Results: Our closest match yet ended regulation in a tie between Eels and Santana. The numbers: #8 Eels/E 39%; Santana/Carlos Santana 39%; Richard Thompson 9%; The Animals 7%; Peter Frampton 5%; Squeeze 2%. We then staged a sudden death overtime period, which Santana won by a 76%-24% margin. Santana advances to the Great 48.
Our search for the greatest band of all time now shifts to the Red Rocks region and our final preliminary pod. In it, a wicked tough pool of challengers confront a man who attained 5-star success as a solo artist and as part of two separate bands.
- #5 Neil Young: Listen
- Deep Purple: Listen
- Iron Maiden: Listen
- The Red Hot Chili Peppers: Listen
- The B-52s: Listen
- The Doors: Listen
- The Levellers: Listen
Note: Both Buffalo Springfield and CSN were entered separately, so Neil Young is here being evaluated as a solo artist.
Please give these fine artists a listen and register your vote below. Polls will close Saturday morning sometime. If all goes as planned, the Great 48 will begin Monday.
<br /> <a href=”http://answers.polldaddy.com/poll/2065520/” mce_href=”http://answers.polldaddy.com/poll/2065520/”>Which band/artist deserves to advance in the Tournament of Rock: Legends?</a><span style=”font-size:9px;” mce_style=”font-size:9px;”>(<a href=”http://www.polldaddy.com” mce_href=”http://www.polldaddy.com”>online surveys</a>)</span><br />
Categories: Music/Popular Culture, Tournament of Rock
Progressive Culture | Scholars & Rogues 
Neil: Personally cant stand his music, but a lot of people claim he’s an influence. Never really broke new ground musically. Maybe he did lyrically, but I was too busy asleep to ever hear the lyrics.
Deep Purple: I never really got into their music except for a greatest hits cd I got from Columbia House when I needed to pick one more cd for free shipping. I obviously know of them and their songs, but off hand I’m unaware of a lot of their deeper cuts, so I can’t vote for them.
Maiden: Easily the best musicians in this pod. They inspired a ton of metal dudes, and have one of the top 5 best hard rock albums of all time (Number of the Beast).
RHCP: Awesome guitarist and drummer. Flea is love and hated, those who hate think he’s kinda a one trick pony. Anthony can write great vocals and complete jibberish and it still comes across cool.
The B52’s: Fun band
The Doors: Are one of the few real popular bands that no other famous band has ever been able to emulate, and that’s a good thing. They had a “sound” and it never sounds dated.
The Levellers: I shouldn’t have to wiki a band in this tournament.
I know the old F’s will go with Young.
Had to go with RHCP. They have a deep catalog, and BSSM, as well as Californication are 2 “front to back” albums. It’s tough to make one of those in a career, but they made 2.
Went with the Doors. Even though I know Slammy will hate me for it.
Voted for the Doors. Darrell summed it up pretty well, I think.
Would there have been a way for me to cast a negative vote for B-52s? I had to grow up with a father who would blast Planet Claire in the car on long car rides.
Tough, tough pod. I say that, but I easily went with The Doors. There’s only one or two bands that might rate higher in my book.
I voted for Neil Young.
Young is a powerful influence on rock and much of what we now know as acoustic folk rock can be traced directly back to Young. He, like Roger McGuinn and David Crosby of the Byrds, and Stephen Stills of Buffalo Springfield (a band Young was also a member of) created folk rock as we know it. Dylan went electric because of guys like Young.
As a songwriter Young got more from G-C-D than any other musician in rock (with the exception of Dylan who disguised his use of the chord sequence with capo work). He also gave us such work as “Helpless,” perhaps the only rock song more poignant than “In My Life.” He remained and remains a vital, working artist even as he has long since attained legendary and Rock HOF (dubious as their judgment sometimes is) status.
The others?
B 52’s – John Lennon once described them as a band that had finally caught up to Yoko’s musical vision. How scary is that?
Iron Maiden – I don’t do metal, but I like them and usually listen when they pop up on satellite radio. I know creativity when I hear it, even if it’s in a genre I don’t care for much….
Deep Purple – This band is responsible for Richie Blackmore and David Coverdale. How scary is THAT?
Red Hot Chili Peppers – The other contenders for my vote in this pod. Influential, still vital, but crazy as hell and sometimes unreliable.
The Doors – Sam and I argue about this – I always argue that The Dead are the most overrated band in rock and that The Doors are second by a whisker. He argues the opposite. Go figure….
That was easy. My taste is a long way from Neil Young, and here there’s a legend every bit as big. Maiden. I’ll never be able to see a clock at 11:58 without singing the chorus to “2 Minutes to Midnight”.
Without radio play they (i.e. Steve Harris) managed to become one of the world’s biggest bands. Who else plays shows in Mumbai, Jersey and Chile…and even if they do, they don’t have Eddie painted on the wing of their 757. Real nice guys too.
Neil Young. This one seemed hard until I thought about Neil’s catalog. “The Needle and the Damage Done”. “Heart of Gold”. “The Loner”. “Hey Hey My My” – and the rest of Rust. “Sample and Hold”. “Payola Blues”. “Cinnamon Girl”. – I sometimes tune my low E down to a D just to play the coda from this one.
Love Maiden. Love the B-52s. Like the Doors a lot. Not all that familiar with the Levellers. Wish I was less familiar with Deep Purple.
Went with The Levellers, who surprisingly are holding their own, largely because they’re the only group of this batch that I still listen to, and partly because folk/rock really hasn’t been doing that well in this thing. The Doors were a good band that descended into self-parody (although Robbie Krieger was a great guitarist, and was actually the one who wrote Light My Fire, not Morrison), and I was never that fond of Young’s tuff. Probably would have gone with RHCP otherwise.
I just want everyone to know, for the record, that if The Doors lose I’m having a temper tantrum.
Retro: It’s gonna be guaranteed entertainment, then, because I’m going to have a tantrum if they win.
Went with Red Hot Chile Peppers. If Neil Young wins, I may have a tantrum (not denying his impact, but as with a few previous artists, I just can’t vote for someone whose music I can’t stand.
That probably makes me a bad person. I’m OK with that.
I’m still having a temper tantrum ’cause green day lost.
BTW, I’m confused. This is the last pod before the great 48? Did you just add 16 bands to the list w/o preliminaries?
This is the last prelim pod. The Great 48 includes these winners vs the top 16 seeds – 4 in each region – each of which had a bye.
Went with Neil Young, but only for his work pre-1990. Strong pod, though. If this is the last pod, did I miss the one with R.E.M.? Don’t recall seeing them. (Not to mention one of my favorite American bands, Dream Syndicate. But they weren’t that big.)
REM is a top-16 seed.
The TOR needed some Pantera!
Fear not, Darrell. We’ve hired Pantera to clean the place up when we’re through.
Actually they did have one of the greatest metal albums of all time (Vulgar Display Of Power) and their followup was pretty great to. There are plenty of bands on this list that aren’t worthy to be mentioned in the same sentence as Pantera.
And there are bands that Pantera isn’t fit to be a road crew for who got no more than a couple of votes.
Either you’re messing with me and I’m not picking up the sarcasm, or you are out of your mind. I know they weren’t a fit for this contest, but they were/are a huge influence in that genre. Eddie Van Halen buried the guitar that he used to make VH2 in Dimebags casket.
Messing with you? Ummm, with all due respect, no. Not to dis Pantera needlessly, but let’s review, shall we?
The Cure 4%
My Bloody Valentine 4%
Mott the Hoople 2%
Lush 4%
White Zombie 3%
Luke Haines/The Auteurs/Baader Meinhoff/Black Box Recorder 4%
World Party 7%
Jefferson Airplane/Starship 5%
Suede 0%
Blur/Damon Albarn 16% (better than some, but amazing given their importance and influence)
The Stone Roses 3%
Nick Lowe 6%
Roxy Music/Brian Ferry 6%
Emerson Lake & Palmer 3%
Steve Winwood/Traffic/The Spencer Davis Group 6%
Tool 10%
Green Day – decent percent, but lost to Robert Palmer? You must be kidding.
Todd Rundgren 10%
Motorhead 8%
The Cult 3%
The Jesus and Mary Chain 5%
Joy Division 5%
Oasis 7%
Catherine Wheel 3%
Paul McCartney/Wings 6%
MC5/Wayne Kramer 3%
Supergrass 3%
Little Feat 9%
Judas Priest 3%
Alice in Chains 0%
Yes 6%
The Stooges/Iggy Pop 11%
Wilco 3%
The Smithereens 0%
The Replacements 8%
The Faces/Small Faces 4%
#7 The Band 7%
Squeeze 2%
Fish 3%
Badfinger 0%
So the Great 48 is 16 votes of 3 artists each then?
Not to mention the bands who apparently didn’t even make it to a pod. That’s when the real venom will start once people figure that out. So, for example, unless Delaney and Bonnie are one of the top 16 seeds, they weren’t deemed worthy of even being in a pod. Ditto Moby Grape. Ditto Jane’s Addiction. And I don’t remember Quicksilver. Or Family. Fairport Convention? Focus? Nowhere to be seen. Oh well, they must be seeded then. A whole lot of 80s bands though. Hmmm.
Wufnik: If I were a fan of the bands that you are, I don’t think I’d be carping about 80s bands. What we have mainly proved so far is that “legend” = “I heard them on my Classic Rock station.” I’d have to go back and count to be sure, but I think we had no more than two or three pod winners who made their names since the onset of the “alternative” era (four of the top 16 seeds fit that description, but it’s easy enough to imagine REM, Nirvana and U2 being taken out by the likes of Joan Jett and Robert Palmer, isn’t it? I have very low hopes for the bands that defined m-m-m-my generation). If you want to carp about one band of another making the tournament go ahead, but this sumbitch has been brutally skewed toward Boomer hero bands and the results have frequently defied critical sense.
Heck, I even gave you the sponsor’s exemption for The Levellers, a band I couldn’t find a four-star review for. They’re doing nicely so far, which suggests they have a following that surpasses that of a LOT of worthy bands who had the misfortune of being born too late. Doesn’t look like they’re going to beat Neil (although we’ve seen late surges before), but still, not a bad showing.
Brian: Yes. 16 seeds, each facing two challengers. Then it’s two artists nose-to-nose beginning with the quarterfinals.
Was King’s X in any of the pods? That’s my favorite band of all time… and they never get the respect they deserve.
I think you kinda accidentally proved my point. Looking at that list at least 1/3 of those guys would be way below Pantera. Also was Weezer on this list or did I miss them?
D: I think you just acknowledged that 2/3 of them aren’t below Pantera.
Weezer is a band you’d expect to turn up in the whatever we call the ToR modern tournament.
Sam: You are correct, I never said they were the greatest band ever, but they are way better then some in this tourney.
Wow, The Doors got creamed. I didn’t expect that. Now I have to put the computer away so I don’t throw it against the wall.
Grrrrrrr.