Blurry in the USA

DJ Cummerbund is something of a mashup genius. But this may be my favorite yet, and considering how much I love much of his work, that's saying something.

I will say I'm not entirely sold on his editorial POV here, visually—it's all very powerful, but as a friend said, it's a bit, well, blurry. He seems to be maybe conflating a few things in a way I'm not sure are beneficial or accurate. But at the end of the day, the audio is stellar, and the visuals powerful. And, of course, it's got a good beat and you can headbang to it.

American Girl

Someone recently asked what the point of the halftime instrumental section towards the end of Tom Petty's "American Girl" is, and whether or not it was just an attempt for them to stretch the song out to be a full 3:30—long enough for a single.

While I think that's a perfectly valid reason to add a section, I doubt it's the reason here. I'd actually argue it's an interesting compositional experiment, using that halftime breakdown in the place where a guitar solo would normally go, and serving a similar function. But it also mirrors the opening section, which is just 18 long bars of D major, leaving no doubt as to what the song's home key is. (Although the bass plays different notes, supplying the harmonic interest in what could otherwise be an overly static section...but which really very much isn't. It's also a nice twist on the usual pedal point situation, which has the bass playing the same note for an extended period, while things change over the top.)

After two verses and two choruses, we get to the instrumental section in question. As mentioned, it shifts into halftime, with a sweet groove courtesy the outstanding Stan Lynch (whose hi-hat work on this song is exceptional, not only providing relentless and energetic forward motion worthy of Benny Benjamin, but choosing some really unusual and extremely tasty places to open his hats). But whereas the intro had just hammered on the tonic, here we move to the V chord. By sticking almost entirely to the dominant, it imbues the section with a slight uneasy feel: we know where the center of gravity is, the center of gravity has been firmly established, and it ain't here. The halftime should make things feel nice and easy, perhaps even a bit lethargic after the workout of the first half of the song. But because we're on the G instead of the D, we're on edge. We're pretty sure we're gonna get back home, but we're not entirely positive. So when we do leave the V and return to the I, and the regular tempo kicks back in, we feel a sense of relief and release, despite the speedy nature.

It's an interesting choice on Petty's part, but then there was a pretty fair amount of formal experimentation in those days. Even leaving aside the things like 20-minute prog epics (oh, "Supper's Ready," you are so silly and so magnificent. I love you madly, "Close to the Edge," and I always will, despite your existence giving birth to the likes of, well, the entire Tales from Topographic Oceans LP), and the interesting and fascinating examples of songs with unrelated musical codas ("Layla" and "Thunder Road" being perhaps the two most successful examples, both of which have more than a little to owe the daddy of 'em all, "Hey Jude"), there's the strange tinkly intro to the Velvet Underground's "Sweet Jane," which seems entirely unrelated. Don't get me wrong, it's lovely, and I dig it...but it has nothing to do with the body of the tune.

(Then again, the "wine and roses" bridge is also strange, which may be why Lou Reed sometimes nixed it when playing live.)

There's the guitar solo section of "My Sharona," which is nothing like the Neanderthal nature of the rest of the tune but instead goes into a sort of if the band Boston played power pop reverie. It's a bizarre tangent down a completely unforeseen sideroad, and absolutely makes the tune, even if it's not one of the first half-dozen things you think of when hearing the song's title.

I've always found the brief "hey" sections after the choruses and before slipping back into the verses strange if effective in Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit," but those are short enough to not really count.

Most of all, of course, if you want to discuss unexpected and seemingly unreleased sections in pop songs, you should probably either start or end with the master: Brian Wilson's uses of a not-dissimilar contrasting section in "Wouldn't It Be Nice" not only also slows things down to a crawl for his sweet teenage pathos:

but the bizarre baroque section in "God Only Knows" comes out of nowhere, has little relation to the rest of the song, shouldn't even remotely work and, of course, is beyond genius.

Listen to that! No matter how many times you've heard it, it's always worth hearing again. Because it should not work. It's so out of nowhere, so out of place, and it somehow—despite coming crazy early in the song, even!—makes perfect sense in the moment. Impossible, and yet there 'tis.

So why did Tom Petty go into that halftime section? My guess: 'cuz it felt great and sounded better.

Nirvana + Vanessa Carlton = unbelievable

This really is, to quote one of the songs, unbelievable.

Smells Like Teen Spirit

I'm obviously engaging in hyperbole when I say this is approaching war crime territory...but not by much.

Nevermind

It was one of the most memorable music-related experiences of my life. I don't remember the first time I heard, say, Revolver or Who's Next or London Calling. But I surely recall the first time I heard Nirvana. A co-worker had the "hello hello hello how low" section of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" as his outgoing voicemail message, and even over the obviously extremely low-fi telephone system, it was absolutely mesmerizing. I called back until I got him in person.

"What is that?" I needed to know.

"It's Nirvana," he said, his tone of voice ever so slightly duh.

I wasn't listening to music at that point—not only was my stereo (and CDs and LPs) several hundred miles south of me, I didn't even have a boombox or Walkman, so for the first time since well before my teenage years, I was entirely out of the loop, when it came to new music. "Who...wha..." I said, charmingly.

He took pity on me, and dropped off the cassette a short while later. My officemate, who had very good but very snooty taste in music, was highly skeptical, as always, but popped it in his office boombox anyway, and cranked the volume knob.

That opening captivated me instantaneously...although I was a bit confused. They were opening with a cover of "Louie Louie"? That's weird.

And then those drums. My god those drums. Sounding bigger than Everest, deeper than the Mariana Trench, louder and faster and punchier—if such a thing were possible—than even the mighty Bonzo himself.

And then the distorted guitars and then the dramatic drop in volume and that bassline and those two chiming notes, mysterious and commanding and incisive...and that voice. A voice that sounded brand new and older than a giant sequoia. Words which were largely understandable and yet collectively incomprehensible and yet somehow ultimately all the sense in the world.

And that chorus. Even the first time, it was instantly familiar while being utterly fresh.

I remember looking over at my officemate at one point, and his eyes were wide in a "yeah, I'm hearing this too—holy shit, am I really hearing this? You're hearing this, right?" kinda expression.

Most watershed moments are only clear in retrospect. But it's not rose-colored glasses when people say they remember how Nirvana changed everything, and it was so obvious and immediate and most of us knew it was happening in real time. It was that powerful and undeniable. And (good god) 26 years down the line, the thing that kicked it all off has lost none of its power. The greatest works of art rarely do.

Learn to Fly In Bloom

Well, this is...awesome, if a little excessively mind-bendy.

Seasons in the Sun

It's easy to look at this as a popular rock band sneering at the saccharine pop of an earlier era. But even without knowing that a young Kurt Cobain had actually loved the song, you can tell, and not just because the adult Kurt smiles a few times. Because while this is more than a little reminiscent of the way The Replacements would butcher a song live, Nirvana took up studio time, rather than drunkenly stumbling into it on stage and, more importantly, they don't just do a verse or two or half a chorus or part of a riff—they do the entire song, largely get the lyrics correct (sorta), and despite swapping instruments, even navigate the key change (something you can see pleases Dave Grohl).

Jesus, what an artist. What a band. What a loss.

Valentine/Drain You

So Tommy Stinson recently said this:

It may have been time, but the timing was less than ideal. The year the Replacements wandered off into the sunset, Nirvana dropped "Smells Like Teen Spirit," effectively ushering in the alternative-music revolution that would dominate rock culture in the '90s. It was the unlikely triumph of underground culture, and it's hard not to think the Replacements, having been key players, wouldn't have benefited somehow from that breakthrough. 

"I'll be honest with you," Stinson says. "I never really got the connection, to be frank. I didn't hear anything in Nirvana or any of the so-called grunge bands that had anything to do with us. I really didn't. In my mind, we were more a sort of rock and roll, sort of almost rootsy punk-rock kind of band. That stuff was more metal-leaning to me. Having people make a lot of to-do about them sounding like us or any connection, I think, was a bit of a misstep in the journalistic world. Aside from wearing flannel shirts."

Which just...

I mean.

Tommy. Tommy.

I love you, brother, I really do, as much as one guy who's never met another guy can love that second guy. But I'm going to say you're a mite too close to see what's pretty obvious. Which is that this, amongst many other things:

pretty clearly helped give birth to this:

Now, look. Don't get me wrong. I'm not going to say you guys are on the hook for a paternity suit or nothing. The breakdown, por ejemplo, pretty clearly owes way more to, say, early Led Zeppelin than it does vintage 'Mats (or even later LZ)—although if, Kurt Cobain's underrated guitar playing aside, Nirvana had had a Bob Stinson in the band, that breakdown might (would) have sounded mighty different. And I loves me some Chris Mars—one of the great drummers of the post-punk 80s, and a fine songwriter in his own right—but he ain't no Dave Grohl: them's some bigass drums being played on this song, sounding (as always) far more like John Bonham than someone from Sonic Youth or Hüsker Dü or R.E.M. or, yes, the Replacements.

But the drum part itself? That could have been written by one Christopher Mars. The melody? Paul Westerberg, without question. The bass? Well, okay, that doesn't sound much like Tommy Stinson, I'll grant you, although Grohl's harmony vocals kinda do; Tommy was and is a great bassist, but Krist Novoselic—one of the most important and most unheralded bassists in history, Iggy Pop perceptively aside—doesn't seem to have been much influenced by him, at least to my ears. Even Cobain's voice has that Westerbergian ability to be sweetly vulnerable one minute and then gravelly and rock as all get out the next second.

Sure, Nirvana was heavier, although much of that was simply that they were of their time as the Replacements were of theirs. But the basic DNA underpinning each band? It might be too much to say they were twin brothers of different mothers...and then again, it really might not be.

Selling Out

 So I ran across this very amusing piece a few days ago, and it reminded me of a series of posts I wrote to a mailing list back in the days of yore, when mailing lists were the main way people passionate about a given topic exchanged ideas and information—which is to say the prehistoric days around the turn of the century.

I don't recall what started the entire discussion, but it could have been the then-fairly-recent commercial for...an automobile, maybe?...featuring Peter Gabriel's song "Big Time." Or maybe it was Led Zeppelin definitely shilling for a car company. Or Pete Townshend...shilling for a car company. Before he sold perhaps his greatest song to a cheesy cop show. Which was before he sold perhaps his second greatest song to another cheesy cop show.

Whichever it was, it seemed just such a betrayal by one of our greatest artists, something I found shocking and upsetting. Ah, but I was so much older then...

Look. I get it. I do I mean, yeah yeah, it's all very meta, the way Gabriel is saucily taking the piss out of the entire venture by using that song, of all his songs, to shill a product. So mighty clever. As Pete Townshend, now vying with the Glimmer Twins for the poster boy of what used to be called selling out, once said:

For about ten years I really resisted any kind of licensing because Roger had got so upset when somebody had used "Pinball Wizard" for a bank thing. And they hadn't used the Who master—and what he was angry about was, he said that I was exploiting the Who's heritage but denying him the right to earn. Who fans will often think, "This is my song, it belongs to me, it reminds me of the first time that I kissed Susie, and you can't sell it."

And the fact is that I can and I will and I have. I don't give a fuck about the first time you kissed Susie. If they've arrived, if they've landed, if they've been received, then the message is there, if there's a message to be received. 

I think the other thing is, though—and I'm not trying to sideswipe this, this is not the reason why I license these songs, it's not the reason why I licensed "Bargain" to Nissan—it was an obviously shallow misreading of the song. It was so obvious that I felt anybody who loved the song would dismiss it out of hand. And the only argument that they could have about the whole thing was with me, and as long as I'm not ready to enter the argument, we don't argue. Well, I'm not ready to argue about it. It's my song. I do what the fuck I like with it.

[Emphasis added.]

Isn't that just adorable. "Sure, I took millions but you were all in on the joke, right? If you were a real fan, you'd have gotten it."

And that sums up Townshend so wonderfully right there, the way he manages to be absolutely right and completely wrong at the same damn time, even as simultaneously compliments and denigrates the hell out of Who fans. As counterpoint, I present this quote taking the opposite stance:

I had such grand aims and yet such a deep respect for rock tradition and particularly Who tradition, which was then firmly embedded in singles. But I always wanted to do bigger, grander things, and I felt that rock should too, and I always felt sick that rock was looked upon as a kind of second best to other art forms, that there was some dispute as to whether rock was art. Rock is art and a million other things as well—it's an indescribable form of communication and entertainment combined, and it's a two-way thing with very complex but real feedback processes as well. I don't think there's anything to match it.

[Emphasis again added.]

Let's see now, who said that? Oh, that's right: it was Pete Townshend. Calling his older self full of shit. (To be fair, Pete often calls himself full of shit, not infrequently in the same interview or even breath.)

So. Seems that once upon a time, at least, there was such a thing as the concept of selling out, and that some artists considered this a bad thing. Some of those artists later went on to do the very thing their earlier selves had claimed to find abhorrent. Life's a funny thing, innit?

First of all, let me point out the blindingly obvious, which is that the world has changed since I wrote much of this, 10 long years ago. For the majority of artists—including, yes, major gazillionaires like the Who and the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton and so on and so forth—the only way to get their new stuff heard is by licensing it to a commercial, and that goes quadruple for almost any act younger than U2. So I get that.

The concept of selling out is so old-fashioned that I'm not sure some of today's artists are even aware that it was even a thing, much less thought of negatively. So I may not like that the only way I'll hear a new song by, say, Camera Obscura or Real Estate or The War on Drugs is when they license it for a television show, but I get it. Hey, times have changed, the world moves on, and an artist has to make a living. I oh so very much get that. Trust me, I'm nobody and I've totally sold out more times and more cheaply than I can bear to remember.

But it seems to me that there's a big difference between writing a song with a commercial in mind (Stevie Wonder's commercial for a local soda of which he was extremely fond) and a song which, theoretically, was written from the heart (say, "Bargain").

The first is a simple act of craftsmanship and has a long history, and if that history isn't normally thought of as noble, well, at least some truly great artists have contributed to it. And when it's simply an exercise, there's seems to me no great crime against High Art, whatever that may be—it's just providing a service, and if the end result is of a high enough quality, we're all better off: there are always going to be commercials, so better good commercials than bad and, really, is it all that different than Bach writing The Art of the Fugue as a try-out for a club he wanted to join?

The second one, however, seems to me a betrayal of everything that truly great rock artists believe in and stand for. I'd have no moral qualms with Pete Townshend or Peter Gabriel giving up rock to write commercials; I'd be saddened, maybe, but otherwise, hey. But to write a song from the heart and sell it to the fans with the implicit promise (and I believe that promise is indeed implicit in everything those guys said in the first few decades of their careers) that this means something to me, this is what I really feel, this is a small slice of my soul...and then sell it to a soulless corporation for a big chunk of change, when neither of those guys is exactly on their way the poorhouse, seems a despicable act.

Do you really believe that's not the exact pose the Rolling Stones were attempting (quite successfully) to sell in the 60s and 70s? In retrospect it's pretty clear that Jagger, at the least, was almost certainly never some true believer—but they worked hard to embody the total rock and roll image, which included giving The Man the finger. But if you don't believe that they tried to make their audience believe that they somehow embodied a higher version of Integrity than the pop stars of yore, as well as the business men of the day, you're either kidding yourself or don't know your rock history. 'cuz that's exactly to a T what those middle-class kids posing as rebels were doing.

Now, do I deny that it's their right to do whatever they want with their work? Of course not. In fact, let's say that again, for those in the back, just to be perfectly clear: it's their work and they have every right to do whatever they want with it.

You know what? To make this unmissable, let's say that one more time:

It's their work and they have every right to do whatever they want with it.

But. For them to deny that every fan who gave them their money and spent hours and hours listening to their work, work that was presented as one thing, and then to turn around and sell that same piece and allow it to be used in such an utterly different and contradictory way, is a rejection of those very ideals that made them attractive to us fans in the first place. It's a con job. It's saying, here, check out this thing—it's a small slice of my soul. And you take it as such and perhaps it forms a small part of who you are. And then ten years later they sell it to an SUV commercial. That's bait and switch. It's a fine technique for making money. It's impossible to reconcile with Art or Truth.

Once again, as Townshend himself said: "Rock is art and a million other things as well: it's an indescribable form of communication and entertainment combined, and it's a two-way thing with very complex but real feedback processes."

It's a two-way thing. You give us your music, we give you our money, but in rock and roll that's not where the deal ends. There's, as Pete Townshend himself said, more—there's feedback and an identification thing that is perhaps unique to rock and which most of the great bands have acknowledged and utilized. Townshend himself obviously did (and this is not the only time he said something along these lines, just the one that was close at hand). Or at least he did before H+P offered him a couple million.

Look, he and they all have the right to do it. But that doesn't mean it was the right thing to do. I'll still enjoy their music and sometimes be touched by it and often marvel at their artistry. But I can no longer believe that they are the pure artists they would have (or have had) us believe they are.

And here's the thing: if artists as diverse as The Doors, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, R.E.M., The Replacements, Sonic Youth, Nirvana and Pearl Jam have all refused to license their songs (it's extremely notable that McCartney has no qualms about licensing the songs of others he owns—Buddy Holly, for instance—but refuses to let the actual Beatles recordings be used) giving up in some cases mind-boggling amounts of money, then the very notion that there's something distasteful about the practice isn't absurd. You can disagree with my argument and maybe you're even right, but these artists obviously agree with me to some extent. And when someone passes up tens of millions of dollars to avoid doing it, it's something that needs to be at least given the benefit of some thought rather than dismissed out of hand.

Now. You'll note that all my examples are of extraordinarily wealthy rock stars. I don't begrudge Gary US Bonds whatever he made for those beer commercials in the early to mid 1980s, or Southside Johnny, who did one as well, or B.B. King for whatever he's done—XM Radio? Sirius? And maybe a hotel commercial too, right? And diabetes medication. And a fast food chain. And maybe a few others. God bless you, good sir, say I.

But do you really think at any point in the past twenty-five years that any of them (toss Etta James in there too) has in their best year made even a third of what, say, The Stones have made in their worst year? When real life (paying the mortgage, say) runs up against ideals, real life wins. I mean, duh. But when you're sitting on a hundred million in the bank, I kinda feel like staying true to the ideals you espoused which got your that fortune in the first place just isn't asking too much.

Neil Young clearly feels the same way, given how openly he savaged his friend Eric Clapton in an award-winning video:

As pal DT once said,

Robert Klein once joked, you may recall, that imagine how set for life Neil Armstrong would have been had he stepped onto the lunar surface and exclaimed, "Pepsi Cola!" Some moments need to exist for themselves, and art needs to exist for itself. If it's good enough or, hell, even mainstream enough, it will take on another life and turn into a moneymaker. And to that I say, "Groovy."  

Two last points and then I'll allow this self-righteous rant to die a merciful and deservéd death. The first is Tom Waits seems to agree with me and, as a general rule of thumb, if Tom Waits agrees with you, you're probably on the right track:

Songs carry emotional information and some transport us back to a poignant time, place or event in our lives. It’s no wonder a corporation would want to hitch a ride on the spell these songs cast and encourage you to buy soft drinks, underwear or automobiles while you’re in the trance. Artists who take money for ads poison and pervert their songs. It reduces them to the level of a jingle, a word that describes the sound of change in your pocket, which is what your songs become. Remember, when you sell your songs for commercials, you are selling your audience as well.

When I was a kid, if I saw an artist I admired doing a commercial, I’d think, “Too bad, he must really need the money.” But now it’s so pervasive. It’s a virus. Artists are lining up to do ads. The money and exposure are too tantalizing for most artists to decline. Corporations are hoping to hijack a culture’s memories for their product. They want an artist’s audience, credibility, good will and all the energy the songs have gathered as well as given over the years. They suck the life and meaning from the songs and impregnate them with promises of a better life with their product.

Finally, I think Berke Breathed's Bloom County summed it up nicely—and when in doubt, always go with a drawing of a penguin:

Subjectivity and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

So Peter Gabriel, KISS and Nirvana got into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Say, which of these things is not like the other?

(hint hint: of the three artists mentioned,
these two guys are the ones who have
a lot in common)

When a band as polarizing as KISS still is—after all these years—getting discussed, the conversation can get heated. They've got a lot of fans, and generally speaking, if you're a fan of KISS, you're a pretty hardcore fan: in my experience, there aren't a lot of people who like KISS a lot but don't love 'em. When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way.

I don't quote a Broadway musical offhandedly. While I'm glad that the Hall is taking fan fanaticism seriously, there's an obvious downside to this, as well. To wit: KISS's 2012 album, Monster, sold 59,000 copies its first week. Justin Bieber's 2012 album, Believe, sold 374,000 copies its first week. Would KISS's fans agree that the Beeb belongs in the Hall, since he's so wildly popular? How about if his popularity—which seems like it's about to collapse any second now—keeps up for another 25 years? Or, more accurately, what if in a few more years his popularity plummets to a fraction of its current state for a decade and a half and then, to everyone's shock, his comeback tour is a monster success, and he's able to more or less ride that goodwill for another decade? How's about then?

I'm guessing most KISS fans wouldn't think so. (I'm also guessing Gene Simmons himself would say the Beebs should indeed get in.)

Popularity is a non-inconsequential factor for inclusion to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. You can't analyze the importance of Elvis Presley or the Beatles or Michael Jackson or Madonna or U2 without talking about their popularity: it's a big and important part of their legacy. But obviously that's not the only factor, or the Velvet Underground wouldn't be in the Hall, and a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame without the Velvet Underground wouldn't be an entity worthy of serious discussion.

So that brings up the issue of quality. Of good versus not good. Or even good versus bad.

Ah, but when such issues are raised, the "s" word is rarely far behind: subjectivity. "It's all subjective," you'll hear. "What's good to one person may be considered bad by another and so on and so forth."

Which is, of course, absolutely true. And...well...unfortunately, somewhat facile. Even when said in good faith—and for what it's worth, I think it's nearly always said in good faith—it's, if not a strawman, at the very least distracting, adroitly leading attention away from the heart of the matter.

(Whether something is facile or not is, of course, also a matter of complete subjectivity.)

Look, here's the thing: it's the rare person who doesn't believe that some works of art are inherently good or bad. You might like stuff you or others think is bad (hello, Osmonds), and you might dislike things you concede are good (hey, Ginger Baker). But to claim that it's all subjective is to believe that a random Hallmark greeting card is the artistic equal of King Lear, or that "How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?" is the artistic equal of Beethoven's Hammerklavier Sonata, or any given Cathy cartoon strip is the artistic equal of the Sistine Chapel. And I've yet to meet the person who would make those arguments in good faith.

So. There are standards. There is good art and there is bad art—and just because, incidentally, something is bad doesn't mean it's not art. "Lick It Up" may suck, but Gene Simmons' own claim to the contrary, it is art. It's just terrible art.

But if there are standards, what are they? Well...that's where things get a bit trickier, at least for me. I'm not saying, not for a moment, that I'm The Ultimate Arbiter or What Is or Is Not Good™. Far from it. I'm not claiming my personal opinions are right and all others are wrong. I'm simply saying that there is a difference in quality between, say, The Beatles and Nickleback, or between Billy Ray Cyrus and Willie Nelson. And while I'm not the naïve romantic I was in my youth, I also believe there's such a thing as art and that while it often (always?) crosses paths with commerce, that they are not inherently the same thing.

So let's take a look at what the Hall itself says about such matters:

To be eligible for induction as an artist (as a performer, composer, or musician) into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the artist must have released a record, in the generally accepted sense of that phrase, at least 25 years prior to the year of induction; and have demonstrated unquestionable musical excellence.  

We shall consider factors such as an artist's musical influence on other artists, length and depth of career and the body of work, innovation and superiority in style and technique, but musical excellence shall be the essential qualification of induction.

Unquestionable musical excellence. Oy. If we accept that there is such a thing as a way to judge unquestionable musical excellence, that'd seem to be an unleapable hurdle for KISS right there. Unquestionable musical capability, sure. They can all play. And to their credit, they seem to rehearse with the kind of obsession rarely seen outside a James Brown band. Paul Stanley's an okay singer, from a technical point-of-view, and Peter Criss actually had a surprisingly soulful voice. But he was and is just a remarkably pedestrian drummer of the sort rarely seen outside the original Eagles. And obviously neither of the others are much of a singer, although Ace Frehley was certainly a fine guitarist, if well short of the Page/Beck level to which he was often and absurdly compared back in the day. (Oh, 1970s, you were a cute 'un.)

As to the second set of criteria, only "influence" and "length of career" would seem to apply, and unfortunately, neither are terribly convincing. Sure, they've been popular for a long time, and good for them, since hard work accounts for much of that. (Nostalgia, knowing what the fans want and willingness to give it to them, and good timing account for most of the rest.)  As for influence, musically they mainly influenced subsequent hair metal bands, with their inspired combining of pop progressions, cadences and melodies out of the ABBA songbook with ostensible metal trappings. So a song that disco-era Rod Stewart could have written is played with explosions and a demon spitting blood and breathing fire. I guess that's an innovation? Unfortunately, it mainly inspired the likes of Poison and Ratt and Warrant and Skid Row.

Perhaps their biggest influence on subsequent artists was their stage show, and that's nearly unimpeachable. Except that all they did was take what Alice Cooper and the New York Dolls had already done and simplify and magnify it for the masses. Which, hey: David Bowie's just warmed over Lou Reed with some Eno and some Philly soul thrown in, right? The difference is that 1) no, he's not but 2) even if he were, he created some brilliant art out of those influences. KISS created enormous bank accounts. Meanwhile, P-Funk were mining more or less the same territory on their stage shows. The difference being, of course, that P-Funk were monster musicians creating some indelible art. So it could have been done. It just wasn't.

Which is why I quoted West Side Story up above. Because more than anything else, KISS is like an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. They both borrow the appurtenances of rock and roll but are really Broadway productions: tons of spectacle, sing-song melodies and the same amounts of professionalism and improvisation. You want a show? You came to the right place. As Gene Simmons said:

"Kiss is a Fourth of July fireworks show with a backbeat."

And what higher praise? What could possibly be more rock and roll than that?

Simmons also said:

"Anyone who tells you they got into rock n' roll for reasons other than girls, fame and money is full of shit." 

Thus, I think, revealing more about himself than he meant to. Not that he's ever hidden his ambitions—more than he's unable to comprehend that anyone else might ever have different motivations. If they claim they do? They're clearly lying. No one could ever transcend the most base desires.

He also said:

"The root of all evil isn't money; rather, it's not having enough money."

and:

"Whoever said 'Money can't buy you love or joy' obviously was not making enough money."

which must have just made his family feel swell.

And most telling of all, he said:

"If someone offered me a billion dollars for the Kiss brand I wouldn't sell. We now have 3,000 licensed products. There's no limit to what Kiss can do. We have everything from condoms to caskets—we'll get you coming and we'll get you going."

Yeah. Hey, did you notice what he didn't mention there? That's right: create a great album.

Look. I liked KISS when I was a kid. In fact, for a while there, I pretty much loved 'em. In college, my band, Übërsphïnctër, covered a couple KISS songs and we were only pretending to be ironic—in reality, it was a hoot. And even now I have some residual fondness for them and can listen to a few of their songs with some pleasure.

But beyond the fact that they were openly, cynically a cash grab with no pretensions towards even attempting to create great art...they simply weren't very good. Their musicianship was admirably adequate, their melodies jejune and their lyrics...oh, their lyrics. Even for a genre and a decade that can often seem fairly horrifying with 20/20 hindsight, KISS's lyrics are repulsive for their level of misogyny. And sadly, they don't seem to have improved significantly with middle-age. Not that that should be especially surprising. After all, this is the band whose leader once proudly ridiculed the very the notion of artistic ambition:

"I'm sick of musicians saying 'I don't care what you want to hear, I'm gonna play whatever I want 'cause I'm an artist.' You're an artist? Paint my house, bitch!"

(When it comes to horrifying misogynistic lyrics, of course, it's not like we're living in paradise at the moment, given that one of our biggest and best stars, Kanye West, released the odious Yeezus just this year, featuring lyrics so vile even KISS would have been taken aback.)

I remember reading a piece once which said that the third album—back when artists were allowed three albums, even if the first two didn't do well—was when you knew whether or not you had a serious artist, one with something to say and staying power. As the saying goes, you have your entire life to write your debut record, and a few months on the road to write the follow-up, hence the typically problematic sophomore album. But then it comes time for the third album, and it's make or break time. Do you really have what it takes? Do you have a The Who Sell Out or Learning to Crawl in you? How's about an Electric Ladyland or Born to Run? A London Calling or Dirty Mind? A Ladies of the Canyon or Fables of the Reconstruction? A Hard Day's Night or Zen Arcade? A The Times They Are a-Changin' or Let It Be?

Let's take a look, then, at the opening tracks off those vital third albums from a trio of this year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees.

Here's Peter Gabriel's:

I know something about opening windows and doors
I know how to move quietly to creep across creaky wooden floors
I know where to find precious things in all your cupboards and drawers
Slipping the clippers
Slipping the clippers through the telephone wires
The sense of isolation inspires
Inspires me

It's a brilliant opening to a brilliant album. Creepy in a way rock and roll almost never had been before, Gabriel has the stones to get inside the mind of a stalker terrifying a homeowner, while drummer Phil Collins and producer Hugh Padgham casually invent the sound of drums for the entire coming decade. Later on, the album will do something not dissimilar with a Lee Harvey Oswald-like assassin in "Family Snapshot," visit a patient in a mental institute in the ricepaper sketch "Lead a Normal Life," take a catchy stab at geopolitics in "Games without Frontiers," and what's perhaps a tortured prisoner of war in "I Don't Remember" before, oh, yes, introducing millions of white fans to hero Steve Biko in the overwhelming "Biko." Gabriel went on to much higher heights, commercially, with 1986's So, but he never got better, because you cannot get better than this record.

Then there's this, featuring one of the most famous opening couplets in rock and roll:

Teenage angst has paid off well 
Now I'm bored and old

After changing the pop landscape in a way only a tiny handful of artists ever had before, with Nevermind, Nirvana decided to try going back to their punk roots for one of the most abrasive rock and roll albums—no, Metal Machine Music doesn't count—ever, and a remarkably bold, defiant gesture towards not just their label or the record industry but to a huge percentage of their own fans. As the Rolling Stones and the Who have proven again and again over the past several decades, no matter how much you got in the bank, it's never an easy thing to leave money on the table, yet that was precisely what Nirvana was determined to do with this album. And they did. In Utero sold 15,000,000 copies less than its predecessor. As they suspected it would. And twenty years later, it's widely (if erroneously) considered the best album of the band's career, with blistering rock and roll such as "Heart-Shaped Box" and "Rape Me," not to mention "Radio Friendly Unit Shifter"and "tourette's," alongside gorgeous, heart-rending tracks like "Dumb," "Pennyroyal Tea" and "All Apologies." And the opening cut laid the entire thing bare right from the beginning. Gone were the double- and triple-tracked guitars and the arena-rock friendly drums. In its place were plain, crunchy instruments placed front and center with a minimum of sonic sheen. And the lyrics were straightforward, saying, hey, look at me and my suppurating warts: how you like me now? The entire band always loved pop too much to ever be as punk as they dearly wanted to be...but that's pretty damn punk anyway. And, far more important, it's great.

And then there's this:

I'm feelin' low, no place to go 
And I'm a-thinking that I'm gonna scream 
Because a hotel all alone is not a 
Rock and roll star's dream
But just when I'm about to shut the light and go to bed
A lady calls and asks if I'm too tired or if I'm just too dead for

Room service, baby I could use a meal
Room service, you do what you feel
Room service, I take the pleasure with the pain
I can't say no

My plane's delayed and I'm afraid
They're gonna keep me waiting here till nine
Then a stewardess in a tight blue dress says
"I got the time"
But just as I'm about to take my coat and get my fly
She says "Oh please," she's on her knees
And one more time before I leave I get some

Room service, baby I could use a meal
Room service, you do what you feel
Room service, I take the pleasure with the pain
I can't say no, no

In my home town, I'm hangin' 'round
With all the ladies treatin' me real good
A sweet sixteen lookin' hot and mean says
I wish you would
But just as I'm about to tell her "Yes, I think I can"
I see her dad, he's getting mad
All the time he knows that I'm in need of

Room service, baby I could use a meal
Room service, you do what you feel
Room service, I take the pleasure with the pain
I can't say no
Room service, well maybe baby, room service

...yeah.

Nice job, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Well done.

First Ballot

So the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, while finally nominating the great and influential Replacements this year, still did not find them worthy for induction.

Such a damn shame. Peter Gabriel, Nirvana and the Replacements. Three of my all-time favorites. Would've been awesome to see all three go in together. Especially considering the influence that this:

...had on this:

Oh. And KISS got in (of course they did), as did Cat Stevens.

Cat Stevens.

(sigh)

And I suppose I should say "Who cares" to all of this, right? To follow the lead of Johnny Rotten and remind everyone what a joke the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame is.

Only, well, I just don't believe that. I love the idea of a Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame existing. Just love it. I love that someone has thought to quantify the unquantifiable and label so many deserving artists (and yes, some undeserving and, yes, some OH MY GOD HOW DID THIS HAPPEN???????) ...

...

...sorry. Where was I? Yeah, I do love the idea of so many deserving artists being worthy of the label "Hall of Famer."  Particularly in a business where stats don't always show the true import and impact and, well, greatness of a band or artist. I really appreciate that the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame exists. I just think it's a damn shame that one band is not in.

A Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame without The Replacements is like the Football Hall of Fame without Gayle Sayers. Neither had particularly long careers. Sayers never played on a winning team; The Mats never had a gold album. Both went away in what should have been their primes. And both, when they were around and doing their thing at the height of their game(s), were breathtaking to watch. Exhilarating. In sports parlance one final time, both changed the way the game is played. For good. And for better. Sayers is a member of that exclusive club; he was a first-ballot member. The Replacements should have been. Only aren't. Damn.

So. Good for KISS, I guess (but, man, they were really not that good, even in their crazy-popular prime). Good for Linda Ronstadt and Hall & Oates, who brought plenty to their respective tables. Good for Nirvana, whose brief and astounding presence resonates still. GREAT for Peter Gabriel, so long deserving of the honor.

I don't hate the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame. Not one bit. But for as long as that building stands in Cleveland and The Replacements are not honored inside of it, something is missing. And it will always make me a little sad.

"Don't break your neck when you fall down laughing."

Smells Like Teen Spirit

So. Kurt Cobain would have been 45 years old today. There've been lots of posts about him today, from running old, little-seen clips, to using aging software to show what he might have looked like.

But one of the first things I always think of when I think of him is the mischievous look he gets around 0:27 here. It's not their greatest performance of their greatest song, but it's pretty damn great anyway. Krist Novoselic appears typically hammered, Dave Grohl attacks the drums like literally no one else—save possibly Animal—ever had before (including, yes, even the mighty Bonham), and Kurt himself seems to want to sorta phone in the performance...but keeps forgetting himself and accidentally being transcendant.

He should have been around longer. But, jeez louise, what he gave us in the meantime.



Yeah.