Rock And Roll Attic

In one of my earliest blogposts I declared that Rock Is Dead. Nothing in the past few years has made me think the corpse has gotten any warmer, but I still like to pay my respects. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland is a beautiful shiny white mausoleum to the art form that I have been to a couple of times.

Since not everybody makes a pilgrimage to Lake Erie to pay homage, they have opened the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Annex in Manhattan. The day after Christmas my family took a trip on the Megabus for the express purpose of seeing what the Annex had to offer. Here is a comparison of the two locations.

Picture of me grinning like a fool
Location	Cleveland’s Lake Erie waterfront	Soho not far from Chinatown
Appearance	Modernist shiny white building meant to resemble a turntable	Non-descript warehouse building you’d miss if it weren’t for the banners.
Nearby Attractions	Great Lakes Science Center for the kids too young too appreciate real music.	The Ugg store outlet across the street had a line the entire time we were there. No waiting for the Annex.
Cost	$22; $33 for a two day pass.	$24.50 per person
Hours	They roll up the sidewalks at 5:30 except for Wednesdays and summer Saturdays when they are open until 9.	Until 8:30 on weekdays and 10 on weekends. Closed Mondays.
Size	A massive four story edifice with all sorts of nooks and crannies and side exhibits.	A single floor in the basement that is a one-way walk-through.
Entry Film	Bombastic two part movie detailing the history of rock with insightful narration.	Ten minute montage of performance clips in chronological order from Delta blues artists to U2.
Main Exhibits	Too many to list. My favorite is the Music of Ohio area that pays tribute to The Pretenders and The Waitresses as well as others. The original ABBA costumes are pretty trippy as well.	The exhibits are much smaller but high in quality. They have Madonna’s bullet bra costume, Bruce Springsteen’s Cadillac, and several walls out of the now-defunct CBGBs.
Special Exhibits	Currently they have exhibits on Motown and WMMS.	The final exhibit area was devoted to the Clash which was the selling draw for my son and me. They had tons of original posters, documentary footage and tons of stage costumes and equipment.
Museum Gimmicks	Not many that I remember, but it has been five years since I've been.	They give you headphones and a sound device that only has a play button on it. The music changes depending on what display you are looking at. Sadly it has no narration.
Gift shop	A huge area with tons of tee shirts, CDs, and tchotkes.	A small area with some tee shirts and crap as well as a counter selling memorabilia with four digit prices.
Estimated time to tour	Four hours if you are with people easily bored. All day if you are really obsessive.	Ninety minutes start to finish and there’s no re-entry if you change your mind.
Worth a special trip?	Yes. Even to Cleveland. In fact it's one of the few reasons to bother to go to Cleveland.	No. But it is easy to tie it into a day in Chinatown and the Lower East Side like we did.

While eating at Goodburger, a transplanted Ohioan saw my souvenir bag and asked me if the Annex was worth the time and money. I had to reluctantly give it a thumbs down, especially if you have been to the main museum. Even in New York, the Times Square Hard Rock Café probably gives The Annex a run for its money in number of display items (although The Annex has an edge in historical significance) and the Hard Rock serves a really good pulled pork sandwich.