Probably just a coincidence that our old friend and jazz scholar Harvey Pekar — pundit of all things great and small — mentions Bruce Springsteen in his and artist Gary Dumm’s “Why I Haven’t Visited the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame”; the Boss certainly put on an HOF- caliber show at the Erwin Center on Monday (see “Live Shots”). But Harvey’s not here to build up, he’s here to tear down — convention — and his hometown of Cleveland’s monument to tourism seemed like a good place to start. Originally, we’d planned to run the strip right after South by Southwest, because we figure everyone’s tired of reading about music at that point, but we got caught up in Patti Smith, John Cale, and Gurf Morlix instead. With the other great Southern music festival just around the corner, New Orleans Jazz Fest, we thought his tale of Cajun fiddle “innovator” Dennis McGee was well-timed. In other words, while Harvey takes the “traditionalists” to task, we’ve Gone Fishin’. — Raoul Hernandez
This article appears in April 21 • 2000.