Rock hall of fame offers amazing music mix

On the ground floor of the six-story rock 'n' roll fantasy - a building that really can start to look like a guitar if you gawk at it long enough - there are video screens that allow those so-inclined to track the musical influences that helped shaped the country's favorite bands of today. On the surface, you learn that the sounds of the Clash were influenced by some crazed Euro-freaks known as Mott the Hoople and that the Byrds left their musical mark on R.E.M. If you trace rock's family tree long and hard enough, however, Berry's fingerprints will almost always appear.

But another thing that's obvious to visitors of what has become the poster child for urban revitalization in Cleveland is the fact that if rock 'n' roll's genesis was not terribly complicated, its beginnings, middles and right-this-seconds are as co

Courtesy of the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame and Museum Designed by nationally regarded architect I.M. Pei, the hall of fame and museum building features six stories of glassed-in rock 'n' roll paradise. It sports a 162-foot tower over Lake Erie, seen in this picture.

mplex as they are delightful. The history of rock 'n' roll cannot possibly be sandwiched into one building - and the rock 'n' roll hall of fame and adjoining museum recognize that fact very well. What they jointly offer is a cross-section of rock history with exhibits, artifacts, movie video and TV presentations and computer-screen activities all tied together with enough music sample to satisfy even the most angst-ridden Generation X-er.

The idea for an actual physical rock 'n' roll hall of fame building was conceived in 1986 and as potential sights were scouted nationwide, the hall of fame officially chose and inducted its inaugural class. The class of 1986 includes the immortal Berry, Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley and Fats Domino. Nine years and $2.6 million later, with the building in Cleveland mostly complete, the museum and hall were opened to the public.

The new Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame wing occupies just one floor of the complex and can be found three stories up. The hall itself is the most formal-feeling and plainly organized part of the building. The tour kicks off with video clips of the formal induction parties for the more than 200 members of the hall's 13 classes of inductees. On the small screen visitors can watch everyone from Led Zeppelin to Little Richard perform on their best behavior.

Next, visitors are treated to a hallway lined with the signatures of most of the hall's members - a neat feature as long as you can forget the fact that you're staring at nothing more than marble-engraved scrawlings. The third floor also includes a video anthology chronicling the careers of the groups and performers inducted during the three years since the museum and hall of fame opened their doors. Recent inductees include such acts as Joni Mitchell, The Eagles and Fleetwood Mac. The hall of fame also features its own listening stations sporting every song ever released by all hall of fame groups and performers.

The museum's "interactive" computerized offerings are found mostly on the ground floor where most visitors elect to begin their tour of the hall/museum complex. Most computerized offerings have obviously not been updated since early 1995 and leave you wishing that it was as easy as "touch screen to begin." Still, visitors that find a computer that still works can, besides tracing rock influences, view snippets of everything from the ageless rock classic "Spinal Tap" to the history of radio.

The ground floor also presents visitors with a plethora of exhibits and rock memorabilia. What's on display ranges from the incredible - the visually overloading "Video Killed the Radio Star," the small but fascinating anthology of Rolling Stone magazine and the glass-encased glimpse into the sound of Motown - to the absurd - John Lennon's grade school report cards, Jim Morrison's will and a rotating platform immortalizing Michael Jackson's sparkling glove.

And then there's the music. While bulky headphones pipe "Sympathy for the Devil" straight to your ear-drums, you can read about the transformation of the classic from a waltz to a samba. While you tap your feet to "I'm a Believer," you can read about Davey Jones' fear of auditions for musical groups who don't play their own instruments. But unlike the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame listening stations where the number of artists are limited but you can hear everything they ever pounded onto tape, the stations that pepper the rest of the museum feature more standout artists but a much smaller selection of their work. "ABC" is still not hard to find - but if you're looking for, say, "Only the Good Die Young" or a Parliament Funkadelic offering other than "Flashlight," you will be out of luck. A separate basement room even gives visitors a glimpse and a listen into the crazy musical word of the one-hit wonders.

Hall of Fame officials say a new rock 'n' roll fashion exhibit is currently in the works. Once finished, the already-on-display-get-ups of acts like George Clinton and Bootsy Collins, Mick Jagger, Aerosmith, Salt-n-Pepa, The Supremes and The Talking Heads will have company and tourists will have even greater opportunity to wish they could go through life wearing such garbs as a Union Jack/Stars and Stripes cape big enough to choke the creatures climbing Pink Floyd's "The Wall" sculpture.

As is almost always a problem when studying rock 'n' roll's romp through history, some of the video presentations and full-length movies once again barf back the exhausted theme that it really is so very tough to be a rock star. Visitors can again hear the world's most bitter man - read aging rocker Pete Townshend - screaming at the camera: "Jimmi, Janis, Keith Moon these were my friends! They may have been your icons but they were my fucking friends."

But the museum's movies, found primarily on the forth floor and ground level, and mountain of TV-screen presentations, located everywhere else, also reveal the good and the bad about rock 'n' roll and rock 'n' rollers that has fascinated the world for more than four decades. From footage of life on the road, on-stage and in the studio with everyone from Bill Haley and the Comets to Etta James to the Smashing Pumpkins and from Aerosmith's Stephen Tyler's hyena laugh and realization that he "must have snorted all of Peru" to a full-length documentary where a narrator pretends to tell the story of Elvis according to Elvis - all of the museum's video presentations are worth hitting the theaters for.

The museum's fifth and sixth floor are devoted primarily to the immortalizing of The King. Visitors interested in seeing all six floors in one day should remember to pace themselves - it seems as easy to spend six days as it does six hours within the rockified confines by Lake Erie.

Finally, no visit would be complete without a visit to the on-sight gift shop. Know before you go that the hall of fame's selection of rarities, bootlegs, and other hard-to-track-down items by all of your favorite mainstream and off-the-beaten-path rock sensations may not be as excellent as your parents or older friends may have told you. Still, you will have little difficulty taking home tons of rock must-buys as long as a few extra dollars is no obstacle - especially if you are an Elvis-fanatic.

opportunity to wish they could go through life wearing such garbs as a Union Jack/Stars and Stripes cape big enough to choke the creatures climbing Pink Floyd's "The Wall" sculpture.

As is almost always a problem in a romp through rock 'n' roll's history, some of the video presentations and full-length movies once again barf back the exhausted theme that it really is so very tough to be a rock star. Visitors can again hear the world's most bitter man - read aging rocker Pete Townshend - screaming at the camera: "Jimmi, Janis, Keith Moon - these were my friends! They may have been your icons but they were my fucking friends."

But the museum's movies, found primarily on the fourth floor and ground level, and mountain of TV-screen presentations, located everywhere else, also reveal the good and the bad about rock 'n' roll and rock 'n' rollers that has fascinated the world for more than four decades. From footage of life on the road, on-stage and in the studio with everyone from Bill Haley and the Comets to Etta James to the Smashing Pumpkins and from Aerosmith's Stephen Tyler's hyena laugh and realization that he "must have snorted all of Peru" to a full-length documentary where a narrator pretends to tell the story of Elvis according to Elvis - all of the museum's video presentations are worth hitting the theaters for.

The museum's fifth and sixth floor are devoted primarily to immortalizing The King. Visitors interested in seeing all six floors of the hall of fame in one day should remember to pace themselves - when there, it seems as easy to spend six days as it does six hours within the rockified confines by Lake Erie.

Finally, no visit would be complete without a visit to the museum's on-sight gift shop. Know before you go that the hall of fame's selection of rarities, bootlegs and other hard-to-track-down items by all of your favorite mainstream and off-the-beaten-path rock sensations may not be as excellent as your parents or older friends may have told you. Still, you will have little difficulty taking home tons of rock must-buys as long as a few extra dollars is no obstacle - especially if you are an Elvis fanatic.

12-03-98