1. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND. They’re not going to get any better than the banana album. This is clearly not a “realist” pick—very few people outside of Manhattan (hell, very few people north of 23rd Street) knew this band in 1967, and it would be a few more years before their influence became clear. But, as somebody once said, almost nobody bought it, but everyone who did started a band…and if we wait until VU becomes reasonably well-known, we might well get to a point where Reed & Cale aren’t together anymore.

2. JIMI HENDRIX. Let me elaborate a bit on Paul’s “and so much more”—Jimi is now (correctly) seen as a visionary who created a basic template for lead guitar. Even now, it’s kind of shocking how many people sound like him…or at least like pale imitations. But Jimi was reinterpreting a whole mess of earlier blues guitarists, starting with Chuck Berry (much as the Beatles reinterpreted Little Richard, Buddy Holly and the Everly Brothers). Jimi had an astonishing sense of history, and the genius to turn twelve-bar blues into something simultaneously transcendent and popular. Like VU above him (and a handful of other artists), he is one of the turning points of rock history.

3. THE BYRDS. A shame they only fly this high on my ballot once they’re starting to crack up.

4. BILL MONROE. And now I’m starting to put some distance between big Bill and Jimmie Rodgers. Call me a frontrunner…

5. HOWLIN’ WOLF. His first time in my top five. The finest of the blues shouters.

6. ARETHA FRANKLIN
7. JIMMIE RODGERS
8. WILSON PICKETT
9. JEFFERSON AIRPLANE. They feel like a guilty pleasure to me, but I love Surrealistic Pillow. If we must have psychedelia, these guys beat the Doors any day…
10. JACKIE WILSON

Backstage:

1. BRIAN EPSTEIN
2. AHMET ERTEGUN
3. TIMOTHY LEARY

(That last one is partly to see if anybody bites; but I think there’s a reasonable case to be made for him.)

Four from my list made it, so lots of room for new entries...

Who will it be?

- Marvin Gaye? -- A couple of sweet hits, and then two awesome duets. Don't think that's enough.

- Stevie Wonder? -- More worthy than Marvin at this point, sounding so sweet. But he's not breaking through yet like the Temptations and the Supremes.

- Cream? -- I always forget (since I don't own it) that Disraeli Gears is a pretty nice album. I'm not a fan of the straight ahead blues thing... bands of that ilk only get interesting once they expand their palate. But there's some nice songs, including that monster riff that's so nice it has become a parody almost. Might consider them after they release Goodbye, which includes my favorite song of theirs, "Badge"

- Aretha? -- Closest newcomer to getting on the list, but not making it.... How could I put the Supremes on but not Aretha? It's a cumulative thing.

My list...

1. Django Reinhardt - The best guitarist on this list. Now come on, don't be sore Jimi.

2. The Kinks - "David Watts, "Death of a Clown," "Waterloo Sunset" -- pretty good threesome to have on one album.

3. The Impressions -- Not such a great year for them... they move up based on others getting voted in and the super strength of their work from a few years earlier.

4. The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Please note the full name of the artist. Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell deserve entry too. (Not as much as Jimi... but just as much as Ringo Starr and Bill Wyman.)

5. The Supremes -- I undervalued them last year. Their string of hits is just too massive.

6. The Velvet Underground -- Too conceptually important to ignore.

7. The Temptations - It's time... Their sweet sound is ready to get a vote.

8. Simon & Garfunkel - I had forgotten that Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme had been released as of last year. They might have made it onto my list. Add a couple of singles ("At the Zoo" and "Fakin' It"). And there's another song that has been pressed onto celluloid, but is less than a month away from being released on vinyl.

9. Buffalo Springfield -- Put aside their hit, which is not as bad as you remember. Their two albums are full of very different sounding songs. With all of the California bands popping up now - the high functioning stoners (Jefferson Airplane), the low functioning stoners (early Grateful Dead), the homecoming king (The Byrds), the newcomer popular kids (The Mamas and the Papas), the hoodlums (the Doors), the A.V. Club genius (the Beach Boys), the kid that everyone likes, but isn't in one clique (Love) - for my money the most interesting music is coming from Buffalo Springfield. The highlights of their two albums beat Pet Sounds, even if individually neither of them do.

10. Patsy Cline

Gone but not forgotten: The Platters, Dinah Washington, the Shangri-Las

Backstage:

1. George Gershwin
2. Wexler/Ertegun
3. Alan Lomax

1. Jacques Brel : toujours
2. Jimi Hendrix : one of the best debuts of all time + a great second album, 2 absolute classics in 1 year
3. Georges Brassens : my favorite artist at that time, but his best is behind him now
4. The Byrds : see my blog . Iposted about "Mr. Tambourine Man"
5. Leadbelly : yes, he’s still here !
6. The Kinks : They’re cutting an impressive string of singles
7. Doc Watson : Folk and bluegrass genius
8. Aretha Franklin
9. Rev. Gary Davis
10. The Velvet Underground

Backstage

1. Ahmet Ertegun
2. Alan Lomax
3. Art Rupe

1. Jimi Hendrix – In his first year of recording, he’s already done nothing less than forever redefine how the music’s signature instrument is played. I’d say that merits first-ballot induction.
2. The Byrds – What made them the greatest folk-rock band was that they successfully synthesized the best elements of both folk and rock, like no one before or since.
3. The Kinks – Their first singles stripped rock and roll down to its most brutally primal elements; then they spent the next few glorious years building it back up again, creating some of the most sophisticated music of the era.
4. The Velvet Underground – Changed rock like few other artists, although at the time it was happening nobody really knew it yet.
5. Aretha Franklin – The rest of the industry saw a failed journeyman singer; Jerry Wexler saw a nascent superstar who merely hadn’t found her niche yet. He helped her find it this past year, gloriously, and she’s been a Queen ever since.
6. Bill Evans
7. Howlin’ Wolf
8. Ornette Coleman
9. Sonny Rollins
10. The Supremes

BACKSTAGE WING
1. Rudy Van Gelder
2. George Gershwin
3. Jerry Wexler