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  • R’NR HOF Announces 2010 Inductees: World Goes “Huh”?

    The Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame just announced it’s 2010 inductees, and they are…(drumroll please)…Iggy & The Stooges, Genesis, ABBA, Jimmy Cliff and The Hollies.

    *Rubs eyes* Say what?

    Yes, folks. In a class that included the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kiss and LL Cool J, this is what that lovely nominating committee was able to come up with.

    I’m sorry, but if Jann Wenner isn’t playing favorites OR someone isn’t getting paid under the table, then I don’t know how else to explain this one.

    I don’t know a whole lot about The Stooges (or Iggy’s music, really, beyond “Lust for Life”), but he seems to be widely regarded as a pioneer. He can slide.

    Genesis? Groundbreaking prog-rock band. Very theatrical and musically complex. Then they regrouped and turned out some of the most irresistible pop nuggets of the Eighties, not to mention a string of stellar solo hits by Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins and Mike + the Mechanics. They should be in (and I just read that Phil Collins is unable to drum anymore. What happened?).

    The Hollies? Aren’t they the “all that I need is the air that i breathe and to love you” band? Can you name one member of The Hollies? Do any bands today cite The Hollies as an influence? Can you name one groundbreaking or even critically acclaimed album by The Hollies? I didn’t think so.

    Jimmy Cliff: “The Harder They Come” is a fantastic album. Might be the best reggae album of all time not recorded by someone named Marley r Tosh. But what has Jimmy Cliff really done besides that? “I Can See Clearly Now”? Seriously. The R&R Hall of Fame needs ONE reggae musician and that musician is already inducted. And I say this as a black man of Caribbean descent.

    ABBA: The textbook definition of a singles band. Granted, they were able to create tons of ear candy, but does anyone who is not Swedish and/or gay own anything by ABBA outside of the obligatory greatest hits compilation? If we’re gonna induct ABBA, why not induct Olivia Newton-John? Or Andy Gibb? Will Britney Spears wind up in the Hall of Fame one day? (God, I hope not). And if we’re inducting legendary singles acts, where the hell are Daryl Hall and John Oates??

    I’ve defended the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame to tons of people over the years, but I think I’m beginning to see the light. Anyone who says that these 5 artists are the most deserving of the list of bands that were nominated seriously has rocks in their head.

  • New Releases 12/15/09: Wrapping ’09 Up with Some Soul

    The release schedule has slowed to a trickle, so…I don’t have a lot to write about this week. That might make some of you happy. Anyway, here’s what’s coming out today.

    Alicia Keys “The Element of Freedom”- Even when Alicia Keys does wrong, she does no wrong. Neither of the two singles released so far-“Doesn’t Mean Anything” and “Try Sleeping with a Broken Heart”-have exactly set the world on fire, but she still finds herself at the top of both the Pop & R&B charts with “Empire State of Mind”. A Jigga-less version of “Empire” appears on this album, in addition to a duet with Beyonce, meaning that Alicia has now joined the list of artists who have joined forces with both members of the Carter household.

    Alicia’s a weird one for me. I like her, but she’s yet to make a studio album that I enjoy all the way through. She’s still prone to clumsy lyricism, for one. With that said, though, her good qualities outweigh the bad ones and I have no qualms adding this to my collection.

    Robin Thicke “Sex Therapy”: This appears to be the John Legend “Evolver”-type album for Mr. Thicke, AKA the “Robin Thicke Sells Out” record. “Sex Therapy” includes guest appearances from the likes of Jay-Z (yet again), The Game, Snoop Dogg and annoying new female rapper Nicki Minaj. Now as someone who generally likes his R&B to be guest rapper-free, this concerns me. But the first single and title track is the “Let’s Get it On” of 2009, and I might be able to forgive having to sit through another record with the D-O-Double G if Robin gives us a couple more baby-makin’ anthems.

    The only other release of note is “Lucy”, an EP by Julian Lennon and James Scott Cook. This is a charity record, benefiting several Lupus research foundations. The titular “Lucy” was a schoolmate of Julian’s. A drawing he made of her famously piqued Julian’s dad’s interest and resulted in the Beatles classic “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. Lucy passed away from lupus-related complications last year, so the song “Lucy” is, in part, a tribute to her. The album artwork also includes a reproduction of that original drawing-which I’m sure will be of special interest to Beatles fans. It’s Julian’s first music in something like a decade, it’s cheap, and it’s for a good cause. Pick it up, why don’t you?

    For a full list of this week’s releases, be sure to check out Pause and Play .

  • Is Chris Brown Being Blackballed?

    Chris Brown has apparently taken to his Twitter page to discuss what he feels is blackballing by “the music industry”. Apparently, he walked into a Wal-Mart store and found that the store wasn’t stocking his album “Graffiti”, which came out earlier in the week.

    In a foul-mouthed tirade on his Twitter page, Brown accused record stores of not stocking his CD on shelves and lying to customers and also said that the industry could “kiss (his) ass”.

    OK-so let’s try to analyze this.

    First off-do I really believe that Chris is being blackballed? No. There have been artists who have been in equal amounts of trouble and most retailers didn’t bat an eyelash. After R. Kelly and Michael Jackson got into their child abuse troubles, music retailers didn’t suddenly wipe all their albums off the shelves (Incidentally: Kelly, Jackson and Brown’s albums are all distributed by Sony Music). “Chocolate Factory” sold 3 million copies, “Invincible” and “HIStory” both sold well over 2 million copies. I was working in retail when all three albums came out, and there was never a directive from anyone saying “take those albums off the shelves”. So I find it really hard to believe that there is a mass conspiracy out to get Chris Brown.

    Secondly, how many of Chris Brown’s fans actually go out to record stores and buy albums? And if they go to their local record store and don’t find the album, don’t you think they’d just go home, turn their computer on and download the album from iTunes? I could see the guy bitching if his album was out of stock at record stores and his fans had no other way to get the record, but we live in a time when there are multiple options for this sort of thing. If it’s not at Wal-Mart or Best Buy, buy it off of iTunes or Amazon, or mail order it from one of the retailers’ websites.

    Is there a lingering bad taste in the public’s mouth resulting from his beating of Rihanna last February? Certainly? “Graffiti” is looking at a first week estimated between 90,000-100,000 units. Not awful, but about 1/3 of what his last album, “Exclusive”, sold in its’ first week and only enough to land him the #5 position on this week’s charts (although it will be the week’s best-selling R&B album). Is it possible that a lot of people who purchased “Exclusive” are turned off by either the beating or Brown’s insincere-seeming press tour or attrition? Yeah. Based on that info, can you say that Brown is being blackballed? Absolutely not.

    Listen, people. The name of the game is money. If there’s a demand for Chris Brown’s music, you’d best believe that there would be rows and rows of the “Graffiti” album on every store shelf in existence. No retailer, no matter how noble minded, is going to piss away Christmas season money in exchange for standing up for a principle.

    This all brings to mind another question: do we judge an artist on their output as opposed to their personal lives? That’s a tricky question to answer, and I don’t know if I have the answer to that question myself. I’m not really a Chris Brown fan, and I probably wouldn’t have bought “Graffiti” whether or not he assaulted Rihanna, but I can’t say what other music buyers may or may not do.

    Your thoughts?