Rock Hall

The naming of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees always causes a flurry of outcries: the list is "not rock enough"; Kiss or Poco or Connie Francis should have been in there; the induction ceremony should be in Cleveland, not New York; and who cares what Rolling Stone honcho Jann Wenner and his cronies think anyway? All of that's been expressed in the commentary over Thursday's announcement of the hall's 2008 class.

In the fall of 1995, some of the biggest names in rock gathered in this working-class city to mark the grand opening of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum on the shores of Lake Erie. Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Chuck Berry and other stars capped a weeklong celebration with a seven-hour concert in front of more than 80,000 people at the old Cleveland Municipal Stadium.

The saga of Lamb of God's Randy Blythe continues with the singer's being indicted on manslaughter charges in the Czech Republic in connection with the death of a fan at a 2010 concert. The frontman of the Virginia-based metal band spent five weeks in a Czech prison earlier this year, accused of pushing a fan from the stage during a performance. That fan died from a head injury. Blythe has denied the charges. In a statement Monday, Lamb of God's manager, Larry Mazer, said, "Obviously, we intend to fight vigorously against these charges as we feel that in no way did Randy intend to cause bodily harm on the young fan who subsequently died from injuries sustained at the show.

Jay Leno may have snagged Barack Obama for a late-night sit-down interview on Wednesday, but the president of the United States has nothing on a competing booking. Jimmy Kimmel sat down with Guns N' Roses cofounder Axl Rose, who gave a rare live television interview on "Jimmy Kimmel Live. "  Rose's band will open a 12-night run in Las Vegas on Halloween night, and no doubt to drum up sales and interest in the gigs, the notoriously grumpy and outspoken singer agreed to talk to Kimmel -- and in the process endorsed Obama for president.  True to form, Kimmel didn't waste any time ribbing Rose.

TEARDROPS will fall Monday night at New York's Waldorf-Astoria, as the countercultural power players who run the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame mourn their great elder, Ahmet Ertegun, who died in December. The loss of Ertegun, a founder of the Rock Hall as well as the Atlantic label and an open-minded record man whose broad taste helped define the term "rock and roll," signals a shift for the controversial institution.

Satan can't pick sides in the rock-and-religion debate anymore. When Saturday night turns into Sunday morning, the drums and electric guitars put down in smoky nightclubs can be heard again in the sanctuaries of many churches. Once bitter enemies, each side in the struggle for young adult souls is turning its philosophical swords into plowshares of appreciation.

Its downtown was once so vacant that it seemed an industrial desert, its finances so ruinous that it plunged into default, its river so polluted with flammable chemical sludge that it routinely spewed fire. Now this city is generating a different sort of heat, sparked by the unlikely catalyst of rock 'n' roll. The official opening today of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum has seized Cleveland with the sort of euphoria that greets a World Series victory.

Curious about that demonic figure looming over the horizon of the Sunset Strip? Never heard of Spawn? HBO is counting on teenage and college-age kids to be very aware of who this super-cool hellion is. Created by former "Spider-Man" artist-turned-publisher and action figure maven Todd McFarlane, "Spawn" is currently one of the hottest comic book characters in terms of sales and toys, rivaled only by the X-Men.