By Rich Heldenfels
Beacon Journal popular culture writer
Northeast Ohio rock music history gets a brisk, hourlong overview — from Alan Freed to Kid Cudi — at 7 tonight on WKYC (Channel 3).
Hosted by Monica Robins (herself a singer in local bands), Cleveland Rocks is tied to the 15th anniversary of the opening of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, which was Sept. 1 but includes an ”anniversary weekend” celebration through Sunday.
Both the rock hall and the story of how Cleveland got it are discussed extensively in the special.
Through about three-dozen interviews with people making the music and witnessing it, with video clips, vintage photos and bits of song, the special also aims to tell the broader story of the region’s place in rock history.
In spite of its title, Cleveland Rocks also includes performers from the Akron-Canton area such as Chrissie Hynde, Macy Gray, Devo and the O’Jays.
Nor does the show confine itself to people who stepped onstage. It cites disc jockeys including Freed, Bill Randle, Kid Leo and Billy Bass, and stations such as WIXY-AM and
WMMS-FM; entrepreneurs including promoter Jules Belkin, history-recording photographers George Shuba and Janet Macoska, venues such as Leo’s Casino and the Agora, and the TV show Upbeat.
While it is rich in stories of music past, it takes pains to note that music is still being made in the present day, by the likes of Kid Cudi and Kate Voegele (also known for her TV work on One Tree Hill).
The show was produced by Mac Mahaffee, on-air promotion manager for WKYC. It sprang from discussions about the anniversary, the station’s archive of interviews done in conjunction with the rock hall — and Mahaffee’s own curiosity about local music history.
During a break from making final tweaks in the program on Wednesday, the 40-year-old Mahaffee called himself ”a child of the ’80s. I’m an MTV kid, so I liked all the ’80s pop and then got into the hair metal.”
”I’m not from Cleveland,” said Mahafee, who came to WKYC from Greensboro, N.C. ”But people kept talking about this scene, and I wanted to learn more about it. . . . I’m extremely jealous of people who grew up [in Northeast Ohio] in the ’60s and ’70s and got to witness this scene firsthand. As Billy Bass said, watching these acts at the Agora, or hearing them on the radio, you don’t know what they’re going to become but . . . going and seeing them on a lark, you’re witnessing history.”
There have been print histories of regional music — including Deanna R. Adams’ Rock ‘n’ Roll and the Cleveland Connection, which was a major resource for the program. But Mahaffee wanted to have one on TV. (He said he has not seen Phil Hoffman’s two documentaries about Akron-area music, It’s Everything, And Then It’s Gone, and If You’re Not Dead, Play.)
Still, an hour, with commercials, is not enough time to cover everything. No Waitresses, for example.
”The challenge was how do you condense 60 years of rich, rich history into 45 minutes or so [without commercials],” Mahaffee said. ”You end up leaving out a lot of groups. And people here are passionate about it. They’re going to be, ‘How come you didn’t mention the Numbers Band, or this or that’?”
He would also have liked to get into Cleveland’s punk musicians, and the session players from the region. And at least one hoped-for interview subject — Hynde — could not be gotten.
”She was in town, and she was kind of hit or miss — committed one minute, then couldn’t do it the next,” he said. ”That happens.”
And the saga of Northeast Ohio, rock music and the rock hall itself is not entirely happy. Some of that seeps into this program, with the ’70s sounding like a period when landmarks were shutting down right and left.
But Mahaffee said Cleveland Rocks is ”more about a celebration than getting into the negativity.” Interviews posted on WKYC’s Web site do include more of the harsh side of the music story. But the special argues forcefully that Cleveland still rocks.
Rich Heldenfels writes about popular culture for the Beacon Journal and in the HeldenFiles Online blog at http://heldenfels.ohio.com and on Facebook and on Twitter. He also does a weekly video chat for Ohio.com. He can be reached at 330-996-3582 or rheldenfels@thebeaconjournal.com.
Read The Heldenfiles, the blog by Rich Heldenfels
