The prog-rock forum I frequent presently has a 110-page (so far) thread on the current Yes album and tour, and the former isn’t even out yet. If you were to post in it you would by no means be one of the youngest. Bienville is full of beans.
I guess it depends on someone’s definition of the Rock Hall of Fame. Is it a place for ground breaking and influential bands? Or is it a place where people that sold a few gold records gets invited?
I liked the Monkees. They had a handful of great hit songs. But Hall of Fame material? I seriously doubt they qualify.
Yes, this is closer. The Monkees played almost everything on Headquarters except an occasional bass part (played by producer Chip Douglas).
The next two albums were a mix of The Monkees’ and studio musicians’ contributions.
The only people younger than 35 who have ever heard a Yes song are the unfortunate children of the negligible number of Yes fans who ever managed to kiss a girl.
Don’t forget Justus. that one was entirely the Monkees, whereas Headquarters featured some other songwriters and a session bass player.
And it kinda sucked, unfortunately, but what can you do? As a singular band, they simply aren’t HOF material, but if you take the whole package, the whole phenomenon, while acknowledging that the four Monkees contributed a whole bunch to it(along with Kirshner, Rafelson, Chip Douglas, MTV(their revival in the 80s hooked a whole new generation), etc., Carol King, Boyce and Hart, Neil Diamond,then I think they are definitely HOF-worthy. It’s just that if the Monkees do go into the HOF, there’s a lot of people who should be accepting that induction along with them.
The Monkees haven’t made an album in 18 years; their last one charted at an embarrassing #200. Yes have a new album coming out next week; their last one, in 2011, made #30. Which band did you say is still making fans?
IMHO, prog in general has an audience that constantly gets renewed by new fans who are looking for adventurous and/or challenging music outside the current Top 40. Someone with that mindset won’t be afraid to pick up a 40 year old album because if they’re willing to buy a song that goes for 20+ minutes, the age of the piece isn’t going to be a big deal. Prog seems to attract rather loyal fans in general.
If you want bubblegum pop, you may as well buy the latest Bieber album as pick up a Monkees collection, unless you’re already invested in the nostalgia. That’s not to say that the pop songcraft on display in the best of the Monkees isn’t excellent–it is–but I just can’t see it inspiring devotion in a young audience in the same way Pink Floyd or Yes do.
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50 years later they and their songs are still recognised by the vast majority of the music loving public? If that isn’t famous then what is?
Not quite 48 years later, to be exact. And I’m not sure about “the vast majority of the music-loving public.”
The Monkees TV show ran just two seasons on prime time (Fall 1966-Spring 1968). It ran on Saturday morning TV from 1969-1973.
If you were a teenager or tweener in those years, or roughly that age at the time of the great MTV revival of the series in 1986, then yes, you recognize The Monkees and their music.
But that still leaves a substantial generation after that who have had little or no exposure to The Monkees. Outside the occasional use of one of their songs on a TV commercial, if you don’t listen to Oldies radio, you don’t hear their songs. I would guess there are legions of tweeners, teenagers and young adults today who’ve maybe heard of The Monkees, but don’t know a single song by them.
This could also apply to those who came of age during the wilderness years between 1973 and 1986.
I’m just saying you can’t make assumptions about songs or artists that “everybody knows” just because you happen to know them.
Did you go to the Monkees concert?
Who?
The Monkees.
Yes.
Sure I can. Everybody knows the fucking Monkees and its got nothing to do with listening to oldie channels. You think “Daydream believer” only gets played on oldie channels?
I’m just some normal randomer from a different country who wasn’t even born for another twenty years after the Monkees were in vogue and I know who they are. I couldn’t name a Yes song if you clubbed me over the head with one but I know the freaking Monkees, because not knowing who the Monkees were would be like not knowing who the Beatles were.
Regardless of who actually wrote the Monkees’s songs and who played on their records, they had 11 top 40 songs and 6 top ten hits. They were extremely popular in their day, and a lot of their hits still hold up very well.
Am I saying they should be slam dunk Hall of Famers? No- merely that they were more successful and popular than many groups that ARE in the Hall of Fame.
To use a comparison, they had at least as many hits as several Motown acts that ALSO didn’t write their own songs and that ALSO didn’t play their own instruments. The Four Tops didn’t play their own instruments or write their own songs, and THEY got into the Hall of Fame. Why are they worthier?
“If I could write, I wouldn’t have to steal this bit.”
The Credibility Gap
While I agree that the Monkees are eligible - and should probably get in - I’ve always been skeptical of this argument. I’ve heard it in baseball for decades about Cooperstown and it always leads to an endless chain of ‘he’s as good as X who’s in’ and slowly it becomes a HoF of the ‘pretty good’.
Remember, too, that it’s the Hall of FAME. By that standard Lou Reed and a lot of other ‘critic darling’ acts shouldn’t be anywhere near it. I have my problems with the Velvet Underground, God knows, but I don’t think even there most ardent supporters could argue that they were more famous than the Monkees.
You know what just occurred to me? The RRHOF is like bigger, less fun version of The Hard Rock Cafe with no food or booze or cute waitresses. Would anybody say The Monkees don’t rate a spot on The Hard Rock Cafe’s walls?
I always thought rock was supposed to be fun. The HOF, even in discussions, seems designed to drain every last funtod (smallest unit of fun) right out of rock and roll.
Well, thank you for your carefully sourced scientific opinion! :rolleyes:
For the record, I noted in my post that while a lot of people might “know who The Monkees are,” that doesn’t translate into knowing many (or in the case of the generation I pointed out, any) of their songs.
I would like for you to specifically enumerate WHICH “channels” other than ones devoted to 60s/70s music Monkees music gets “played on.”
Meanwhile, when you have to resort to profanity to make your point, you know you’ve already lost the argument.
All of them. You want their frequencies so you can go check it out?
Actually, I’ve been making the argument for years (and it’s fallen spectacularly on deaf ears for the most part) that the Rock ‘n’ Roll of Fame should have a two-tier system that’s roughly analogous to the Baseball Hall of Fame’s Veterans Committee.
There are artists in the history of rock who are very obviously innovators, revolutionaries, visionaries…whatever else you want to call them.
And then there are artists who don’t rise to that standard, but who were nevertheless VERY good at what they did, had sustained careers and brought pleasure to a lot of people.
Frankly, many artists who have entered the RRHOF rest more comfortably in this second category. Just off the top of my head, I can think of:
Del Shannon
Gene Pitney
Brenda Lee
The Dave Clark Five
Ricky Nelson
Lloyd Price
Now let me make it clear that I like, and in some cases love, every one of these performers a great deal. They made wonderful music that I treasure. But if you asked for an honest answer from most of them, those who could answer would probably themselves admit that their accomplishments don’t equal most of the artists that should unquestionably be members of the RRHOF.
I believe the music these second-tier artists made should be remembered and memorialized in some way, because the more years that elapse, the more their music will be forgotten. Oldies radio completely abandoned 50s music decades ago, and 60s music is being played less and less. I realize that you can still get it on specialty stations on satellite radio, but you still have to have some impetus to check it out in the first case.
My proposal would at least keep the names of these deserving performers a little in the limelight. If it had been put into place, no one would be complaining about Paul Revere and the Raiders or The Guess Who, for example, not being in the RRHOF, and the DC 5 would have gone in before Mike Smith died. If this category existed, The Monkees would be a shoo-in, and lot of anguish could be averted!
But right now, the inductees are an uncomfortable mix of the unquestionably brilliant and the…well, “pretty good” is a little pejorative, but it’ll do.
I don’ t know the full story, but I can’t say I’ve ever heard of a baseball player who got into Cooperstown via the Veterans Committee route refusing the honor.
He loses because he said “fucking Monkees”? Really? You’re going with that argument, while criticizing someone else’s?