Checklist Of Shame C

.....The nominees for the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, Class of 2012, were recently announced. Every year when these announcements are made there is widespread grumbling about the choices, much of it justified. Occasionally some of the dimmer butane lighters in the rock fandom chandelier kvetch about nominees in the non-performer category. If you don't understand why the Ertegun brothers are considered to have more of an influence on rock music than Rush, well, you're just going to have to trust the rest of us on that one. They did. Yeah, Rush is overdue and should have at least been mentioned before now, but have you noticed that the Moody Blues aren't in there? Or Gerry and the Pacemakers? There's overdue and then there's overdue.

.....This year doesn't seem to have any non-performers among the fifteen nominees. I'm wondering if Dr. Warren Zanes has had any part in steering the process towards righting past wrongs. He would have an uphill battle trying to explain to the balding, putrefying pot casualties in charge that if they really believe that Brian Eno (who produced "Remain In Light", "Joshua Tree" and others, in addition to recording dozens of albums himself and in collaborations) is just too unfamiliar to the public, then maybe this might not be the year to nominate whoever was the receptionist at Capitol Records in 1968. But I wouldn't want to see the non-performer category disappear completely. John Hammond certainly deserves his spot. Yet Shel Talmy is inexplicably missing, as are lesser names like Lou Adler (prolific producer and founder of the ODE label), Bert Berns, Don Zientara (engineer for nearly every Dischord record during it's first decade), Chinn and Chapman or Mickie Most. I mean, they didn't need someone to put a gun to their head to induct Phil Spector. Not that we know of, anyway. But if the non-performers are going to be put on the back burner in order to play catch-up with neglected performers, they seem to have chosen a method of making it less-than-obvious. Here's what they've done: if you count backwards from this year's cut-off for induction (1986), the previous decade is represented by six acts, the decade before that by five acts and the decade before that four acts. I'm sorry, but that's way too intelligent, orderly and rational for the people who've been running this flea circus for 25 years. Someone had to have shown them how to do it, probably using laminated cards (you know, because of the drooling). Maybe it was Zanes, maybe there's a particularly savvy nurse on staff there, all I know is that something's changed for the better.

.....If you haven't read yesterday's post, please do so. It explains (at length) what I'm doing here and why. I dug up an old list of CD's I own and flipped through it to see who might now be eligible for induction. The sheer volume of acts who've been passed over to make room for talent scout Ralph Bass, bluegrass king Bill Monroe and jazz legends like Billie Holiday and others who arguably have little to no involvement in rock music, even as influences, is staggering. I decided to just throw up my hands and list them. It's important to point out that this list isn't anywhere near complete; this is just a fraction of what I happened to own fifteen years ago. I'm not even including every musical act who's old enough, just the ones who'd make viable candidates. Yesterday I posted artists beginning with A or B. Today I pick up again with C.

1. JOHN CALE- Already represented as a member of the Velvet Underground, Cale has been producing, recording, scoring soundtracks and performing continuously since he left in 1969. Many of the acts he produced, such as the Stooges and Patti Smith, were also belatedly acknowledged lately so it's not impossible that his solo career (which is roughly twenty times the volume of his recordings with the Velvets) might get noticed some day.
2. CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN- Masters of fusing rock with other styles, they've only been eligible for a few years.
3. CAPTAIN BEEFHEART- Well, he's dead now. Are you happy, Jann? Is that what you wanted? Was that selection just too painfully obvious for you?
4. JIM CARROLL- Better known as a poet and essayist, Carroll rerecorded his song "Catholic Boy" with Pearl Jam for the soundtrack of the movie "Basketball Diaries", based on the fictionalized memoir of his teen years. Also no longer with us. I feel fortunate to have seen him live in a spoken word appearance.
5. NICK CAVE- His solo career has only recently been eligible and it's unlikely that the nominating committee will acknowledge the original Australian releases of his bands Boys Next Door and Birthday Party.
6. CHER- Not at the top of my list either, but she certainly influenced more drag performers than Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead combined. And they never had their own TV show. Downside: single handedly responsible for all that Autotune garbage.
7. GENE CLARK- Represented as a member of the Byrds, Clark has two solo albums being reissued soon if not now. In terms of visibility, he suffers from the fact that his catalogue, though not massive, has never been entirely in print at any one time. There is an excellent German 2-CD compilation covering much of his solo work but there needs to be a coordinated reissue program. Also no longer with us.
8. JULIAN COPE- Raised in Liverpool but so closely associated with LSD that one could be forgiven for assuming that he came out of Manchester. Many of the bands he inspired certainly did.
9. THE CRAMPS- I've gone into this band in depth on Livejournal and a post here that still gets page views. I've promised an expanded compilation playlist months ago and I haven't forgotten about it. Consider it a Halloween present. But I couldn't pass up an opportunity to mention here that on their last original album, FIENDS OF DOPE ISLAND, The Cramps had a song specifically about getting ignored by the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. That means that between the time they wrote the song, arranged it, recorded it, mixed it, manufactured the CD, packaged it, distributed it and showed up at venues across the country and the world ready to perform it to audiences who were anticipating it because they had already heard the album, the band could still be assured that the Hall could be predictably relied on to not induct them, thus insuring the continued relevance of the song.
10. CRASS- For all the scapegoating of punk groups in Murdoch publications during the seventies in England, for all the tsk-tsking by the professionally indignant over torn T-shirts and pogo dancing, Crass were the only band (actually an art collective, of which music was only an element) to actually be denounced by name on the floor of Parliament as a potential threat to the well-being of the realm. In fact, there could potentially be legal hurdles to getting them into the country to appear at an induction ceremony. A legal team would need to review Reagan-Bush era policies that might still be on the books which could prohibit them from entering the U.S.. If Legendary Pink Dots and Echo And The Bunnymen can be considered threats to national security, Crass would probably be offended if they weren't.

.....Once again, if you'd like to add any act beginning with the letter C, assuming they released a recording as early as 1986, just put them in the comments area. I check it daily.