Prog Rock and the Hall of Fame

Last night was the annual induction ceremony for the Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame. I watched most of the broadcast and let me tell you, the Oscars got nuthin' on these guys. The show was over 4 hours long.

It was very interesting to watch as quite a diverse group of musicians were ushered into the hall. The inductions of Metallica and Run D.M.C. were the focal points of the night but also inducted were the likes of Jeff Beck, Little Anthony & the Imperials, and rockabilly pioneer Wanda Jackson (who I thought was the highlight of the night).

I love the way the hall of fame includes so many diverse style of music that fall under this umbrella of Rock N' Roll. Though, one of my favorite styles, progressive rock, is sadly underrepresented in the hall. I can only think of two acts that can really be considered progressive rock that have been inducted into the hall...Pink Floyd and Frank Zappa, and Zappa is pretty much in his own genre. Of course, I would like to see my favorite band, Genesis, make the cut someday, but I'm not sure if they'd be considered "influential" enough. I actually think their former frontman, Peter Gabriel, stands a better chance of making it in as a solo artist. He's always been a bit more respected than his former band mates, while they have consistently outsold him.

So...Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame, it was a fun evening...but let's try to get some prog on the bill soon, ok.

MTV Plays Music!?!?!

MTV has just launched a new website called mtvmusic.com. This is strange because not only is the name kind of like talking about an ATM Machine...you know, Automatic Teller Machine Machine, so now we have Music Television Music...but MTV hasn't had anything to do with music for what like 14 years now. But this website is really a cool idea, they have pretty much every video in their library up on the site for viewing, plus your can embed the code on your own site. So, way to go MTV!

Now enjoy one of the greatest videos of all time...not only does it have puppets, but it's my all-time favorite band!

Land of Confusion by Genesis!

Genesis MTV Music

Return of the Rockafire Explosion

This video is just too fun to pass up. When I was a kid, the cool place to go was Showbiz Pizza. Mediocre pizza, skeeball, video games, and an animatronic animal band...who could ask for more? Well apparently there's a guy out there in the land of the internet who has a collection of the animatronic figures from Showbiz, and he's taken it upon himself to re-program them to perform some more recent tunes. So here's the Rock-afire Explosion performing the remake of the Genesis classic "Land of Confusion" by Disturbed. Since I have fond memories of Showbiz, love cover songs (BTW check out the Coverville podcast), and am a huge Genesis fan...this was just plain cool.

Genesis: Live Over Europe 2007

I've mentioned before that my favorite band of all-time is Genesis, so I just had to offer up a review of their newly released live album, "Live Over Europe 2007."

I think Genesis may have released more live albums than just about anyone: Genesis Live (1973), Seconds Out (1977), Three Sides Live (1982), The Way We Walk Vol. 1: The Shorts (1992), and The Way We Walk Vol. 2: The Longs (1993). It's kind of interesting that a band with it's roots in the progressive rock genre would have so many live albums. Prog bands don't tent to have a lot of variation between the album versions and live versions of songs. But from the days when Peter Gabriel would wear fox heads and flower costumes in concert, Genesis has always been a great live band.

The new album features songs from all stages of the band's history, recorded at various venues across Europe last summer. Most of the songs have appeared in other live incarnations, still, it's great to hear new recordings of these classics. For me, the highlight of the album "Ripples," a beautiful song from the 1976 album "A Trick of the Tail" which has never made an appearance on one of the band's previous live efforts. Another favorite was "Conversations with Two Stools," which is a recording of the Phil Collins / Chester Thompson drum duet, which has been a Genesis tradition since Collins took over lead singing duties in the mid 70's. The duet flows directly into the classic instrumental piece "Los Endos," which at least features part of my namesake song, "Squonk."

It doesn't exactly break new ground, but "Live Over Europe 2007" is great chance to hear a classic band together again.