Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kerry Marx

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was draftify. Modussiccandi (talk) 08:17, 18 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Kerry Marx

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He has a lot of credits to his name, but I couldn't find any sourcing. Statements of membership in Grand Ole Opry are greatly exaggerated; he's just a backing musician and not a member. De-prodded because he played on a Grammy nominated album, but he himself was not the nominee. The sources are all WP:PRIMARY or only mention him very fleetingly. A search of The Tennesseean on Newspapers.com only found passing mentions or different people with the same name. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 16:34, 2 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Bands and musicians-related deletion discussions. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 16:34, 2 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep or move to draft. My first inclination would be to move to draft to see whether sources can be improved, but I ultimately think that this should be kept. The subject was the guitarist for a Grammy-winning CD, "Songs From The Neighborhood". In other words, not just a nominated album, and not just a backing musician on that project. BD2412 T 17:45, 2 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@BD2412: Kerry himself did not win the Grammy, though. He was just one of many hired hands on the album. And there is still literally zero sourcing. This article about the album winning the Grammy doesn't even mention him. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 18:45, 2 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- That's why my preference is to move to draft. BD2412 T 19:00, 2 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- I have changed my !vote from "move to draft" to "keep or move to draft" based on the Dan Daley reference, which I have now substantially added to the article. BD2412 T 16:02, 4 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - I must admit that the article has become quite promotional from when I created it in 2014 but that is an easy fix. However, notability is there IMO, according to WP:NMUSICIAN (criteria 6). You can also find sources in Newspapers.com if you don't just isolate it to the Tenneseean. --CNMall41 (talk) 19:45, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

He is one of literally hundreds of backing musicians who back more notable acts on the opry. That doesn't make him notable in his own right. Also I narrowed it to The Tennesseean because he's a Nashville based musician. That they gave him no ink whatsoever despite his job being in Nashville is quite telling. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:48, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There are not hundreds of backing musicians at the Opry. There is the Opry Band, of which he is a mender and the director according to Billboard. --CNMall41 (talk) 19:51, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Do any of the other members have biographies six miles long bragging about every person they've rubbed elbows with, though? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:52, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I am not sure I follow the logic of the WP:OSE argument above. We don't base notability on others. Also, if you read above, the "six miles long" biography looks like WP:FANCRUFT from the last eight years since its creation. There is an easier solution to FANCRUFT than AfD. --CNMall41 (talk) 19:55, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Deleting the fancruft does not magically make sources appear. So far I've seen not a shred of evidence that there are sources. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:57, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

You have said that. However, I provided one above and told you where the others exist for a WP:BEFORE. --CNMall41 (talk) 20:03, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any point where you proved that sources exist. A search for "Kerry Marx" on newspapers.com yields literally nothing but false positives for articles that have the words "kerry" and "marx" nearby, or the OCR misreading "Perry" as "Kerry". Can you find even one hit on newspapers.com that is valid? Because I sure as hell couldn't. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 20:10, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I will make a list now, but not sure where the false positives are coming from. Are you isolating the full name?--CNMall41 (talk) 20:11, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

First result was the Tennesseean actually, showing he was a member of TNN's Prime Time Country band. Here is also the Tennessean confirming him as part of the Opry house band (not just a backup musician). --CNMall41 (talk) 20:14, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This one is kind of funny so thought I would add it here. Apparently he was in a band called Wax Beans??--CNMall41 (talk) 20:17, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

word with Johnny Cash. I think if you isolate the name the sources should appear instead of "literally nothing but false positives." --CNMall41 (talk) 20:20, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I put "Kerry Marx" in quotes, and it still kept giving me things like "I doubt Barack Obama and John Kerry have Marx or Hegel on the brain" or the OCR mistaking "Perry" for "Kerry". Among the sources you cited, though: the first two just name-drop him for less than a sentence in the context of greater things; the "Wax Beans" one may not even be the same guy; and the fourth is a concert review that again, doesn't even dedicate a full sentence to the fact that he exists. Those are all trivial coverage at best, not significant. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 20:28, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Very strange with Newspapers.com but I get that also from time to time depending on what I am searching for. Trivial or significant, he meets WP:NMUSIC #6 in my opinion as verified by the sources provided. Again, just my opinion based on interpretation of the guideline. --CNMall41 (talk) 21:06, 3 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@CNMall41: I have found one book cite, Dan Daley, Nashville's Unwritten Rules-Inside The Business of Country Music (The Overlook Press, 1998), p. 268-70, ISBN 0879518898, available from the Internet Archive library, which has a few paragraphs on the subject, mostly describing his early experience as a touring musician and session musician. BD2412 T 01:17, 4 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for checking. --CNMall41 (talk) 01:40, 4 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 02:06, 10 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I still remain unconvinced that any of the sources brought forth are significant, third-party coverage. Pinging @Caldorwards4:, @Hog Farm:, @Sammi Brie:, @Martin4647:, @ChrisTofu11961: for their expertise. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:45, 12 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Draftify or Redirect. Per WP:NMUSIC, an artist "may be notable if they meet at least one of the following criteria". Since the artist fails WP:GNG due to passing mentions, and it does not fufill more than one criteria, the topic is non-notable. — Mcguy15 (talk, contribs) 00:54, 13 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Delete or draftify: TPH makes a strong case for the current article having no proof of notability (which I agree with) and that he made quite the thorough search and came up empty. Unless a list of good sources (and not one-off mentions like that Billboard magazine page above) is found, I'm very unconvinced by the keep arguments (Especially BD2412's; you can't just assume something like that makes a person notable without coverage backing it up). QuietHere (talk) 10:04, 13 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- @QuietHere: I apologize for any confusion resulting from my late change of !vote. I initially voted, as you did, with a preference to send this to draft. I then "changed my !vote from "move to draft" to "keep or move to draft" based on the Dan Daley reference", which as I indicated elsewhere in the discussion contains several paragraphs about Kerry Marx, and not a one-off mention. BD2412 T 15:21, 13 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  Oh no, that's my mistake. I read over the discussion before responding but forgot about your vote change and made an assumption during a second skim. And indeed there is quite a bit in that book. That alone is not enough to save the article for sure, especially given how close we'd be to violating WP:ONESOURCE, but it is promising that we've even got that much. I'm definitely leaning more toward draftify now, but we're still gonna need more than that before I'm convinced. QuietHere (talk) 18:57, 13 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Delete since subject fails WP:GNG and WP:ARTIST. The sources are simply and clearly not enough to establish independent notability: A Billboard text list mentioning Marx once; articles such as this about some other artist -in this case Kalisa Ewing- that mention Marx once, as a backing musician (ah, the fate of session men!); books in a similar vein, such as Another Song to Sing: The Recorded Repertoire of Johnny Cash and Nashville's Unwritten Rules; and our subject's own website. Since it is evident there's a fair number of contributors keen on improving on the proofs of the subject's notability I'd suggest a generous move to draftify the text and allow it to pass another, future audition. -The Gnome (talk) 13:54, 13 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.