WIKIPEDIA – 2009-2010
Beast has a website, http://www.bobyeazel.com/Beast.htm , but scarcely any mention at all on Allmusic and nothing yet on Wikipedia.
(December 2009)
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While Allmusichas considerable information on her, Wikipedia does not have so much as a stub on Wendy Waldman, a talented and experimental singer/songwriter who has released several well-regarded albums beginning in the 1970's.
Until I created a short article a couple of months ago, Cindy Bullens would have been a natural choice as an Under-Appreciated Rock Artist of the Month, since she had also languished without any Wikipedia recognition. Her 1978 debut album, Desire Wire is one of the great lost rock albums of the 1970's – and that is Allmusic's opinion as well as mine.
(January 2010)
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Several years ago, I looked up the Wikipedia article on the Dutch band the Outsiders – one of the truly great rock bands of all time and maybe the very best from a non-English-speaking country – and happened to click over to their American contemporaries, also called the Outsiders, only to discover that there was just a stub (in other words, a few sentences with basic information like bandmembers' names, major hit song, etc.). With over 1¼ million articles in Wikipedia at that time (it is significantly above three million now – and that is just in the English Wikipedia), it hadn't occurred to me that I would have an opportunity to work up an article on a well-known group, so I started in. Though the James Gang and the Raspberries each had a generous write-up, there was nothing at all on the Starfires or the Choir, so I also contributed those articles. I had planned to get to Cyrus Erie but haven't as yet, so that Cleveland band – which had only minimal recording though – still is without notice in Wikipedia.
(February 2010)
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So far, here is all that Wikipedia says (though more is available on two later bands with the same name): "Bang was an American hard rock band from Florida, active briefly in the early 1970s. The group released several albums and had one minor hit single with 'Questions', which reached #90 on the Billboard Hot 100."
(March 2010)
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There is a little more on Waterlillies now than there was when I first considered them for a monthly piece, but there is still only a stub in both Wikipedia and Allmusic now.
(June 2010)
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Predictably, despite what the liner notes describe as their "all-star lineup", Wikipedia has nothing about them. In Allmusic and also in Wikipedia, there is a short article on a mid-1960's Mod band from London called the Eyes, along with references to several other bands of that name; of the punk band the Eyes though, there is nothing at all, except that the cover for one of their 45's is mistakenly included on the Mod band's Allmusic page.
(July 2010)
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On Wikipedia, there is no listing for Queen Anne's Lace, though "Queen Anne's lace" is identified as a common name for any of several plants, including wild carrot – and there is a band called Wild Carrot that is described. Anne Phillips also has a Wikipedia listing, but this one is a professor.
(August 2010)
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As a postscript, I have to confess that the Piltdown Men actually do have a pretty decent write-up in Wikipedia. Apparently when I looked them up after I got the album and realized what a great article I could do on them, I looked up "Piltdown Men" without the "The" and missed the entry. Still, I just couldn't resist!
(October 2010)
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It was about a year ago that I started my series on Under-Appreciated Rock Bands of the Month (including one Under-Appreciated Rock Artist of the Month), to celebrate the more obscure albums and bands in my record collection that had not yet been profiled in Wikipedia. It has been great fun, and I have learned quite a bit myself in doing the research. Some of these albums have been in my collections for ages, while the Breakaways album had just arrived the month before I wrote the article.
(Year 1 Review)
