplest way. that way tinnitus won't have to dredge thru the 50's nominations to nominate electric wizard.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by beantownbubba »

dime in the gutter wrote:not to further muddy the waters....but....

why not have a dedicated thread for each decade? seems to be the simplest way. that way tinnitus won't have to dredge thru the 50's nominations to nominate electric wizard.


I'm pretty sure that's what TC's doing.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by RevMatt »

beantownbubba wrote:Re garage rock and presumably other genres that I'm not going to take the time to think about, the reason why the Nuggets album was so important is that almost by definition, garage rock consists of one shots by obscure bands, not bands that have developed a HoF type resume. It's not clear how one addresses that. I assume the actual HofF does it by having occasional exhibits featuring various under-represented genres, but I don't know.


As far as garage rock goes, yes most bands were one shots, mostly because of the draft. Kids out of high school could either go to college or get drafted. They were not free to pursue musical careers until they were older and no longer eligible for the draft.

However, Paul Revere and The Raiders had a decade's worth of hits -- their final Top 40 was "Indian Reservation" in 1973 -- and The 13th Floor Elevators produced a small but highly regarded discography that compares well with The Velvets and The Stooges.
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by dime in the gutter »

i guess all the talk about prog rock, disco, nirvana and rap threw me.

my bad.

i am now on board.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by dime in the gutter »

RevMatt wrote:
beantownbubba wrote:Re garage rock and presumably other genres that I'm not going to take the time to think about, the reason why the Nuggets album was so important is that almost by definition, garage rock consists of one shots by obscure bands, not bands that have developed a HoF type resume. It's not clear how one addresses that. I assume the actual HofF does it by having occasional exhibits featuring various under-represented genres, but I don't know.


As far as garage rock goes, yes most bands were one shots, mostly because of the draft. Kids out of high school could either go to college or get drafted. They were not free to pursue musical careers until they were older and no longer eligible for the draft.

However, Paul Revere and The Raiders had a decade's worth of hits -- their final Top 40 was "Indian Reservation" in 1973 -- and The 13th Floor Elevators produced a small but highly regarded discography that compares well with The Velvets and The Stooges.

dude...this is the 50's nominations thread. get your shit straight.

dude meaning the good rev, not btb.

he clearly knows what he is doing. btb, that is.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: Criteria

Post by RevMatt »

dime in the gutter wrote:
RevMatt wrote:
beantownbubba wrote:Re garage rock and presumably other genres that I'm not going to take the time to think about, the reason why the Nuggets album was so important is that almost by definition, garage rock consists of one shots by obscure bands, not bands that have developed a HoF type resume. It's not clear how one addresses that. I assume the actual HofF does it by having occasional exhibits featuring various under-represented genres, but I don't know.


As far as garage rock goes, yes most bands were one shots, mostly because of the draft. Kids out of high school could either go to college or get drafted. They were not free to pursue musical careers until they were older and no longer eligible for the draft.

However, Paul Revere and The Raiders had a decade's worth of hits -- their final Top 40 was "Indian Reservation" in 1973 -- and The 13th Floor Elevators produced a small but highly regarded discography that compares well with The Velvets and The Stooges.

dude...this is the 50's nominations thread. get your shit straight.

dude meaning the good rev, not btb.

he clearly knows what he is doing. btb, that is.

This was an active thread and I was responding to posts made before the title was changed to the 1950's nominations.

But carry on. I'm done here
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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by Iowan »

I'm pretty strapped for knowledge on the 50's. Are we supposed to just list our nominees, or omit doing so if someone already said it?

I'll take:
Chuck Berry
Elvis
Buddy Holly
Bo Diddley
Little Richard
Jerry Lee
Hank
Ray
Carl Perkins

About the extent of my 50's knowledge. I know Cash started out down here too, but I don't know what decade to peg him in. Honestly, 90's could be as good as any.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by dime in the gutter »

a few previously un(der)mentioned that certainly are 1st ballot inductees.

roy orbison
johnny cash
bill haley
eddie cochran
big joe turner
gene vincent
link wray
everly bros

as they relate to previous posts in this thread.

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by tinnitus photography »

dime in the gutter wrote:not to further muddy the waters....but....

why not have a dedicated thread for each decade? seems to be the simplest way. that way tinnitus won't have to dredge thru the 50's nominations to nominate electric wizard.

:lol:

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Re: Let's Start the Rock & Roll HoF from Scratch: The 50's

Post by tinnitus photography »

aren't we supposed to have some sort of rationale for why these names are being listed?


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