Induction highs & lows

Highlights and lowlights of the Rock Hall induction ceremony:


Highlight: Ron Wood (right), still a badass at 64, smoking at his table on the floor of Public Hall (who's going to stop him?); canoodling with his latest 30-years-younger girlfriend, Sally Humphries; and leading the Faces through a spectacular three-song set, including the raucous one-night-stand anthem "Stay With Me." (More on the Faces set here.)

Highlight: Green Day. They started the show with a ferocious pair of songs, including "Letterbomb" (fan video here), with Billie Joe Armstrong F-bombing the audience until they got on their feet. Inducting Guns N' Roses 4 1/2 hours later, Armstrong also provoked debate, asserting that Appetite For Destruction was the best debut album in rock 'n' roll history (speech text here).

Lowlight: The 5 1/2-hour marathon length of the show. The Rock Hall needs to trim its inductee classes and enforce time limits on speeches, like the Oscars, with swelling music if necessary. Less talk, more rock.


Highlight: Slash's guitar solos on three Appetite for Destruction songs, especially "Sweet Child of Mine," in a three-fifths reunion of the classic Guns N' Roses lineup.

Lowlight: Bette Midler's speech explaining Laura Nyro to a new generation was passionate, but a mess. She bombed with her line about New York in the 1970s being worse than Cleveland ever was -- a failed attempt at solidarity that came off as a burn. "The Divine Miss Bitch!" my date exclaimed.

Highlight: Sara Bareilles saving Nyro from Midler's mess with a gorgeous version of "Stoney End."

Lowlight: The red carpet was nearly bereft of star power. Most of the stars slipped through a back entrance, leaving the front-door scene-stealing to two guys dressed in homage to the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage" video and George Clinton, arriving in the Euclid Beach Park rocket ship car.

Highlight: Celebrity-watching from the balcony. Bird's-eye view of Chris Rock and Kid Rock at same table with Mellencamp, Midler, and Meg Ryan (Mellencamp's date). Little Steven at the next table, Michael J. Fox near the front.


Highlight: The Freddie King induction, with his daughter Wanda ad-libbing one of the night's best speeches, confounding the teleprompter, and two ZZ Top guys tearing through King covers.

Lowlight: Kid Rock, the Roots & Co. tried, but couldn't substitute for the Beastie Boys, who didn't perform. MCA, diagnosed with cancer three years ago, did not attend. Ad-Rock and Mike D likely refused to perform without him. That's understandable, but LL Cool J's appearance on stage briefly had me dreaming of a one-time Def Jam reunion that was not to be.

Highlight turned lowlight: Chuck D and LL Cool J's dual (dueling?) induction speeches for the Beasties. Interesting insights about the Boys' role in '80s hip-hop, but they got lost in the long talk.


Highlight: Donovan. Ever the Scottish mystic, Donovan accepted induction with a poem written for the occasion. (Who is the woman, now in the grave, who stole his art?) He played his breakthrough ballad "Catch the Wind" and "Sunshine Superman" before tearing through "Season of the Witch" with John Mellencamp.

Highlight: Darlene Love singing "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" in tribute to songwriter and TV host Don Kirshner.

Lowlight: Axl Rose not showing, of course.

Highlight: Chris Rock's induction of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, with an aside dismissing the Axl controversy (at 12:30): "Even if he was coming tonight, he wouldn't be by now."


Highlight: The Chili Peppers -- Flea and Anthony appropriately shirtless -- doing "By the Way" & "Give It Away." Ron Wood, Slash and George Clinton joining them for the finale, Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground."

Photos by Wanda Santos-Bray/City of Cleveland Photography

Rob Zombie, Paul Simon & More: 2011 Rock Hall Presenters

Rob Zombie (left), Paul Simon and Neil Young will be among those inducting this year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum class.

The list of pairings for the March 14, 2011 ceremony at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City is as follows (inductees listed first)

• Alice Cooper/Rob Zombie

• Neil Diamond/Paul Simon

• Dr. John/John Legend

• Darlene Love/Bette Midler

• Tom Waits/Neil Young

• Jac Holzman/John Densmore

• Art Rupe/Lloyd Price

• Leon Russell/Elton John

Iggy, Stooges lead 2009 class into Rock Hall

"Rock Hall silver-anniversary ceremonies lacking in 'sizzle,'" reads the blasé Plain Dealer headline this morning. And yeah, OK, plenty of no-shows diluted last night's inductions, from Peter Gabriel (for Genesis) to two Hollies to half of ABBA.

But how can you write the headline "lacking in sizzle" next to a photo of a shirtless Iggy Pop, after he and the Stooges tore through "Search and Destroy" and "I Wanna Be Your Dog"?

I refer you instead to the New York Times coverage, which includes this choice collision of the Grey Lady's style and Iggy's punk spirit:

Behind him, Mr. Pop, 62, was already unbuttoning his white dress shirt, getting ready to jump, drop to his knees, strut and twist across the stage and down into the black-tie audience.

Yes, that's Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day singing with Iggy in the photo. Here's a link to an Artisan News Service video about Iggy's induction on YouTube, with a test pattern blocking out Iggy's hands as he flipped off the crowd in triumph.

(Photo from rockhall.com)

The Seat-Filler Chronicles

The parties are presumably over, but I had a small part in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Saturday at Public Hall. My duty for the evening: to be a seat-filler for the Fuse TV broadcast.

It wasn’t exactly like the Seinfeld episode when Kramer fills seats at the Tony Awards. "They don't like to see empty seats on TV, so when somebody gets up I just park my caboose on their spot until they get back,” Kramer says.

However, Kramer's right about the “they,” meaning television producers and public relations cronies.

I moved only once, from Row J down to the first row in the upper balcony. Who would want to move after that switch? Not me.

I was lucky, it turns out. Four seat-fillers in the first row, to my left, were booted early from their prime spot overlooking the stage.

With the improved view, I give you what the live television audience probably didn’t catch.

* Mayor Frank Jackson telling the crowd before the ceremony he “looked forward to Cleveland hosting the event every three years.” The mayor watched the entire show one table away from Max Weinberg, Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band drummer and the future Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien band leader. Check out Jim Vickers’ April story on what’s happening now at the Rock Hall. Hint: It’s Bruce-related.

* The giant teleprompter. Presenters Rosanne Cash (for Wanda Jackson), Weinberg and Garry Tallent (for Bill Black and DJ Fontana), and Paul Shaffer (for Spooner Oldham) used it for their speeches.

* Wanda Jackson needing what appeared to be a wooden crate to reach the microphone and accept her induction.

* Some people at Run-DMC’s table wearing the group’s signature Adidas kicks and toe-tappin’ to Metallica at the end of the ceremony.

* While it was still hard to tell one penguin from another with all the tables (Is that the Rolling Stones’ Ronnie Wood or inductee Jeff Beck?), Metallica fans easily outnumbered the other inductees’ and, arguably, the band received the loudest cheers. The highlight was a toss-up between the thrashers’ three-song closing act and Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page joining Beck to play guitar. The Page and Beck performance made its way to YouTube this morning.

Check out the Fuse TV running blog for even more insight on Cleveland's night.

Kings of Rock

Tonight's the Rock Hall induction ceremony at Public Hall. It'll be simulcast in the Rock Hall itself: $5 admission, doors 7 pm, show 8 pm.

I'm most excited about Run-DMC getting in. Raising Hell was the second album (cassette, actually) I ever bought.

Because of my unusual last name, I have a complicated relationship with the song "It's Tricky" -- but when I ran (unsuccessfully) for high school junior class president, I used the sleeve of the 45 RPM single on my campaign poster.



A couple of months ago I got into a debate about Run-DMC's induction -- with a guy who didn't think rappers should get into the Rock Hall because they're not rock!

That guy needs to see this: Run-DMC's eerily prescient 1985 video for "King of Rock" -- created the year before the Rock Hall picked its first inductees and chose to locate in Cleveland. Believe it or not, Run-DMC walks into a "Museum of Rock and Roll" and a security guard tells them they don't belong. They bust in and prove him wrong. Today's the perfect day to watch it.