It's Still Rock and Roll to Me

 Week Seventeen: It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me

Hot funk, Cool punk, even if it’s old junk

It’s still rock and roll to me

--Billy Joel, It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me from Glass Houses 

What do the following names have in common: Diana Ross, Nina Simone, Whitney Houston, Louie Armstrong, Chet Atkins, Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys, and Dolly Parton? How about Grandmaster Flash, Howlin’ Wolf, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, The Notorious B.I.G., and Tupac Shakur? The answer is simple: all are members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame yet none of them ever produced one note of “rock and roll” music. 

I think we have Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed to thank for the term “rock and roll.” By the mid 1950’s artists like Little Richard, Chuck Berry, and Fats Domino had transformed the rhythm and blues music often referred to as “race music” into what we now think of as early rock and roll. Interesting term that. “Race music” was primarily blues-based rhythm and blues music created by black artists for black audiences. Performers such as Elvis Presley and Pat Boone (yes Pat Boone; his version of Little Richard’s Tutti Fruiti became a #1 hit) brought “race music” to white audiences. Elvis’s arrangement of Big Mama Thornton’s Hound Dog is often mistaken for the original version.

A few short years later the Beatles changed popular music forever. Bob Dylan shocked the folk music universe by electrifying his guitar, and the Beach Boys encouraged us to have fun, fun, fun ‘til Daddy takes the T-bird away. By the late 60’s music described as rock and roll had become so diverse it virtually no longer resembled its original forms. Little Richard, Pat Boone, and Jerry Lee Lewis had abandoned the genre for religion. Luminaries such as Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, and Eric Clapton used the electric guitar to create what would become “hard rock.”

So what is, or what was rock and roll? Better yet, how long did it exist as a genre? Regardless of the answers to those questions, legendary record producer Ahmet Ertegun imagined it important enough to serve as the basis for a hall of fame. While celebrating the musical contributions of a wide variety of artists, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has not limited its inductees to those who created rock and roll music.  Take the initial roster of inductees for example. Of the ten inductees, four (James Brown, Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, and the Everly Brothers) were not known for their rock and roll music.

Induction is tightly controlled by a selection committee once described by Janet Morrisey of the New York Times this way: With fame and money at stake, it’s no surprise that a lot of backstage lobbying goes on. Why any particular act is chosen in any particular year is a mystery to performers as well as outsiders, and committee members want to keep it that way. Controversy is not limited to who is inducted and (just as frustrating) who has been overlooked. Only eight percent of inductees are female, there are only five Canadians in the hall, and many pioneers of rock and roll have been passed over in favor of the more popular artists for whom they made it possible. Bruce Dickinson of the band Iron Maiden called the hall “an utter and complete load of bollocks.” He said, “It is run by a bunch of sanctimonious Americans who wouldn’t recognize rock and roll if it hit them in the face.” Members of the punk band, The Sex Pistols called the museum “a piss stain.” Other critics include inductees Steve Miller and Elton John, whose considerable influence led to the induction of Donna Summer and Leon Russell.

My problem with The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is its name. As dedicated as the museum might be to preserving the legacy of famous musicians, it is clearly not dedicated to Rock and Roll. The solution is simple. Change the name. The Cleveland Museum of Music would say it well enough. Using any criteria they choose to induct whomever they want, but if it’s dedicated to rock and roll then members of Run DMC, N.W.A., and Public Enemy wouldn’t be included. On the other hand, if it really is committed to preserving the legacy of rock and roll, there is no excuse for the absence of Joe Cocker, Johnny Winter, Jethro Tull, Little Feat, and the J. Geils Band.  

Instead of changing the name, the museum seems to say, “Hot funk, cool punk, even if it’s old junk, it’s still rock and roll to me.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqzKCcu1EgA