Performers:

• The Cure
  
• Def Leppard
  
• Janet Jackson
  
• Radiohead
  
• Roxy Music
  
• Stevie Nicks
  
• The Zombies
  

Inductees will be honored at the Induction Ceremony in Brooklyn on March 29, 2019. An edited broadcast of the induction ceremony will again air on HBO.

On an episode of the "Who Cares About the Rock Hall?" podcast, current and former Nominating Committee members Seymour Stein, Bob Merlis and Andy Paley lamented that dozens of 50's and 60's artists like The Clovers, Connie Francis and Ivory Joe Hunter still hadn't been inducted into the Rock Hall. When SEYMOUR STEIN, one of the four most powerful people in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame's history, can't seem to even get those artists on the ballot after 33 years, what does that say about the system?

At the other end of the musical spectrum, last year the Rock Hall failed to induct Radiohead, a singular artist who stand head and shoulders above their peers. The Rock Hall Voting Committee either were too out of touch to recognize their significance (bad), or assumed they would get in so they didn't spend one of their five votes on them (worse). Either reason illustrates fundamental problems that the Rock Hall refuses to address.

This year, artists with undeniably Hall of Fame-worthy careers such as Outkast and Beck couldn’t even get nominated, and it seems like they weren’t even seriously considered. Imagine the Baseball Hall of Fame not finding room on its ballot for Derek Jeter in his first year of eligibility. It’s ridiculous. Getting inducted into the Rock Hall is great, but becoming a first ballot Hall of Famer is special. Exceptional artists of every generation should be inducted on the first ballot and get the honor of that distinction, but because the list of worthy candidates is so long, the Nominating Committee feels an obligation to try to keeping correcting past mistakes and in the process creates brand new ones.

Those are just a few of the symptoms of this arbitrary and broken system that everyone seems to complain about on the inside and the outside. Many of these problems are created by the induction process:

• The Nominating Committee selects an arbitrary number of nominees each year.
• Voters can only select up to five artists from the ballot, even if they feel more are worthy. This leads to voters who will try to vote strategically rather than based on qualifications. Seriously, why is this rule in place? Why not let people vote for everyone they feel is worthy?
• The yearly cap on inductees has put the Rock Hall hopelessly behind. Ideally, the Snub List wouldn't grow every year, but it does.
• The bulk of the Voting Committee membership is made up of Hall of Famers who tend to vote for their peers rather than those they have influenced.
• Every Hall of Famer gets a vote, but does it make sense that Parliament-Funkadelic members once had 16 times the voting power of a solo inductee?
• There are no term limits for the Nominating Committee or Voting Committee.
• There is a general impression (even on the NomCom) that the HBO broadcasts of the induction ceremony cause smaller induction classes with more populist artists.
• There is no official criteria provided by the Rock Hall to judge artists by. Each nominator and voter brings their own personal definition as to what constitutes a Hall of Famer. (On that Rock Hall podcast, Andy Paley kept emphasizing the Fame part in the name, even though the Rock Hall has previously made it clear that shouldn't be used as a qualification.)
• A large segment of the Voting Committee doesn’t believe that non-traditional “rock” artists should be inducted at all, despite the fact that the Rock Hall has always tried to include all branches of the rock and roll tree.
• Nearly every sub genre of rock and roll is underrepresented in the Hall of Fame. Prog, metal, hip hop, punk, R&B, pop, electronic, new wave, post punk, alternative.... it goes on forever.
• The Rock Hall Museum has an incentive to favor artists who do well in popularity polls rather than by their merits.
• The Nominating Committee has traditionally had a predominantly white male composition.
• Nominating Committee members are not required to recuse themselves when dealing with artists with which they have a financial relationship.
• The Rock Hall has honored marginal artists for questionable reasons which has significantly lowered the bar for induction, creating more confusion about what constitutes a Hall of Fame career.
• There’s no eligibility sunset, so the same old artists get considered every. single. year, and it feels like they win some sort of lottery when they randomly get pulled out from the hat and make the ballot.

This is just a short list of issues that the Rock Hall fails to deal with year after year. The men in charge of the process (Jann Wenner, Jon Landau and Joel Peresman) have been happy to maintain the status quo as the integrity of the Rock Hall continues to erode. Even when the Rock Hall tries something new (the Fan Poll, the Singles Category), they find a way to screw it up.

It’s clear that the Rock Hall needs new leadership to start fixing these problems, but apparently their complacency extends to the highest levels.

Why do certain Rock Hall nominees get inducted and others don’t? These annual prediction posts try to make sense of the Rock Hall Voting Committee’s tendencies. Over the years we’ve justified our predictions by discussing:

• The need for an exciting HBO broadcast
• The propensity of the voters to induct their peers over younger artists
• The correlation between the fan vote and the inductees
• The voters’ preferences for fresh names on the ballot

One thing that doesn’t really get discussed is who is actually most worthy of induction. It really doesn’t matter as much as it should.

Future Rock Legends predicts the five inductees of the Rock Hall class of 2019 will be:

• Def Leppard: No surprise here. The winner of the Rock Hall’s fan poll has been inducted every year so far, and this year will be no exception. Def Leppard are first-time nominees and unquestionably “rock,” which matters to a not-insignificant portion of the voting pool (many voters dismiss half the ballot each year because the artists don’t fit their narrow definition of “rock and roll”). Their performance will be a major highlight of the induction ceremony.
• Stevie Nicks: The Rock Hall is certainly aware of its issues of women being underrepresented in Cleveland. A Stevie Nicks induction would give them a positive story to tell this year, as she would become the first woman to be a multiple inductee.
• Todd Rundgren: For Rundgren’s fans, this nomination has been a long time coming, and his strong showing in the fan poll is proof that he has a lot of passionate support. We’re betting that includes enough members of the Voting Committee and they will be eager to induct him now that he has finally made the ballot.
• The Zombies: After three previous turns on the ballot, the Nominating Committee has given The Zombies a clear lane for induction this year. Paul Shaffer has made it his mission to get them in, so even if they strike out, they will keep coming back again.
• Radiohead: Perhaps last year’s ridiculous snub woke up the voters enough to realize they shouldn’t assume anyone is getting in, no matter how obvious it seems.
• (If there are six inductees) John Prine: This year’s most surprising nominee could waltz right into the Hall on his first try. Prine’s lengthy career has touched multiple generations of voters, giving him an edge over those who had a briefer impact.

Inductees will be officially announced next week, a day or two after voting closes on December 10th.

For twelve years we have been conducting an unofficial poll which requires voters to select five artists on their ballot. The results (after 1163 ballots):

1. The Cure 50% (half of our voters had them on their ballot of five)
2. Radiohead 48%
3. Janet Jackson 45%
4. Kraftwerk 39%
5. Def Leppard 39%
6. The Zombies 39%
7. Roxy Music 38%
8. Stevie Nicks 37%
9. Todd Rundgren 35%
10. MC5 29%
11. LL Cool J 25%
12. Devo 23%
13. Rage Against the Machine 22%
14. Rufus with Chaka Khan 16%
15. John Prine 14%

In many ways, Questlove is the ideal Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Nominating Committee member. He has a rich, personal appreciation of a broad spectrum of musical genres, knows musical history, has worked with a hundreds of the best artists of all time, and is in tune with (and been a part of) the last quarter century of music. Last November, Questlove was asked by Gold Derby's Zach Laws about his experience on the Nominating Committee and he shared some of his thoughts and frustrations about the "interesting and amazing" process he calls, "the musical recreation of Twelve Angry Men." Some highlights:

• Questlove advocated for Bill Withers in 2015 and got him nominated (and ultimately inducted). He thinks part of the reason Withers was overlooked for so long is because his name is at the end of the alphabet and people don’t have the patience to work through to the end of the list.
• Questlove mentioned that there have been occasions where he'll say a name, and people in the room won't know that they aren't already in the Hall of Fame. “A lot of times I’ll sit on the board and I’ll say a name, and they’ll be like ‘Todd Rundgren's not in the Hall of Fame?’”
• Questlove shared the moment at the 2013 meeting when KISS was finally nominated, thanks to a passionate speech from Tom Morello: "The star of that board room is Tom Morello. I'm grateful and so fortunate to have been within two feet of him when he gave that KISS speech. It was so damn inspirational, even Jann Wenner was going to bust out into Pomp and Circumstance.”
• Questlove compares the process to Washington political lobbying. He talks about making deals with Stevie Van Zandt before the meeting to help each other get artists on the ballot (trading a J. Geils Band vote for a Janet Jackson vote, for example).
• Questlove believes there should be more women in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
• Sometimes it’s the biggest names that have the hardest time getting attention. Questlove talks about discussions at last year’s meeting and how Radiohead almost got forgotten. “Radiohead was so obvious that it was almost like, I'm sure he'll mention it, or she'll mention it. Radiohead was the last name mentioned after a 3-hour process.”
• Questlove, like Chubby Checker, believes “people should get their roses while they're living.”
• ”It's such a narrow process to get through those doors... I wish there was a process that would allow at least 7 to 9 members per year. Because there are a lot of names on there that will get passed up and passed up and passed up. But I love the politics of it all. That's the fun part.”

• Alan Light personally used his two picks to advocate for Janet Jackson and The Cure, and got both on the ballot.
• Light felt that Janet Jackson deserved one more chance on the ballot this year because of increased exposure as a result of her tour and other awards.
• The Nominating Committee has been rotating through The Cure, The Smiths and Depeche Mode on recent ballots, but Light felt the time was right to give The Cure another chance because of their 40th anniversary shows and other publicity.
• When asked why Judas Priest wasn’t nominated again after doing well in the fan poll last year, Light revealed that they had done “horrendously” in the actual Voting Committee tally, so they decided to shift the focus to Def Leppard.
• Majewski mentioned that the Nominating Committee now has 30 members -- 23 men and seven women (up from six last year). Light said there were 28 people in the room this year (Seymour Stein was calling in from L.A., as revealed on the Who Cares About the Rock Hall? podcast.)
• Light stressed that the Nominating Committee crafts the ballot in a way where they try not to nominate artists who are in a similar lane, so as not to split the vote.
• Alan Light regarding the Stevie Nicks nomination: ”In the Nominating room, Pat Benatar came up, Cyndi Lauper came up, The Go-Go's came up and the Eurythmics were in this conversation, and not that it comes down to this, but the women in the room really did start to coalesce around Stevie and push things that way out of the mix that was there. That was the one that --and it's silly to say that women are one piece of what's here-- when it's women of the 80s, I don't think you put Pat, Cyndi and Stevie on a ballot together in the same way that you don't put The Cure, The Smiths and Depeche on the ballot together. It was actually the women in the committee who sort of led the focus to Stevie out of that list.”
• Alan Light said that Dave Grohl was responsible for getting Devo nominated this year and Paul Shaffer is behind The Zombies appearances on the ballot.
• Light admitted that the Nominating Committee did in fact take the Rock Hall Museum’s Voice Your Choice visitor poll into account when considering the nominees. Stevie Nicks and Def Leppard were the top two leaders all summer and both were nominated. Rock Hall Foundation President Joel Peresman for some reason tried to deny the poll’s influence to the Plain Dealer, "The new in-museum voting system does not factor into the nomination process as the members of the nominating committee aren't made aware of that. And we rely on their independent thinking, which in this case happened to match up.”
• Light mentioned that David Fricke has previously advocated for The Guess Who and that Stevie Van Zandt tries to nominate Procol Harum every year.
• Rock Hall Museum President Greg Harris and Rock Hall VP of Education and Visitor Engagement Jason Hanley both joined the show to discuss the nominees. Each separately mentioned how cool it was that Stevie Nicks would become the first woman to be a multiple inductee.
• Despite having written a book about him, Light didn’t think Jeff Buckley should be inducted into the Rock Hall.

• The Cure
  
• Def Leppard
  
• Devo
  
• Janet Jackson
  
• John Prine
  
• Kraftwerk
  
• LL Cool J
  
• MC5
  
• Radiohead
  
• Rage Against the Machine
  
• Roxy Music
  
• Rufus featuring Chaka Khan
  
• Stevie Nicks
  
• Todd Rundgren
  
• The Zombies
  

Please vote in our fan poll!

Follow us on Twitter for the latest Rock Hall news.

• Although the criteria for nomination is vague, Trakin personally valued influence, originality and success
• Trakin believes there should be a Veteran’s Committee
• The Rock Hall holds the annual nomination meeting in New York, so members who don’t live there have to pay for their travel (the Rock Hall doesn’t allow participation via conference call). Trakin revealed that the manager for Hall & Oates paid for his travel expenses from L.A. knowing that Trakin would advocate for them at the meeting. (More on this below.)
• Trakin said The Replacements have a lot of enemies in the music industry, which may hurt their chances of getting nominated again
• Although he’s not on the Nominating Committee, Irving Azoff is a powerful force in the process and he may have helped his client Bon Jovi get in this year
• Trakin suggested that the Doobie Brothers may also benefit from having signed with Azoff Music, and could appear on the ballot soon
• Trakin personally nominated and advocated Blondie and Hall & Oates, but also supported the New York Dolls
• Trakin felt Atlantic Records artists had an advantage especially when Ahmet Ertegun was alive
• Although he never nominated them, Trakin discussed the lasting influence of Suicide and feels they deserve to be inducted
• Some members of the Nominating Committee use visual aids like PowerPoint in their presentations for particular artists
• It is Trakin’s opinion that Radiohead didn’t get inducted this year due to their unwillingness to attend the ceremony
• Trakin argues for more transparency in the process and that the fan poll should be worth more than a single vote (he mentioned 10%)
• Trakin said that Jann Wenner is the biggest culprit of holding personal grudges against artists

By far, the most surprising revelation of the interview was Trakin’s willingness to admit that the manager of Hall & Oates paid for his way to New York so he could advocate for the duo in the Nominating Committee meeting. Trakin’s advocacy certainly seems genuine, but this type of pay-to-play transaction only gives Rock Hall critics who say the system is hopelessly corrupt even more ammunition. If Trakin is allowed (or at least not prohibited) to accept a free trip to New York in exchange for a nomination, what other types of payments are happening behind the scenes?

The Nominating Committee is filled with agents, managers, record executives, and artists, who all stand to profit from a Rock Hall nomination for those they represent, so in a system like that why wouldn’t a writer like Trakin find a way to benefit too? The Rock Hall leaders have never addressed these obvious conflicts of interest, and until they do, anyone associated with the Nominating Committee deserves to have their motives questioned with every ballot and induction.

If you want to think about a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame without feeling like you have to take a shower afterwards, check out the unsullied Rock Hall Revisited and Projected classes devised by the readers of Future Rock Legends.

1. Introduction from Rock Hall Museum President & CEO Greg Harris
2. Tom Petty Tribute (The Killers perform “American Girl”)
3. Bon Jovi (Inducted by Howard Stern; “You Give Love a Bad Name”, “It’s My Life”, “When We Were Us”, “Livin’ on a Prayer”)
4. Dire Straits (No inductor; No performance)
5. Sister Rosetta Tharpe (Inducted by Brittany Howard; “That’s All” - Brittany Howard with The Roots, Paul Shaffer and Felicia Collins; “Strange Things Happening Every Day” - Felicia Collins with The Roots and Paul Shaffer)
6. The Cars (Inducted by Brandon Flowers; “My Best Friend’s Girl”, “You Might Think”, “Moving in Stereo”, “Just What I Needed”)
7. In Memoriam Video
8. Ann Wilson and Jerry Cantrell’s Chris Cornell Tribute (“Black Hole Sun”)
9. Stevie Van Zandt introduces the new Singles category and first six inductees
10. Nina Simone (Inducted by Mary J. Blige; “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free”, “I Put a Spell on You” - Andra Day with The Roots; “Ne me quitte pas”, “Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair”, “Ain't Got No, I Got Life”, “Feeling Good” - Lauryn Hill)
11. The Moody Blues (Inducted by Ann Wilson; “I’m Just a Singer (In a Rock and Roll Band)”, “Your Wildest Dreams”, “Late Lament”, “Nights in White Satin”, “Ride My See-Saw”)
12. No All-Star Jam

Just down the road stands the world’s leading institution celebrating the history of rock and roll. We stand here to honor the careers of musicians whose incredible work helped shape that story. But we all know the history of music can be changed by just one song, one record. In three minutes we suddenly enter a new direction, a movement, or a style. Experiencing that three minute song results in a personal revelation, an epiphany that significantly changes our lives. This year we are introducing a new category to the Rock Hall. We’re calling it the “Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Singles” as a recognition of the excellence of singles that changed rock & roll -- kind of a Rock Hall jukebox. The records are by artists not in the Rock Hall. Which is not to say these artists will never be in the Rock Hall, but just that they are not in the Rock Hall at this moment.

• Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats - "Rocket 88" (1951)
• Link Wray & His Ray Men - "Rumble" (1958)
• Chubby Checker - "The Twist" (1960)
• The Kingsmen - "Louie Louie" (1963)
• Procol Harum - "A Whiter Shade of Pale" (1967)
• Steppenwolf - "Born to Be Wild" (1968)

At first blush, this appears to be a new backdoor into the Rock Hall for artists who can’t get over the hump with the voters. The Rock Hall used similar methods to bypass their own Voting Committee to induct Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the “5” Royales, Freddie King, and Wanda Jackson as Early Influences, after they had each been on the ballot as Performers. Unlike Early Influence inductees, the newly honored Singles artists are still not Hall of Famers, so they could theoretically still be nominated, but it sure feels like the Rock Hall is trying to clear out some names from their growing backlog of candidates. We would be shocked to see any of these artists on the ballot next year.

At this point, there are still many more questions than answers, since the Rock Hall has yet to acknowledge this award on its website or in a press release. When they do provide some information, perhaps they can answer these questions:

1. Why was this announced as a surprise at the ceremony? Wouldn’t announcing it in advance provide more exposure for these songs and artists?
2. Were the honored artists and their families invited to the Induction Ceremony? Chubby Checker has been extremely vocal about his absence from the Hall of Fame, so it’s odd he wasn’t at the ceremony.
3. Will songs be honored annually, or is this a one-time award?
4. Will the artists honored in this category become members of the Voting Committee like other inductees?
5. Who is on the committee that picked the first songs?
6. How will these songs be recognized at the Museum? Will they be listed next to the other 2018 inductees on the signature wall?
7. What are the eligibility rules for this category? Does a song have to be older than 25 years?

All of the honored songs are part of the Rock Hall’s 2004 list of the “500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll,” so it seems likely that future inducted singles will come from this list. There are over 220 songs left on that list from non-Hall of Famers, so it will take decades for them to honor them all if they continue with the category.

If we had to guess, Steven Van Zandt created this category out of his frustration that many seminal artists have little chance of ever being inducted, and he wanted to do something, anything, to honor them before it’s too late. While the intentions may be pure, the execution was ham-fisted at best. Not inviting the artists and their families to the ceremony, or even notifying them of the honor in advance, just seems sloppy and inconsiderate. The Rock Hall itself has created this situation by limiting the number of inductees to five or six per year while simultaneously lowering the bar by inducting marginal candidates. That generates even more artists who can genuinely be considered snubs who will never be inducted at the current pace.

There are lots of ways to address these problems, but the Rock Hall never seems willing to experiment with their induction system beyond force inducting artists into categories in which they don’t belong.

The low point of the 2018 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony was undoubtedly the Dire Straits segment. It was the culmination of what must have been a messy behind-the-scenes drama.

Soon after the inductees were announced, it became clear that Mark Knopfler was not particularly interested in the honor. He didn’t provide the usual interviews to Rolling Stone or the Plain Dealer, and there was virtual radio silence from the band’s camp in the months to follow. In late March, keyboardist Guy Fletcher responded to a comment on his website saying there would be no performance at the Induction Ceremony and there would only be a video presentation. A week later, word started to trickle out that David Knopfler had decided not to come to Cleveland after being told the Rock Hall would “only pay certain expenses after telling him it was all covered,” and that Mark Knopfler wasn’t coming either. The iciness continued when the Rock Hall announced the list of presenters for the ceremony and there was barely a mention of Dire Straits.

At the induction ceremony, the Dire Straits induction segment started off in typical fashion with well-produced video showing old footage of the band during their heyday, but then instead of introducing the presenter, the announcer simply introduced the band members who showed up: John Illsley, Guy Fletcher and Alan Clarke. Illsley then awkwardly inducted the band himself:

In the absence of someone here to induct Dire Straits into the 2018 Hall of Fame. As a founding member, I felt perhaps I might be the best qualified one to do this. [puzzled applause] It’s a bit weird, but there we are, life’s strange...

So, I know it’s a bit odd, but it is my honor to welcome Dire Straits into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

According to an interview, he mentioned it to the person that runs the Hall to be the one doing it as a joke, however, the person responded by asking if he wanted to and that's why he actually did it.

— Nathan Miller (@NathanMiller88) April 15, 2018

In the 32 Induction Ceremonies leading up to this, lots of artists have been no-shows, but every single inductee has had a presenter. For the Rock Hall to spitefully take that away from one of their own honorees is shameful. Can artists be difficult? Of course. But three Dire Straits members did show up and should have been given the respect they deserved. It’s not just an insult to the band, but also to the fans as well.

The Dire Straits portion of the 2018 inductee exhibit is also an example of the Rock Hall doing the bare minimum. Granted, they don’t have control over whether or not the artists provide them instruments or clothes, but the exhibit looked pretty sad -- a fan’s tour jacket, some albums (still in plastic) and an accordion.

Today’s exhibit guide at the @rockhall is dripping with irony since Knopfler is just blowing off the event tonight. Also the Dire Straits portion of the exhibit is noticeably thin. pic.twitter.com/5acqcKoqS6

— Jonathan Hopwood (@jonathanhopwood) April 14, 2018

Update: Billboard reports some additional information about the Dire Straits situation:

Dire Straits John Illsley decided to handle the band’s induction speech himself on Saturday morning, when it became apparent the Rock Hall hasn’t found anybody to do it that night (Keith Urban and Neil Young were reportedly approached but declined). “We didn’t have anybody to induct us for all sorts of reasons.,” Illsley said in the press room, “so I said, ‘Would it be crazy if I did it?’ And (producer Alex Colleti) said, ‘What a great idea.’ I sort of wrote it about 15 minutes before we came down, so that why I had to read it out, because I couldn’t remember what I had written down.”

There’s also this report that the Rock Hall turned down Robbie Robertson’s offer to induct them after the other choices had fallen through:

There was a journalist on @siriusxmvolume Friday who said Keith Urban was going to cancel a show to do the induction but once he found out Mark Knopfler wasn't coming, he backed out. Also said Robbie Robertson was willing but the @rockhall said were just doing a video.

— Greg P. (@GregP821) April 17, 2018

Update 2: A rep for Keith Urban denies the story.