Thu 4/10
To the delight of metalheads everywhere, the vastly influential Kiss has finally won induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
They’ll be sharing the stage at the induction ceremony next year with Peter Gabriel, Hall & Oates, Nirvana, Linda Ronstadt, and Cat Stevens.
In addition, legendary British Invasion managers the late Brian Epstein (the Beatles) and Andrew Loog Oldham (the Rolling Stones) were named for Ahmet Ertegun Awards given to people in the industry, and the E Street Band was named for a “Special Award for Musical Excellence,” perhaps to assuage those who complained the Bruce Springsteen was inducted without his band in 1999.
Strong cases can be made for Kiss and Nirvana as influencers who re-arranged how people thought about music.
Kiss was, arguably, the Beatles of the ’70s in terms of how many kids they motivated to start their own bands. With their cartoonish stage act, they engaged kids at a very young age, provoking imitation. It’s routine to run into people who say that Kiss was their first concert, at age 9 or 10 or 12.
Nirvana upended the entire music business almost overnight. They made pop/hair metal obsolete instantly and opened the door to a host of major label signings of bands who would once have been relegated — if they were signed at all — to the under-resourced “college rock” division.
The other choices are all of the Rock Hall’s typical “They had hits so they should be in” caliber — bland, efficient acts whose selection will offend few and delight their aging fans. Gabriel might be the exception, but he’s already been inducted with Genesis where he did his groundbreaking work. Linda Ronstadt is clearly a sympathy vote for a singer whose medical condition has taken her ability to sing. And Patsy Cline, who influenced almost every roots-rock/Americana singer who ever existed, is still not in.
Those choices might be the result of what can be described as the Rock Hall’s promiscuous induction policy, perhaps to please music industry scions who worked with the acts, and its vague induction standards. The Rock Hall has inducted 295 groups and individuals since its first class in 1986. The Country Music Hall of Fame has only inducted 121 members since it was established 25 years earlier, inducting Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers and Fred Rose in 1961 (the first two are also in the Rock Hall).
But, although rock is younger than country, the Rock Hall inductions have staked out a bigger piece of territory. They’ve inducted doo wop groups, singer-songwriters, blues singers, country artists, disco acts, and rappers as well as rock acts — selections often greeted derisively by dedicated (and narrow-minded) rockers.
The inductions will take place April 10, 2014 in the usual city — New York — but a new venue, Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Unlike the usual New York events at the Waldorf-Astoria in Manhattan but like the Cleveland awards ceremonies at Public Hall and last year’s in Los Angeles, it will be open to the public. So everyone can enjoy the endless speech from Oldham as he delivers a paean to every radio promotion man he met in the ’60s.
Tickets will go on sale in January.