Uncovering the Next Generation's Hall of Fame
Women in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame: An Update
In recent weeks there has been renewed public interest in the amount of women in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame after influential writer Jessica Hopper, annoyed about the Hall's posts celebrating Women's History Month, tweeted the sobering statistics.
Do they tho? 719 inductees to the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame, only 61 are women. That's 8.48%. C'mon @rockhall, it's FUCKING GRIM BRO when yr doing worse than women-artists-on-country radio numbers (10%) and women headliners at major music festivals (13%) https://t.co/YvpCvwZ72o
— Jessica Hopper (@jesshopp) March 10, 2023
Hole frontwoman Courtney Love noticed the tweets and wrote a scathing indictment of the institution in an op-ed in The Guardian.
If so few women are being inducted into the Rock Hall, then the nominating committee is broken. If so few Black artists, so few women of colour, are being inducted, then the voting process needs to be overhauled. Music is a lifeforce that is constantly evolving – and they can’t keep up. Shame on HBO for propping up this farce.
If the Rock Hall is not willing to look at the ways it is replicating the violence of structural racism and sexism that artists face in the music industry, if it cannot properly honour what visionary women artists have created, innovated, revolutionised and contributed to popular music – well, then let it go to hell in a handbag.
The Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde followed with a public post on Facebook dismissing the institution as "establishment backslapping" and saying she didn't want to be associated with it.
With all of that as context, here are updated graphs showing the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame's record of inducting women.
First, showing the split among all individuals who have been inducted (all categories):
Next, showing the split between all-male acts versus artists with at least one woman (Performer category only):
Finally, the numbers on the Rock Hall's Nominating Committee over the years:
As a point of reference, out of the 183 inducted members of the Country Music Hall of Fame, 25 are women (13.7%). Full list of the members of the Country Music Hall of Fame can be found at Future Country Legends.
The Country Music Hall of Fame inductees are selected by a secret committee run by the Country Music Association (CMA). It's unknown what the gender split is for those involved.
For more on the subject of Women in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, review our extensive archive on the subject dating back over a decade.