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Friday, January 20, 2006

Arbitrary but fun Friday:  Great American something

Last summer a local radio station conducted a listener poll to determine the “greatest American rock and roll band.” Because it was a classic-rock station, the leading candidates were the usual Parade of Horribles: the Eagles, the Doors, the Grateful Dead (three different kinds of hideous right there), and of course the various All-Stars of Turgid who named their groups after cities, states, or rivers of Hades.

But when I finished all my retching and kvetching—being, after all, a small-time Insufferable Music Snob—I realized that I didn’t have the faintest idea what “alternative” I would offer.  Part of the problem, I think, is the term “greatest”: it suggests a longevity and/or a ponderousness that eliminates from consideration groups like the Ramones, who had a tremendous impact on American popular music but are really, in retrospect, three-album wonders.  See also Velvet Underground, Television, Modern Lovers, Nirvana.  Well, so maybe X?  Hüsker Dü?  The Replacements?  Can it be true that there were no “great” American bands prior to the late 1970s?  (Musically, btw, I think the best of these bands was X.  Partly that’s because it’s true, and partly it’s because I never completely forgave the Replacements for being such incompetent drunken louts in half their live shows.  At least Hüsker Dü showed up and played like they meant it.) I ask this with all due respect to you Creedence fans out there, but c’mon, CCR is a B plus at best.

And then I began to marvel at how overwhelmingly white this question is.  You might conceivably be able to suggest P-Funk, but the rules seem to forbid suggestions like the Funk Brothers or the incarnations of the James Brown Band that involved Maceo Parker, Fred Wesley, Jimmy Nolan, Clyde Stubblefield . . . or a medley of people who’ve backed up Prince over the past 25 years. . . .

So I’m turning this one over to you, folks.  Have a fine weekend.  But anyone who says “Grand Funk Railroad” will be banned.  And don’t even think of reviving this summer’s Southern Rock thread, either.

Posted by Michael on 01/20 at 03:09 PM
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