By Steve Newton
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has done it again, proving once more that it has its head so far up its ass that it isn’t even funny.
I’m sure as hell not laughing.
Today the Rock Hall named it inductees for the class of 2014 and, unbelievably, pioneering guitar legend Link Wray was left out in the cold. Instead, those monsters of rock known as Hall & Oates got their tickets to immortality.
Now, I’ve got nothing against Hall & Oates, they’ve got some great tunes. At least they did in the ’70s. But for christsakes—put them in the Pop Hall of Fame. Don’t have them beat out somebody like Link Wray when you’re talking rock ‘n’ roll.
And the same goes for Cat Stevens, who also got the nod. I’ve heard “Moonshadow”; I’m good with it. I love “Peace Train”. Stick him in the Pop Hall of Fame too. Or the Easy-Listening Mudroom of Fame, if you will.
ANYWHERE BUT THE “ROCK AND ROLL” HALL OF FAME!
The other four inductees announced today are Nirvana, KISS, Peter Gabriel, and Linda Ronstadt, so let’s take a look at them too.
Nirvana is a no-brainer. They deserve to take the red carpet directly to the heart of any Hall that calls itself Rock and Roll.
KISS is a no-brainer too, but more in the sense that it has no brain. That’s never mattered much, of course, because KISS had the costumes and makeup and staging and pyro and whatever else it needed to make up for the fact that all its best songs got used up on that wicked debut album. Still, for sheer popularity and influence, they probably deserve a spot in the Rock Hall.
Though not as much as Rush did.
Peter Gabriel is an incredibly talented artist and a great humanitarian, and he’s been known to rock (“Big Time”, all that classic prog stuff with Genesis), so he’s in. And Linda Ronstadt? I can’t decide either way about her.
But what I do feel strongly about is the snubbing, along with Wray, of fellow nominees Deep Purple. Purple is about as “rock and roll” as you can get, as one listen to Machine Head proves. Music-wise, they deserve to get inducted way more than KISS. Maybe Jann Wenner and the other directors on the Rock Hall board got their noises out of joint when Ritchie Blackmore declared that he “couldn’t care less” about getting into their hallowed institution.
Deep Purple will get in one day, I’m sure, and in the meantime there’s no shortage of other things to slag the R&RHF about. Tops on my list is the fact that Irish guitar great Rory Gallagher hasn’t even been nominated yet.
Now that is seriously fucked.
Just ask Slash.