Making a Case: Weird Al

By the Rock Hall’s standard, the most honored artists are those who don’t reinvent the wheel. It’s much easier to continue spinning it and spinning it.

A bevy of Rock Hall members and future Hall members are guilty of stealing the riffs that made them famous.

The most heinous con artists would be Jimmy Page, Keith Richards, and thrice-inducted Eric Clapton, whose careers began the moment they plundered the catalogs of black bluesmen before them.

Any Replacements fan knows that Goo Goo Dolls’ singer/songwriter Johnny Rzeznik owes a treasure trove of “creative royalties” to Paul Westerberg.

The kind of company rip-off artist Rzeznik (center) keeps.

And not too long ago, we pointed out how ungracefully Green Day ripped off the Kinks.

There are too many examples to chose from that I have to resort to a visual description of the history of rock and roll.

Which brings us to Weird Al Yankovic. What separates Al from his riff-raping predecessors is that Al makes no bones about it.

And he has been doing this since his 1979 debut. Think about it: Weird Al has had widespread name-recognition for 32 years. By pop culture standards, that’s at least 3 generations that know who he is and know at least a handful of his songs.

That’s both a cause and effect of this role within music: pop culture’s kingmaker. A pop artist isn’t a pop star until Al does them right.

Here’s a taste of Rock Hall inductees and future inductees that got a free career boost courtesy of Weird Al: Michael Jackson, Queen, R.E.M., Madonna, Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Aerosmith, Billy Joel, Eminem, U2 and Green Day.

Personally, my favorite Weird Al tune his Devo parody, “Dare to Be Stupid,” – an original song penned by Al that was intended to sound exactly like Devo. I guess this makes me a first-generation Al fan.

If the Rock Hall prefers its music watered down by a bunch of one-trick white boys, wouldn’t Al fit that criterion exactly?

All joking aside, what case could the Rock Hall make against Al? I’d love to hear it. Because the case for him includes:

• 12 platinum albums and singles
• 18 gold albums and singles
• 3 Grammy Awards
• 11 Grammy nominations
• Dozens of singles and albums charting across several continents

Put that up against any artist that’s in or considered a shoe-in for the Rock Hall.

If anything, just nominating Weird Al Yankovic would make the Rock Hall look a lot less of the bad joke that it currently is.

Kickin' Em Out: 1992

Two headed monster: Beck and Page.

The Traveling Wilburys consisted of three monoliths of rock in Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and George Harrison. It also featured Tom Petty, another mega-star not quite on that level but definitely on the next shelf.

They are all Rock and Roll Hall of Famers.

Throw in Jeff Lynne of Electric Light Orchestra and we’re talking about the most amazing supergroup ever assembled.

But will the Wilburys ever be inducted into the Rock Hall? Should they be inducted? Aside from boasting a lineup that is the musical equivalent of the 2010 Miami Heat and 2011 Philadelphia Phillies starting rotation rolled into one, did they do enough - one really good album (1988’s “Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1") and one wildly uneven and maybe even horrid follow-up (1990’s “Vol 3,” haha where is “Vol. 2”)  - to warrant induction as a group?

Of course not.

Second from right: Nerdy Eric Clapton.

So given the photo and headline above, you know where I’m going with this: CDNR is kicking The Yardbirds out of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Yeah, we went there.

So they had Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck at different points, or all at once, or two at a time, or who really cares - I’m not going to sift through their boring history.

Their "hits" included "For Your Love," "Heart Full of Soul," "Shapes of Things” and "Happenings Ten Years Time Ago."

Quick - hum the last three? Ah, knew you couldn’t.

And tell me with a straight face that “For Your Love” is a great song. Again, I knew you couldn’t. It sucks, right?

Fab Five? Killer Quintet? Super-duper-group?

If you want to say the Yardbirds laid down some awesome jams, I’m with you there.

If you want to say they’re significant because they contained Clapton before he did Cream and Page before he did Zeppelin and Beck before he did whatever he went on to do, I’m with you there too.

But they’re a supergroup, not unlike the Wilburys or Bad English or Golden Smog.

Maybe 25 years from now, when there are no more bands to put in the Rock Hall because music sucks, they can come back in.

Pardon the Bad English, but for now, their asses is out.

Bobby "Blue" Bland
Booker T. and the MG's
Johnny Cash
Leo Fender
Bill Graham
The Yardbirds
The Isley Brothers
Elmore James
Doc Pomus
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Professor Longhair
Sam and Dave