From: Jeff Tamarkin
Subject: R&R Hall of Fame

Bob,

Like Toure and Joel Selvin I spent time on the R&R Hall of Fame nominating committee, albeit almost 20 years ago, and like Joel I was kicked off, in my case for writing a guest editorial for "Billboard" on the inequities of the nominating process (which earned me a public tongue-lashing from none other than Phil Spector at my last committee meeting).

Perhaps things have changed since I was involved, but my observations at the time were that the process was anything but democratic. While I’m sure Toure means well with his statement that "rock n roll is meant to be defined by the Hall as the broadest possible definition of that term so all the genres considered pop music are in our purview," therein lies the committee’s biggest problem – the committee is trying to define rock in its own image rather than reflect what history actually defines as rock. I can’t say that I’m all that familiar with Eric B & Rakim, and I’m not one of those who feel rap shouldn’t be included at all, but I think I can safely say that 99% of the audience that has bought rock records and gone to rock concerts over the past half century would have a hard time understanding why that act is considered rock by the committee when so many artists that are indisputably rock by history’s reckoning remain out in the cold. ??The following is a list of artists that have yet to be inducted into the R&R HoF. The majority of the list was supplied to me by the proprietor of a website called the People’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I’ve added a few names myself. Whether all of these deserve induction is questionable, but I think it’s safe to say that the majority of actual rock fans would at least consider these rock. Would they include Eric B & Rakim in this list, not to mention several other artists already inducted (Is ABBA really rock? Is Madonna?). I’m guessing not.

The list of the un-inducted (and mostly un-nominated), to which I’m sure each of your readers can add at least a few blatant oversights:

The B-52s, Badfinger, Black Flag, Blues Project, Roy Brown, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Johnny Burnette & the Rock ‘n’ Roll Trio, The Cadillacs, Glen Campbell, Captain Beefheart, The Cars, The Chantels, Cheap Trick, Chubby Checker, Chicago, Joe Cocker, The Crystals, Dick Dale, The Dead Kennedys, Deep Purple, Def Leppard, Devo, Dick Dale, Dire Straits, The Dominoes, The Doobie Brothers, Electric Light Orchestra, Fairport Convention, Marianne Faithfull, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Peter Gabriel, Grand Funk Railroad, The Grass Roots, The Guess Who, Ronnie Hawkins, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Heart, Herman’s Hermits, The Jam, Jan & Dean, Jethro Tull, Joy Division, Judas Priest, Albert King, Ben E. King, Carole King, King Crimson, Kiss, Al Kooper, Love, John Mayall, The MC5, The Meters, The Steve Miller Band, The Monkees, The Moody Blues, Mott the Hoople, The Neville Brothers, The New York Dolls, Randy Newman, Gram Parsons, Paul Revere & the Raiders, Procol Harum, Cliff Richard and the Shadows, Roxy Music, Todd Rundgren, Rush, Otis Rush, Neil Sedaka, The Smiths, Sonic Youth, Steppenwolf, T. Rex, Thin Lizzy, The Turtles, Stevie Ray Vaughan, War, Dionne Warwick, The Marvelettes, Mary Wells, Link Wray, Yes, Warren Zevon, The Zombies

I have a favorite story that I like to tell from my brief tenure on the committee. I think it reflects the committee’s prejudices. At the time I was editor of the record-collecting magazine Goldmine. When word got out that I was serving on the committee I began receiving dozens of letters from readers asking me to place into nomination a favorite artist. I explained that I didn’t have that power but they kept coming at me anyway. Shortly before my second and last nominating committee meeting I received in the mail a petition signed by 5,000 fans of the Moody Blues asking that they be considered. Now, I’m not much of a Moody Blues fan – I like "Go Now" and played that first symphonic album a bunch in college but haven’t really listened to them in the past few decades – but I felt an obligation to at least make the petitioners’ efforts known. So I carted the petition to the meeting and at some point I told the above story, that it was sent to me unsolicited, etc. After the laughter died down one of the big players in the room, the manager of a major rock artist, asked me if I was a fan of the Moody Blues and if I felt they deserved nomination. I replied that I was not a personal fan of the group but that a lot of people obviously do feel they were important enough to be considered. The bigwig immediately shot back with, "Well, if you’re not advocating for them personally, then forget it," and the efforts of the 5,000 died right then and there in that room. Nearly 20 years later the Moody Blues have yet to be nominated.

Personally I’d rather see Link Wray and the Dolls get the recognition, but that’s not the point. That’s my taste and the nominating process needs to not be about taste. Rock ‘n’ roll is not something that can be defined by a bunch of suits and critics meeting once a year to push their own agendas, sell tickets to a dinner and plan a TV show. The history of rock is not subject to filtering by a committee. It’s something that has been defined by record buyers, concert-goers, magazine readers, radio listeners, club people – fans, the people who decide what is rock and what isn’t – for some six decades now. And no amount of wishin’ and hopin’ is going to convince that audience that Eric B & Rakim belongs in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Jeff Tamarkin

Subject: Nic Adler / Next Big Sound

Bob:

Next Big Sound is a great service.  It’s still relatively new so it should get even better in time.  The improvement that I am waiting for is one that I think every act should be paying attention to, and that is YouTube search data and views for ALL band content.  Currently, NBS only provides YouTube data for the band’s own channel.  I have a free account because I track data for multiple bands.  But the last time I inquired, search data was not available for Premium accounts either.  I use NBS to track band performance in social media relative to those band’s YouTube videos in my accounts.

Check out the Adele chart provided on the Premium tab on the NBS website.  Assuming that is real data, it shows that Adele has twice as many Wikipedia views as Facebook Fans (1.4 million vs. 700,000).  Most bands’ data shows similar results.  It’s not an apples to apples comparison like Wikipedia views vs website visits.  But this is a pretty good indication that music fans researching an artist new to them prefer independent third party information.   I believe this is what you meant by "fans don’t trust the artists" in your post on festivals.

The lesson abstracted from the Wikipedia data for Adele is that YouTube data for a band’s own channel probably doesn’t mean very much.   I think most bands approach YouTube like an online version of MTV.  It’s not.  MTV gave artists instant credibility partly because it was a filter.  Credibility is one aspect of video that appeals to acts.  But Rebecca Black put the final nail in that coffin.  Music fans know that anybody with a little cash can produce a polished MTV style video.  Fans want authenticity, not a commercial.  So the band’s content is just a fraction of overall activity.

YouTube is a search engine; the second largest after Google.  YouTube is expanding its social features but it is still not a social media site.  The content on YouTube is what people are talking about in social media.  It starts with a blogger or fan, etc searching for something to share.  Or, whenever a band is mentioned or written up in social or traditional media (or even listed in a concert schedule), it frequently results in a YouTube search by the reader.  Those searches generate a results page and most of the results are NOT videos posted by the band.  And the videos that were produced by the band, didn’t get most of their views from search anyway.  Also, notice how few channel views there are compared to video views (5-8% for most bands) and how few subscribers there are compared to Facebook fans.

Bands should be tracking search data and total views for ALL band content.  That data tells you what is working in social and/or traditional media.

Best,

Keith Robbins