(Cannon, get it?)First was Joel Selvin's crochety column in yesterday's SF Chronicle about this year's "lackluster" Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominees. According to Selvin, Chic and Donna Summer were "one hit disco bands", Afrika Bambaataa and the Beastie Boys belong in the "hip-hop hall of fame, not the Rock and Roll Hall of fame", and the RRHoF nominating committee has a "musical education began in the '80s". Get off my damn lawn, you damn kids! grumble grumble.
Selvin has been the Chronicle's "senior pop writer" since the days of wax cylinders, and has been out of touch for the last 30 years. S.F. Weekly used to run a weekly "Selvin watch" from his columns, until the piece ran out of steam and the Weekly got acquired by New Times and started sucking even more than the Chronicle. Some of Selvin's columns, like last Saturday's writeup of the Costello/Clover show are pretty good (probably because My Aim Is True came out in July 1977, a few months before Joel fell out of touch), but he sounds like Bill O'Reilly (or Roger Friedman) whenever he tries to tackle "current" post-boomer music.
I'm not overly whelmed by the latest batch of RRHoF nominees (Afrika Bambaataa, Beastie Boys, Chic, Leonard Cohen, Dave Clark Five, Madonna, John Mellencamp, Donna Summer, the Ventures) and think the whole concept is questionable, but Selvin's "that's not ROCK AND ROLL" arguments against Madonna, Chic, Donna Summer, and the Beasties are even more of a joke, just as old and tired as he is.
I'm embarrassed that my own list of worthwhile acts who haven't made it to the Hall of Fame yet (the Hollies, the Zombies, the Monkees) all fall safely within Joel Selvin's restrictive definition of "rock & roll". Except the Monkees -- who according to the Selvin generation weren't a real R&R band, just actors who played a band on television. They were schlock, not rock.
Arguing about who does and doesn't belong in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame might be a tiring exercise, but at least it's more fun than arguing about who is and isn't "indie rock". This list of the "100 Greatest Indie-Rock Albums Ever" from the latest issue of Blender actually isn't too bad, even if its definition of "indie-rock" ("Born 25-odd years ago in suburban garages and spread via college radio, it has made distortion into something hummable, boredom into something thrilling and aimlessness into a raison d’être — and these days, thanks to blogs and the fine people at Grey’s Anatomy, it’s more popular than ever." -- that's one sentence) doesn't jibe with any reality I've experienced in my life.
If indie-rock was born 25 years ago, what was the first indie-rock release? Blender's list includes the self-titled Velvet Underground album from 1969 (on non-indie MGM/Verve) and the first Thirteenth Floor Elevators album from 1966, but perhaps they were proto-indie-rock?. The Velvets and Elevators fall within Wikipedia's definition of indie-rock: "a genre of alternative rock that primarily exists in the independent underground music scene", but quote indie-rock unquote didn't really exist until the 1980s. They've also got the Shaggs at #100. Like the bartender said after the priest and the rabbi walked into the bar "is this some kind of a joke?".
Blender's list fueled the usual discussion on music blogs like stereogum and idolator ("where's This? And how could anyone rank That over The Other?") including hair-splitting pedantry about how That could be called "indie-rock" anyway, since it came out on Interscope.
PS: I've been a Barry Bonds apologist for a long time, but this has to cheapen his home run record a little.
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