Not to get too far off topic but by mentioning Obi-Wan and Yoda, their themes popped into my mind. Then I thought of John Williams. Then I thought, it's too bad there isn't a Hall of Fame for him. Or at least not a notable one. If there's a genre of music I know, it's film scores.
I also just remembered he doesn't have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Maybe this site should do a "Not on the Hollywood Walk of Fame" list.
I actually knew about the $30,000 but didn't realize the star had to write a letter saying they really really wanted it. Guess it makes sense though.
That said, Humphrey Bogart has a star and he died before the creation of the Walk of Fame. So I guess they make exceptions for dead people. Unless his family wrote the letter.
But Steve Spielberg has a star. He should be a bit more pro-active for Williams. hehe
My understanding is that anyone can nominate a candidate, but that candidate has to confirm agreement with the nomination. Also, the $30,000 can be paid by anyone willing to spring for it and not necessarily by the candidate. This would explain how Chuck Berry got his star--I can't see him sticking a crowbar in his wallet for 30 grand for a star in the ground.
Keeping with rock and roll, to my knowledge, the Kinks are the only artists ever to write a song about the Hollywood Walk of Fame: "Celluloid Heroes."
I wonder if the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has now peaked with the induction of both Nirvana and KISS. I would say Nirvana was the most anticipated future candidate and KISS might have been the most popular omission.
In terms of debate for ommisions...we may have hit a high water mark.
In about a month the list revisions will be out on the site, and i can definitely see that the glaring snubs aren't as heavy as it was when this was just a drunken bar idea in my head four years ago.
What doesn't help (and forgive me if i sound like an old man here) but "music isn't what it used to be".
The album does not mean what it used to, and the top attending concerts are either by acts who have not had a hit in twenty years or by interchangable pop acts.
I agree that Hall nominees and attendant snubs have peaked, and there are a couple of related reasons for this. One is that the Hall has already harvested all the major eligible talent. The other is that we've entered the eligibility period marked by what I call the Great Expansion and the Great Bifurcation.
The Great Expansion, which began in the 1980s, is the exponential broadening of popular music as more genres emerged, and they in turn begat even more genres and sub-genres and sub-sub-genres as popular music continued to expand. You could argue that in the Rock and Soul Era that has always been the case, but I identify the late 1970s and certainly the early 1980s as being the dividing line between the "classic" period and the "modern" period. The Great Bifurcation, also begun in the 1980s, saw the viability of the underground to rival the "overground" in terms of production and distribution of music. The upshot has been, over the course of three-plus decades, much greater niche marketing, with it becoming harder for an artist of any genre to gain universal recognition and possible fame even as that artist could in fact become famous within a genre or set of related genres.
The example I like to use is that we will most likely never see another Beatles or Rolling Stones, not because those two bands were so far off the charts that no other artist will ever match them musically, but because the conditions that enabled them to become so famous 50 years ago did not exist 30 years ago, let alone today--the channels were so limited 50 years ago that it was difficult not to notice the Beatles or Stones, but that was not the case 30 years ago, and it certainly isn't today.
Our definition of "fame" is going to have to change to a recognition that within the overarching label of "rock and roll" there are a number of "kingdoms" in which artists belonging to those "kingdoms" indeed rule within those "kingdoms"--but they could very well be all but unknown to listeners from other "kingdoms."
Put another way, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame may very well become "Balkanized."
