On their website, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame succinctly explains the process of how artists in the performer category are chosen:

Each year, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation's Nominating Committee selects the group of artists nominated in the Performer Category. Ballots are then sent to more than 1,000 historians, members of the music industry and artists—including every living Rock Hall Inductee—and the top performers (typically five to seven each year) receiving the most votes become that year's induction class.

The Rock Hall has never released a full list of all of their voters, but it is well known that it changes from year-to-year as new artists are inducted and when music industry voters cycle in and out.

In the last couple of years, it's been revealed that there is a policy that voters can be removed from the list if they don't return their ballots two years in a row. Based on the rule above, it seemed logical that this policy would only apply to the discretionary voter selections made by the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation and its president Joel Peresman, not the inductees.

However, on a member-exclusive episode of the Who Cares About the Rock Hall? podcast, DJ Yella (2016 inductee with N.W.A) revealed that he hasn't received a ballot in years. At the end of the episode, host Joe Kwaczala shared that an inside source believed that the policy about losing your ballot after not returning it two years in a row was likely the reason Yella couldn't vote.

A few thoughts on this revelation:

1. This is f**king insane!
2. It's one thing to take away a vote from an absentee critic or industry person, but doing it to a Hall of Famer is indefensible.
3. How long has this been going on? The Rock Hall has unequivocally stated that "every living Rock Hall inductee" receives a ballot for as long as we can remember.
4. Apparently Hall of Famers lose voting privileges for life if they miss two ballots in a row. Again, this is insane!
5. Does anyone think the Rock Hall applies this "rule" to all Hall of Famers, or just ones they don't care as much about? There is zero chance they would do this to Hall of Fame favorites like Bruce Springsteen or Paul McCartney.
6. What is the possible justification for doing this? Is it too much hassle to keep inductees' addresses current? Are you trying to save on postage? Are there some inductees' opinions you don't value? Seriously, someone try to justify this policy.
7. On the other hand, there are countless legitimate reasons an inductee may not return their ballot. Maybe they moved. Maybe they've been on tour. Maybe they don't like the nominees. None of those reasons should mean they lose their voting rights.
8. And yes, for inductees, these are voting RIGHTS. The Rock Hall is unique among peer institutions exactly because inductees vote who else gets in! Whoever instituted this policy has zero understanding of what gives an induction its significance.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame should publicly address this policy shift and clearly state how many inductees have lost their voting rights through this year. Moving forward, they need to reverse course and send ballots to ALL of their Hall of Famers, without exception. (And then get rid of the person that came up with this "policy" in the first place.)

On Saturday, the Rock Hall issued a brief statement to the press: "Jann Wenner has been removed from the board of directors of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation."

That announcement followed a wild 36 hours since a New York Times interview was posted where the Rock Hall co-founder and 2004 inductee made comments that were dismissive of Black and women artists.

Here is the exchange in the interview which led to the controversy:

There are seven subjects in the new book; seven white guys. In the introduction, you acknowledge that performers of color and women performers are just not in your zeitgeist. Which to my mind is not plausible for Jann Wenner. Janis Joplin, Joni Mitchell, Stevie Nicks, Stevie Wonder, the list keeps going — not in your zeitgeist? What do you think is the deeper explanation for why you interviewed the subjects you interviewed and not other subjects?

Well, let me just. …

Carole King, Madonna. There are a million examples.

When I was referring to the zeitgeist, I was referring to Black performers, not to the female performers, OK? Just to get that accurate. The selection was not a deliberate selection. It was kind of intuitive over the years; it just fell together that way. The people had to meet a couple criteria, but it was just kind of my personal interest and love of them. Insofar as the women, just none of them were as articulate enough on this intellectual level.

Oh, stop it. You’re telling me Joni Mitchell is not articulate enough on an intellectual level?

Hold on a second.

I’ll let you rephrase that.

All right, thank you. It’s not that they’re not creative geniuses. It’s not that they’re inarticulate, although, go have a deep conversation with Grace Slick or Janis Joplin. Please, be my guest. You know, Joni was not a philosopher of rock ’n’ roll. She didn’t, in my mind, meet that test. Not by her work, not by other interviews she did. The people I interviewed were the kind of philosophers of rock.

Of Black artists — you know, Stevie Wonder, genius, right? I suppose when you use a word as broad as “masters,” the fault is using that word. Maybe Marvin Gaye, or Curtis Mayfield? I mean, they just didn’t articulate at that level.

How do you know if you didn’t give them a chance?

Because I read interviews with them. I listen to their music. I mean, look at what Pete Townshend was writing about, or Jagger, or any of them. They were deep things about a particular generation, a particular spirit and a particular attitude about rock ’n’ roll. Not that the others weren’t, but these were the ones that could really articulate it.

Don’t you think it’s actually more to do with your own interests as a fan and a listener than anything particular to the artists? I think the problem is when you start saying things like “they” or “these artists can’t.” Really, it’s a reflection of what you’re interested in more than any ability or inability on the part of these artists, isn’t it?

That was my No. 1 thing. The selection was intuitive. It was what I was interested in. You know, just for public relations sake, maybe I should have gone and found one Black and one woman artist to include here that didn’t measure up to that same historical standard, just to avert this kind of criticism. Which, I get it. I had a chance to do that. Maybe I’m old-fashioned and I don’t give a [expletive] or whatever. I wish in retrospect I could have interviewed Marvin Gaye. Maybe he’d have been the guy. Maybe Otis Redding, had he lived, would have been the guy.

Wenner may not have "given a fuck," but the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame clearly did. Since 2020, under chairman John Sykes, the Hall of Fame has been trying to repair their "all-boys club" reputation that was forged under Wenner, His comments were clearly incendiary enough for them to sever the last remaining ties to their founder. (The Board vote was reportedly unanimous with the exception of longtime Nominating Committee chairman Jon Landau.)

Wenner's other institution, Rolling Stone, also tried to distance themselves from his comments:

Rolling Stone co-founder Jann Wenner has been ousted from his position on the Board of Directors of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation. The news was announced on Saturday, following an interview with The New York Times, where he made widely criticized comments about Black and female musicians, alongside revealing other questionable editorial decisions.

Wenner is promoting his book, The Masters, which features interviews with influential artists, such as Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, Pete Townshend, John Lennon, and Bruce Springsteen — none of the artists featured are female or non-white. In the Times interview with Wenner that published on Friday, he said that Black and also female musicians “didn’t articulate at the level” of the white male musicians in his tome.

…

Beyond the controversial comments about the artists that were and were not featured in The Masters, he also revealed during the interview that he allowed interview subjects to edit transcripts of their interviews prior to publication, which is not an accepted editorial practice and Rolling Stone does not allow interviewees to approve transcripts or final copy.

After being fired from the Rock Hall's Board of Directors, Wenner released an apology, “I totally understand the inflammatory nature of badly chosen words and deeply apologize and accept the consequences."

Those "badly chosen words" now provide the necessary context for understanding Wenner's legacy at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and beyond.

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.

By most accounts, the 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony was a huge success that had some memorable speeches and performances. The Rock Hall's recent trend of having large induction classes is a necessary and positive move after years of honoring the bare minimum number of artists and the institution's general neglect of the special categories.

The only downside to large induction classes (if you can call it that) are the practical time constraints of the ceremony to honor all of these people. How do you properly create tributes to 14 inductees with video packages, induction speeches, acceptance speeches, and performances, all within a reasonable time limit? It's a difficult challenge for producers who are forced to make hard decisions about what to cut to shorten things up.

Unfortunately, at the 2022 ceremony the Rock Hall failed on even the basic minimum requirements for three of its inductees: Elizabeth Cotten, Harry Belafonte, and Sylvia Robinson. Similar to previous years, those inductees were honored with short video segments outlining the importance of their careers. But unlike every other inductee* in the history of the Rock Hall, there was not a designated person to officially "induct" them into the Hall of Fame. It's a huge missed opportunity to connect the inductees to contemporary artists and simply to welcome them into the institution. It's a troubling sign that the producers could dispose of this foundational tradition that makes the induction ceremonies special.

An absolute bare minimum ceremony segment for ALL inductees (living or dead, in attendance or not) should have the following:

• Video package describing the inductee's career
• Having someone say the words, "It's my honor to welcome [inductee] into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame"
• If the inductee is alive, they should be given the opportunity to give a speech

That's it! Adding on presenter speeches, tribute performances, or allowing family members to accept on a deceased inductee's behalf are all great too, and should happen if there's time, but are understandable to omit when there are other living, present inductees to get to. The fact that the Rock Hall decided to overlook this minimal requirement with these three inductees is extremely unfortunate, and hopefully isn't the beginning of a trend.

See also The Rock Hall's Shameful Treatment of Dire Straits from 2018

On the morning that the 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ballots were due, Dolly Parton was finally asked what she would do if she was inducted, after she had previously asked to be removed from contention (but denied by the Hall of Fame).

Well, I’ll accept gracefully. I will just say thanks and I will accept it because the fans vote, but when I said that, it was always my belief that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was for the people in rock music. And I have found out lately that it’s not necessarily that. But if they can’t go there to be recognized, where do they go?

So I just felt like that I would be taking away from someone that maybe deserved it - certainly more than me because I never considered myself a rock artist. But obviously there’s more to it than that.

The timing of Dolly's two statements has been awful. The initial request to be removed from contention came six weeks after the nominees were announced, and three weeks after voters had a chance to fill out and return their ballots. Subsequently, many voters have honored her request to be removed from consideration and cast their ballots towards other artists, perhaps assuming she wouldn't accept the award or attend the induction ceremony. Her latest statement, which clarifies her feelings towards the honor, comes after nearly all ballots have already been cast and counted, and leaves many voters wondering if they should have voted for her anyway.

When the nominees were originally announced in early February, Dolly Parton was assumed to be a heavy favorite for induction. But with the ensuing uncertainty around her nomination, it's now less clear whether she has received the votes to get in.

The class of 2022 inductees should be announced this week.

BREAKING: A month after asking to be removed from the ballot, Dolly Parton now says if she is inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame she will “accept gracefully.” @MorningEdition #RockHall2022 pic.twitter.com/7syDdg6TBo

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) April 29, 2022

Three days after Dolly Parton stated she wanted out of the induction process this year, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame responded with their own statement denying her request.

Earlier this morning, before the Rock Hall's response, Dolly Parton elaborated about being considered "rock and roll" in an interview on Fox & Friends:

Dolly Parton on Fox & Friends this morning about her request to be removed from the Rock Hall ballot: “I still didn’t feel right about it. It would kind of be like putting AC/DC in the Country Music Hall of Fame. It just felt a little out of place for me.” #RockHall2022 pic.twitter.com/qb6U82nmFi

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) March 17, 2022

Dolly's understandable misperception about the genres the Rock Hall honors is widely held among many people who are casual observers of the institution. Even those who follow the Rock Hall closely may have been surprised to see a superstar country artist on the "Performer" ballot, since up until this year, the Hall of Fame had never nominated most of the greatest country artists of all-time such as Merle Haggard, Loretta Lynn, Willie Nelson, George Jones, The Carter Family, Waylon Jennings, Garth Brooks, Patsy Cline, Dolly Parton, and many others. With most of those country legends having been eligible for decades, and a massive backlog of artists in genres they already try to celebrate, there was little indication that the Rock Hall would turn to Nashville when looking for icons to honor.

Assuming voters understand Dolly Parton is still very much on the ballot, she remains one of the biggest favorites for induction this year, and 2022 will mark a new era for Country artists in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Click here to access the 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Ballot Tracker

Today, in a stunning move, Dolly Parton posted the above statement on social media that she wants to "respectfully bow out" as a 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominee. Parton was a heavy favorite to be inducted this year, but now her Rock Hall fate is uncertain.

Asked for comment by multiple media outlets, the Rock Hall has yet to publicly respond to Parton's request, but it would seem they have three choices:

• Option 1: Just ignore it. Nominees were announced over a month ago, and some ballots have already been filled out and returned. The Rock Hall could continue with the process it started and if Parton gets enough votes, move ahead an induction and hope she changes her tune, but if not, treat her induction like 2021 absentee Hall of Famer Todd Rundgren.
• Option 2: Publicly and officially remove her from the ballot. The Rock Hall would need to remove her name from consideration this year, instruct the Voting Committee that she is no longer eligible, and give voters who already turned in their ballots a chance to change their votes.
• Option 3: Privately remove her from the ballot. The Rock Hall can continue with the induction process as-is, but behind the scenes throw out any votes that she has already received and hope her statement is enough to discourage anyone else from voting for her.

So which direction will the Rock Hall take? Option 1 is what the Rock Hall usually does when nominees or inductees disparage the institution, but in this case, the Rock Hall will likely want to hold out hope that they can induct a fully cooperative Dolly in the future, so pushing ahead seems unlikely. Option 2 requires them to do a lot of extra work to revise the ballot and notify voters with new instructions. It also sets a precedent that would give artists agency over their Rock Hall nominations. Option 3 seems the most likely scenario. The Rock Hall never publishes their voting rules, so it's easy enough for them to rewrite them to accommodate unprecedented issues like this.

See also the Sex Pistols' "piss stain" letter and Axl Rose's open letter declining his 2012 induction.

In other 2022 nominee news, this weekend Dionne Warwick was on Andy Cohen's show and was asked if she "gives a damn" about getting inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Warwick responded, "No, I don't. I'm not a rock and roller. I've been interviewed on this subject many times. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as I grew to know it many years ago was specifically for 'rock and roll' acts… I feel now, especially with Dolly Parton being nominated, which I'm thrilled for her about, they should rename the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame to the Music Hall of Fame."

For years, some vocal fans and Rock Hall critics have been pushing back against the Hall of Fame's broad definition of "rock and roll," and now even some nominees appear to be uncomfortable being assigned that label.

After years of using its special categories sparingly, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame expanded its scope this year by including seven inductees in three existing categories: Musical Excellence, Early Influence, and Non-Performer (Ahmet Ertegun Award). The changes surrounding the process have wide ranging implications for who they can honor in the future as well as who they will likely neglect.

First things first: It should go without saying, but all of these inductees are clearly Hall of Fame-worthy and any criticism of the Hall of Fame's process should not be construed as a criticism of the artists who have no control over the matter. Dramatically increasing the overall number of inductees this year was a major step in the right direction.

The following are the newly revised descriptions of the Performer, Musical Excellence, and Early Influence awards taken from the Rock Hall's website and press release for the 2021 inductees (in random order):

1. [An award given to artists] whose originality and influence creating music have had a dramatic impact on music.
2. [An award given to artists] whose music and performance style have directly influenced and helped inspire and evolve rock & roll and music that has impacted youth culture.
3. [An award given to artists] who, in their careers, have created music whose originality, impact and influence has changed the course of rock & roll.

Do you know which description goes with each category?

Early Influence

The Rock Hall has been pushing the limits of the original intent of this category since at least 2009, when Elvis contemporary Wanda Jackson was honored as an "Early Influence" the same year she was on the Performer ballot. Despite testing the limits of the process, the category's original definition was clear:

"Artists whose music predated rock and roll but had an impact on the evolution of rock and roll and inspired rock’s leading artists."

The key words in that statement that makes it distinct from the definition of an artist in the Performer category is "predated rock and roll," generally considered the early 1950s. Fittingly, some of the first inductees in that category were names like Robert Johnson, Lead Belly, Bessie Smith, and Howlin' Wolf. Even after 35 years of inductions, the Rock Hall still has more foundational artists left to honor, as evidenced by this year's induction of Charley Patton, the "Father of the Delta Blues" who was born in 1891.

This year the Rock Hall decided to formally drop the "predates rock and roll" description altogether in favor of definition #2 above. As you might surmise from the generic category descriptions, there are no stated rules or timeframe for who might qualify as an "Early Influence."

Musical Excellence

This category evolved out of the Sidemen category, and was intended to broaden its definition to include producers. Here's how the Rock Hall described it in 2013:

"It honors those musicians, producers and others who have spent their careers out of the spotlight working with major artists on various parts of their recording and live careers. Though they often play a key role in the creation of memorable music, the public rarely knows them by name."

The category may have been expanded beyond studio sidemen (and yes, it was all men) at the urging of Elton John, who wanted to get his friend Leon Russell into the Hall of Fame. As a jack-of-all-trades, Russell did not fit neatly into the Performer or Sideman categories, so in 2011 he was honored in the new Musical Excellence category. The following year, the category was used to induct three recording engineers. After that, the Hall of Fame drifted further away from the behind the scenes roots of the category to induct the E Street Band (2014), Ringo Starr (2015), and Nile Rodgers (2017).

After Ringo was inducted, the Rock Hall revised the definition of the category to remove the "out of the spotlight" parts:

"This award honors musicians, songwriters and producers who have spent their life creating important and memorable music. Their originality, impact and influence have changed the course of music history. These artists have achieved the highest level of distinction that transcends time."

This year's definition (#1 above) is intended for "artists, musicians, songwriters and producers," and is so generic and inclusive, that again, it can apply to any of this year's inductees.

The Rock Hall hasn't inducted anyone considered a true "Sideman" since 2009. This is a huge missed opportunity for the Hall of Fame to spotlight the musicians who worked in the shadows and don't typically get the fame and fortune of the lead artists. If the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame isn't going to recognize them, who will?

The Rock Hall Nominating Committee has long been frustrated that the voters haven't found room on their ballots year after year to induct artists such as Kraftwerk, LL Cool J, Chaka Khan, MC5, and the J. Geils Band. Just as they did in 2017 when they gave up trying to get Chic inducted after 11 nominations and instead gave Nile Rodgers the Musical Excellence award, this year they decided to do the same with LL Cool J after he missed induction on the Performer ballot for the sixth time. Needless to say that voters have noticed this end-around of the induction process and are questioning why they received a ballot at all if the Rock Hall will just induct who they want anyway.

So how should the Rock Hall handle these issues? First, they should keep inducting large classes such as these. Having 13 inductees to help clear the backlog is the best thing the Rock Hall has done in years. However, it's fair to say that wedging artists into the wrong categories, or twisting category definitions so they become meaningless is not ideal. There are better options:

• Increase then number of Performer inductees every year. If special category inductions were the only alternative for larger classes, then sure, keep doing that, but the unwritten rule of inducting between 5 and 7 performers annually should be doubled.
• Expand the number of artists that voters can choose on their ballots. It's quite possible LL Cool J and/or Kraftwerk missed out because they were voters' sixth choice each year, or they suffered due to strategic voting patterns. Voters also tend to gravitate towards the new names on the ballot, so if you miss out in your first year, it becomes more difficult to get over the hump with voters, especially if they think you'll just be back on the ballot the next year.
• Create a rule where after a certain number of nominations, you are automatically inducted the following year, similar to the old "seven year rule." The Hall currently has two performer inductees who got in that way, and there are no asterisks to be found.
• Create a spot among the performers for a "Nominating Committee selection," that makes it feel like an honor to receive it, but announce it before the ballot goes out so it doesn't look like a consolation.
• The Rock Hall shouldn't have artists leap from the Performer ballot to one of the special categories in the same year. It's a bad look and it appears to be a consolation prize, rather than the special honor it should be. The Hall should have anticipated the scenario of LL Cool J missing out again (with Jay-Z on the ballot, his odds were going to be very low), and kept him off the performer ballot if they were going to induct him no matter the outcome. Ballot spots are precious and shouldn't be spent on artists who are getting inducted regardless of the vote tally.
• Provide some boundaries to the special categories. If you want to expand the definition of "Early Influence" to include more recent artists, that's fine, but give it a specific definition so new inductees fit in with the ones who have already been inducted in that category. All Hall of Famers are supposed be influential, so what makes the special category distinct?
• Better yet, create new categories that are specifically built to fill the holes in the current system. And yes, the Singles Category has been a disastrous attempt at doing this, but a more thoughtful solution is out there.
• If you create new categories, you can leave Early Influence for its original purpose of honoring artists who predate rock and roll. There is still so much left to do in that era, that expanding it now will inevitably neglect the artists it was created for. The same goes with the Musical Excellence award. Now that the category is being used to honor transcendent rock stars like LL Cool J and Randy Rhoads, will there be room to induct the "out of the spotlight" heroes?
• John Sykes alluded to the fact that there are new seven-member committees for each category. Do women have equal representation among the selectors? The fact that there are no women inductees in the special categories this year (and very few historically) should be cause for alarm for Sykes who has made increasing diversity on the Performer ballot a priority.
• As for this year's Musical Excellence inductees, LL Cool J should obviously be included in the Performer category. Billy Preston had a significant solo career in addition to his work as a sideman, and would not have been out of place on the regular ballot, and may have even gotten the votes to be inducted. Randy Rhoads is the ultimate lead guitarist, and not a behind-the-scenes backup musician. Ideally Rhoads would be inducted alongside Ozzy Osbourne as a Performer, but Ozzy hasn't been nominated yet (and now his chances have likely dropped even further now that Rhoads is already in).
• For the Early Influence inductees, Charley Patton obviously fits the original definition of the category. Kraftwerk and Gil Scott-Heron are both essential Hall of Famers, but don't fit with the previous inductees in the category. The Rock Hall should simply create a new "Modern Influences" category for these types of artists that have created genres that have helped perpetuate rock and roll into the 21st century. It's not too late to change it!
• If the Rock Hall continues down this path where any artist is eligible for Musical Excellence, it's going to become a problem. Already people are questioning why LL Cool J was chosen and not Chaka Khan/Rufus, who has been nominated just as many times. Why not MC5? Why not Judas Priest and Iron Maiden? Up until recently, the Rock Hall could simply tell artists and fans that they weren't in because they "didn't get the votes." Without a set of rules for the category, what's going to be their excuse now?

This year's induction class is overwhelmingly a net positive, so it's difficult to be too critical when there are so many great artists finally getting honored. The most prestigious awards carry with them a gravity because of the seriousness to the process. The Rock Hall's casual rewriting of its awards to solve its larger structural issues diminishes the clarity and logic of their inductions. How can you explain the story of a category which includes Hal Blaine, Cosimo Matassa, the E Street Band, Ringo Starr, and LL Cool J without talking yourself in circles?

Here’s Greg Harris trying to explain how LL Cool J wound up in the Musical Excellence category after being nominated as a performer six times: “As a process, I wouldn’t try and go too deeply with it.” #RockHall2021 pic.twitter.com/zuSwC7kJss

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) May 15, 2021

With its 2021 class, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame took a significant step in a new direction. The first induction class under chairman of the board John Sykes is notable for many reasons. Some quick thoughts on this year's class:

• The Hall inducted “the most diverse list of Inductees in the history of the organization,” according to the Hall’s own press release.This year has three performer inductees which include at least one woman, the most since 1996. Huge credit to Sykes for making this a priority with the Nominating Committee and then delivering.
• There are 13 artists this year, the Rock Hall’s largest class since 2012, and tied for the fifth largest class ever. With the massive backlog of worthy candidates in all genres and categories, seven inductees per year wasn’t cutting it, so this is an encouraging development.
• Welcome Tina Turner, Carole King, and Dave Grohl to the “Clyde McPhatter Club” for becoming two-time Hall of Fame inductees. That is the most new members added since 1997.
• The Rock Hall has abandoned the idea of a live ceremony (for now). There is inherently tension between the time constraints of an induction ceremony and the number of artists you can properly honor. By adding the even tighter limits of a live HBO ceremony, it apparently became too much for the Rock Hall to accept. Good for them for opting for more inductees and letting the ceremony run long.
• Kraftwerk finally gets in. Having been nominated six times since 2003 and topping a number of lists of the biggest snubs, Kraftwerk just couldn’t get over the hump with the Voting Committee. There was almost universal agreement of their importance, but the Rock Hall’s system was too broken to get them inducted as performers. So after floating the idea last year of expanding the meaning of the “Early Influence” category to include genre pioneers, rather than just pre-rock and roll era artists, the Rock Hall decided to go for it this year, inducting Kraftwerk and Gil Scott-Heron, both of whom released their first recordings in 1970. The Hall’s new definition of the category is so loose as to be meaningless, so the category can be used for anything moving forward.
• With the hip hop backlog quickly getting out of control, the Rock Hall decided it needed LL Cool J out of the way. Like Kraftwerk, the Rock Hall couldn’t find a way to induct him as a performer (his rightful category), so they decided to just induct him in the catch-all Musical Excellence category, which they have been using recently for artists who can’t get in on the performer ballot (Nile Rodgers) or using it to fast track an induction (Ringo Starr). It’s a major indictment of the Rock Hall’s induction system that they have to resort to these tactics to induct seminal artists like LL Cool J.
• Heavy metal gets an acknowledgement with the induction of Randy Rhoads. Metal fans are rightfully frustrated that obvious Hall of Fame-worthy artists like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden get passed over year after year. The induction of guitar legend Rhoads gives metal fans some small hope that the Rock Hall won’t completely abandon the genre.
• The induction categories somehow became more of a mess than they already were. The new descriptions in the press release are a meaningless word salad (more to come on this later). We have been critical of the Hall of Fame’s blurring the category lines since 2009 when Wanda Jackson jumped from the Performer ballot to an Early Influence inductee, but this year has a whole new “f*ck it” attitude emanating from the Rock Hall. Sure, the category distinctions don’t mean much to the casual fan, but this is the equivalent of a football player being enshrined in Canton as a coach, just because he gave an inspiring pre-game speech once.
• What the Rock Hall should have done is alter their system to allow Kraftwerk and LL Cool J to be inducted as performers with a “Nominating Committee Selection” footnote and be done with it. Destroying the meaning of the other categories to wedge in valid performers is completely ridiculous and undermines the reputation of the entire institution. This is undoubtedly John Sykes’s biggest mistake this year.
• After averaging less than two inductees in the “special” categories in recent years, the Rock Hall went all-in this year, with a whopping seven inductees in this class. In a year in which the Rock Hall has focused on diversity, they neglected to include any women among the seven inductees.
• The 2021 tally: 18 men and 7 women (28%). That increases the overall percentage of women in the Rock Hall by 0.5% up to 8.1%.
• If you can ignore the categories and how the artists were selected (which most people do anyway), this is a *fantastic* Rock Hall class that has something for everyone. The induction ceremony has the potential to be an all-time great.
• The Rock Hall now says they have over 1,200 voters, up from about 800 five years ago. For years they have been trying to diversify their Voting Committee, so it seems they are just adding hundreds of voters to dilute the power of their own inductees.
• John Sykes’s quote in the press release about the Hall honoring “artists whose music created the sound of youth culture” is a clunky rewording of the Motown Records motto “The Sound of Young America,” presumably to keep it from being U.S.-centric?

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The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Nominating Committee will be meeting next month to craft the 2021 ballot. In recent years there has been mounting pressure from artists and critics to induct more women into the Hall of Fame. Let's ask and answer some questions regarding the numbers.

Q: How many women have been inducted into the Rock Hall?

A: Between 1986 and 2020, there have been 923 people inducted into the Hall of Fame, 70 are women (7.6%). The following graph shows how many men and women have been inducted each year.

Q: Aren't those numbers misleading because for a female-fronted band like Blondie, that only counts as one woman and six men?

A: Only 15.4% of inducted artists include at least one woman. On average, the Rock Hall inducts about 1.5 artists with a woman per year versus 8 which are all-men.

Q: What is with the gaps in the chart?

A: No women were inducted in the Rock Hall classes of 1986, 1992, 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2016.

Q: Greg Harris, the Rock Hall Museum President, said the low numbers are "a reflection of the amount of music that was made in the 50's and 60's, and I think we get more of an explosion of female performers especially in the 80's and 90's." So that must mean the female numbers are trending up?

A: The graphs above certainly don't show any upward trends overall. If you look only at inductees who began after 1980, five out of 23 have a female member (Stevie Nicks solo, Madonna, Janet Jackson, Whitney Houston, and Joan Jett), and all of them began their solo recording careers in the early 80s, which means there is no female representation for artists starting between 1985-1994. The 22% of artists from the 80s and 90s is higher than the overall 15%, but it's hardly an "explosion."

Q: How many women have been inducted twice?

A: In 2019, Stevie Nicks became the first woman to be inducted into the Rock Hall for a second time. Twenty-one men have been inducted twice, and Eric Clapton has been honored three times.

Q: Who decides which artists get inducted?

A: Some quick background on the induction system: The Rock Hall's process of determining its honorees begins with an appointed Nominating Committee consisting of roughly 30 members (artists, label executives, writers). That committee meets once per year and develops the performer ballot, which then gets sent to the 1000+ member Voting Committee, consisting of all living Hall of Famers plus an undisclosed list of others in the music industry (again, artists, writers, industry people). The five to seven artists who receive the most votes get inducted.

The Rock Hall has historically been secretive about who is on the Nominating Committee (and they still won't provide the list when asked), but we have been listing it on Future Rock Legends for years. While the Rock Hall argues that it's lack of women inductees is just a reflection of the gender imbalance in rock history, there is no such justification for allowing a system that they fully control to continue to have a gender imbalance such as this:

When you look at the above graph, which shows that just 11% of Nominating Committee members have been women over the years, it's hard not to think that the system has been rotten from the start, especially when some men in the group were abusers of women (or were apologists for it). Look at how overwhelming the numbers were between 1999-2006, and then scroll back up and look at how many women were inducted during that era:

The slow and steady gains in recent years looks positive, but it hasn't been enough to move the needle on the ballot or with the inductees. Just three women were nominated last year, and only Whitney Houston was inducted.

It should also be mentioned here that of the 74 people who have been listed as committee members which make selections in the Non-Performer, Early Influence and Sidemen categories, only three have been women (4%).

What should the Rock Hall do about any of this?

Well, if they don't do anything, it will be more of the same, despite Jann Wenner's insistence that in 20 years people will be complaining too many women are getting inducted. The 2020 class added twenty men to the Voting Committee and zero women, which just exacerbates the imbalance in the system.

A better option would be to listen to Rock Hall critics like Evelyn McDonnell. In her piece about the issue titled The Manhandling of Rock 'N' Roll History, she outlined three steps the Rock Hall needs to do to begin to right the ship:

1. Flood the nominating committee and voting membership with more women.
2. Reduce the voting power of members inducted as players in bands
3. Nominate a shit ton of all-female bands next year.

This will be the first induction class under the new leadership of John Sykes, who took over as Chairman of the Board for the Rock Hall Foundation at the beginning of 2020. While Sykes inherits the Rock Hall's dismal record of nominating and inducting women, he can't be expected to correct 35 years of gender imbalance overnight, as the Hall of Fame's history has already been written. What Sykes does have full control over and can correct immediately is the gross inequity of the induction system itself. If Jon Landau, the Nominating Committee's chair, won't diversify his membership this year, he should be removed from his post. He has had 22 years at the helm and has clearly failed to bring equity of opportunity to the process, even after critical outcry.

The Nominating Committee is just one piece of the puzzle that needs to be fixed. It's safe to assume that the gender split of the Voting Committee is also heavily titled towards men. McDonnell's suggestion to dilute the voting power of bands is a great idea and should be implemented for the class of 2021. Combine that with a fresh look at the non-inductee voters to make sure there is a true diversity of voices casting ballots.

The Rock Hall has been predominantly run by white, male, baby boomers for its first 35 years. They built a museum and a cultural institution that tells the story of rock and roll as they experienced it, but it's an incomplete history. It's long past due to start a new chapter born from an equitable system.

Eight months after the Inductees were announced, and four months after the ceremony was to have taken place, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame added six names to the list of 2020 honorees. Initially, Nine Inch Nails sole inductee was Trent Reznor, but this week the Rock Hall added six current and former members of the band: Atticus Ross, Robin Finck, Chris Vrenna, Danny Lohner, Ilan Rubin, and Alessandro Cortini.

Ilan Rubin, born July 7th, 1988, becomes the youngest person ever inducted into the Rock Hall, beating the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Josh Klinghoffer, who was also 32 at the time of induction*. Notably, Rubin is also the first Hall of Famer that was born in the 1980s.

* (When should a person be considered "inducted" into the Rock Hall? When the inductees are announced? At the date of the ceremony? January 1st of their induction year to control for variable ceremony dates? Using any of these calculations, Rubin beats out Klinghoffer.)

The late additions to the inductees is nothing new for the Rock Hall these days. They have made slight adjustments to the inductee lists in each of the last few years (Reeves Gabrels in 2019, Hugh McDonald in 2018), but a major correction this far after the inductees were announced is unusual. After the inductees were announced, Reznor was asked by Rolling Stone about getting in alone:

They are just taking you and nobody else from the band. Was that the right call?

My preference would be that my band get inducted. I’m not the one deciding that, but there’s an effort on my part to acknowledge that.

Reznor collaborated with the Rock Hall's curatorial staff on the Nine Inch Nails special exhibit and was also eager to participate in the ceremony and surrounding festivities. It seems clear that his cooperative attitude greased the skids for getting his band members inducted.

For its part, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame has not officially commented on the added inductees, other than to confirm that they are now included. As usual, they will offer no explanation, criteria, or reasoning for their decision. Trent Reznor once said of the Rock Hall, "I honestly couldn’t give less of a shit,” which pretty much sums up how the Rock Hall feels about its own credibility.

Let’s take a look at the history of each of the four categories and which former designations are included in each:

• Performers (1986-present): This is the most straightforward of the categories and has gone unchanged since the Rock Hall’s inception. The description of the category at the museum states: “These inductees are the artists who have changed the world of rock with their mastery and artistic vision.” Notably, this is the only category in which inductees are chosen by the Voting Committee. Inductees in the other categories are selected by subsets of the Nominating Committee.

• Ahmet Ertegun Award (2008-present): After Rock Hall co-founder Ahmet Ertegun died in 2006, the Non-Performer award was renamed in his honor. In previous years, there were two separate awards, one for Lifetime Achievement and one for Non-Performers, as evident in 1991, when Nesuhi Ertegun was given the Lifetime Achievement award and Dave Bartholomew and Ralph Bass were inducted as Non-Performers. The induction program noted the difference (see the photos below), and up until a few years ago, RockHall.com also made the distinction (they now blend the two categories into the Ahmet Ertegun award). To further confuse things, Jann Wenner was inducted in 2004 with the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Nonperformer Category.

  

  

  

• Early Influence (1986-present): In the first induction class, this category was called “Forefathers and Early Influences.” Between 1987 and 1991, it was sometimes shortened to just “Forefathers,” even inducting Ma Rainey in that category in 1990. Since 1992, the category has been called “Early Influences,” but is only used sporadically.

  

  

  While the name of the Early Influences category eventually settled down, the definition slowly became more flexible. On RockHall.com, the category is still defined as “Honoring the artists that pre-date the birth of rock & roll, but have had a profound impact on music’s evolution and its iconic artists.” The only proscriptive criteria is that artists should pre-date rock & roll, generally considered to have begun in the early 1950s. That hasn’t stopped the Hall from inducting artists such as Wanda Jackson, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, and Freddie King, all of whom were first nominated in the Performer category before being inducted as Early Influences, despite the bulk of their careers occurring during the rock & roll era. Rock Hall Foundation President Joel Peresman recently suggested that the definition of the category be further expanded to potentially include influential genre-pioneers like Kraftwerk, who didn’t form until 1970.

• Award for Musical Excellence (2011-present): The Sideman category (2000-2009) was retired after the 2009 ceremony, and all 15 inductees have been folded into the Award for Musical Excellence category, which is an honor that is now used as a catch-all for “performers, songwriters and producers.” Never mind that performers have their own category and producers and songwriters have traditionally been inducted into the Non-Performers category. The Rock Hall has used this category as a way to induct artists like Leon Russell, the E Street Band, Ringo Starr, and Nile Rodgers, without having to go through the formality of putting them on the ballot that is sent to the voters.

  This award was originally called the "Award for Recording Excellence" in 2011, but was changed to the current name in 2012.

  

• Singles (2018-2019?): This well-meaning category was initially created as a way to honor artists who had historically significant songs but generally would have been unable to get inducted as Performers under the current system. But in 2019, the Rock Hall inducted a song by a current inductee thereby throwing out its only rule for the category and making it meaningless. The Rock Hall Museum never embraced the Singles inductees with an exhibit and has now scrubbed any mention of them from their website. (January 2020 Update: The Singles have been added to the Rock Hall's website.) HBO didn’t broadcast the Singles segment of the Induction Ceremony in 2019, so this category may be toast.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s casual attitude towards its own history continues to be troubling. For an institution that has a robust Library & Archives, they are all too willing to change their own history, either by quietly inducting people after the induction ceremony or by omitting the names of inducted artists from their website and Hall of Fame wall that go unfixed for years. With their most recent website redesign, they removed valuable content that they had built over the years in favor of highlighting their online store and paid memberships. Hopefully some of the Museum’s talented curators can turn their attention to preserving the history of their own institution and live up to their “commitment to forever.”

• Underrepresentation of nearly every genre of music among its inductees.
• Skepticism by fans and artists over the fairness and propriety of the induction system.
• Lack of diversity and conflicts of interest among the decision makers at the Rock Hall.
• The mishandling of inducted artists, which led to animosity and refusals to appear or perform at the Induction Ceremony.
• Unclear rules which get changed without logic or explanation.

Many of us who follow the Rock Hall have come up with a number of proposals which could help solve their chronic issues.

1. Address the Backlog: This, more than any other issue, is the heart of the problem. The current induction system, which only inducts between five and seven performers each year, has produced a lengthy list of artists who are arguably worthy of induction, but can’t break through. Every year in which more worthy artists become eligible than are inducted, the list just gets longer. By arbitrarily limiting the number of inductees, the Hall created a system where it is guaranteeing that worthy artists will never get a chance to be honored. The Rock Hall is currently at the bottom of a hole they have been digging for over 20 years. They’re not going to get out of it by increasing the number of annual inductees by one or two per year. More creative measures are needed. Some potential solutions:
   • On the Hall Watchers podcast, Eric and Mary proposed moving the ceremony to a two night event which would allow the Hall to induct more artists without compromising the induction ceremony format. For its 25th anniversary, the Rock Hall staged a two-night all-star concert at Madison Square Garden, so they have some experience with that format.
   • The Hall could also move to a system of themed induction classes, where a dozen artists could be enshrined around a common theme.
   • This upcoming ceremony will be the Rock Hall’s 35th, which provides an opportunity for the Rock Hall to have super-sized classes every five years.
   • Change the entire ceremony structure to allow for large induction classes. This would require shorter speeches and performances, but it would give the Rock Hall flexibility to induct significantly larger classes.

   A change like this can’t happen without upending the expectations of what a Rock Hall induction looks like (but again, this is the hole that the Rock Hall dug itself).

2. Create a Veteran’s Committee: Years ago, Tom Lane offered up this proposal modeled on other Sports Halls of Fame which have a system meant to catch worthy inductees who were left behind for one reason or another.

   As John Sykes takes steps to keep the Rock Hall up with the times, it would behoove them to create a new category that fills in the historical gaps in the rock and roll canon. The Rock Hall has been trying to play catch up for 35 years now, and there are still foundational artists who can’t even get nominated, and it’s not even at the expense of newly eligible artists who also can’t get on the ballot.

3. Listen to Criticism: Over the past year, much of the conversation about the Rock Hall has revolved around the underrepresentation of women. Instead of taking a dismissive attitude about the issue, listen to your critics and engage in the conversation. Take the opportunity to improve your institution and create some goodwill with the public. Burying your head in the sand isn’t going to work.

4. Become Transparent: The Hall has been proudly opaque since its inception which has led to conspiracy theories and allegations of corruption and conflicts of interest. The Hall could turn that around under its new leadership by publishing their rules, providing independent accounting of votes (or publishing the numbers), reveal the members of the Nominating and Voting Committees, and making those in charge available to the media. As non-profit entities, the Rock Hall Foundation and Museum should have a minimum amount of transparency about the core functions that support their mission.

5. Stop the secret inductions: We highlighted a couple of examples of artists who were quietly inducted after the fact. This type of behavior creates distrust with the public and doesn’t properly honor those who get inducted.

6. Eliminate or Fix the Singles Category: A lot has already been written on this subject, so we won’t rehash it here, but it’s unwise to create Rock Hall categories that don’t have a clearly defined purpose and are left to the whims of one individual.

7. Term Limits for Nominating Committee Members: The Country Music Hall of Fame utilizes a system where Nominating Committee members are appointed to three year terms. Each year, one third of the members get replaced. After serving out their term, members are eligible to return for another three years, but only after sitting out for at least one term.

   While there would be some institutional knowledge lost in this system, it would greatly increase the number and diversity of voices in the room. Members who distinguish themselves would be invited back after three years, while others would just be let go.

8. Rethink the Voting Committee: There has always been a tension between the will of the Nominating Committee and the results produced by the 1000 or so members of the Voting Committee. The NomCom nominates worthy artists over and over and yet they keep getting bypassed by the voters. While it seems fair on the surface, a system where each inductee automatically becomes a voter has created a population of voters who tend to favor artists closest to themselves, which magnifies the imbalance. One way to improve the system would be to give inductees with multiple members a fraction of a single vote. So each member of The Cure would get 1/10th of a vote as opposed to the 10 votes they currently get. By minimizing the voting power of large bands, it would provide a more representative power to each solo inductee.

9. Change the Voting System: With the significant backlog of worthy artists, getting on the Rock Hall ballot is an achievement unto itself. Why not expand the list of artists who meet that threshold by greatly expanding the number of nominees well past the 15-20 that have been nominated in recent years? There is a lot of frustration from the Nominating Committee about not wanting to put forward similar artists in the same year, but a ballot of 50 names would open up a new world of possibilities. Likewise, when the Voting Committee gets the ballot, allow them to vote for as many Hall of Fame worthy artists as they like. Currently they are restricted to voting for only five, which creates strategic voting that leaves clearly worthy artists on the outside. There are so many different ways to vote that are superior than the current system, the Rock Hall should start experimenting immediately. (The Hall should consult with inductee Krist Novoselic, who has been an advocate for proportional representation in politics.)

10. Give the Fan Vote some actual power or just eliminate it: The Hall of Fame seems to love the fan engagement from the online fan poll, but most fans have no idea how little it (officially) matters in the actual tally (the fan vote is cumulatively about 0.1% of the total ballots). Provided the Rock Hall can stage an online poll that can’t be rigged, the results should at least be worth 5% of the total. Otherwise you’re just taking advantage of passionate fans’ time.

There are many other ways that the Rock Hall could be improved, but the most important thing for John Sykes is to just get started.

The real problem involving women and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame — the central, intrinsic, original sin part of the hall, worse even than its insider-y nature and inconsistency — is the lack of women on the nominating committee. In recent years, there have been five or six on a committee that ranges from 30 to 45 members, and that’s a high mark for the hall.

It is appalling, sexist, unforgivable, and f*cking ridiculous. All the men on the committee — particularly critics like Anthony DeCurtis, David Fricke, Bill Flanagan, and others who would be expected to note such nonsense in other institutions — should be called out for not having the guts to stand up and say they won’t participate in such a preposterously sexist organization. But of course, this timidity is no doubt what has made them, from the perspective of organization leaders like Jann Wenner, ideal nominating-committee members.

I don’t know what effect a balanced gender representation on the nomination committee might have. It might make for more women nominees, it might lead to a more sophisticated appreciation of dance music, or it might keep the hall just as insider-y and in-clubby as it is now, only with more women involved. Any of those outcomes is acceptable; that’s not the point. The makeup of the committee is the hall’s major scandal.

During his appearance on SiriusXm for the nominee announcement, Rock Hall Foundation president Joel Peresman said that the Nominating Committee basically remained unchanged from last year, but a “woman from Los Angeles” was added to the group. That will increase the number of women on the Committee to 23% (seven women, compared to 23 men) In the early 2000s, that number was around 6%.*

Incoming chairman of the board, John Sykes, has pledged to diversify the Rock Hall Foundation’s board with “more women, more people of color and [become] a board that reflects the artists that are now being inducted.” The Board currently has 26 members, two of whom are women (8%). Sykes hasn’t directly called for more diversity on the Nominating Committee, but he seems to be setting the tone for how he wants the institution to move forward.

* - It should be noted here that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame will not release a list of Nominating Committee members to journalists who ask, and prefers the names not be made public.

Along with Ahmet Ertegun, Jann Wenner is responsible for creating the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as an institution and for spearheading the campaign to create a Museum. Those accomplishments are monumental feats and should be applauded. Mick Jagger provided this statement: “A long time ago, when no one was thinking about our music and its posterity. Jann saw that we needed a place to celebrate popular music and recognize the people who had made the music grow. It was a visionary idea and he stuck with it.” The positive impact the Rock Hall has had on Cleveland culturally and economically (over $2 billion since it started) is incredible. It is fitting that Wenner is himself an inductee in the Hall of Fame he birthed. But as Ben Sisario wrote for the New York Times, Wenner “became more associated with the institution than any other figure — becoming its top negotiator in the industry, as well as the person blamed, fairly or unfairly, for its shortcomings.”

Wenner was long believed to be the Rock Hall’s primary gatekeeper, keeping out any artists he felt unworthy. Wenner’s biographer, Joe Hagan reinforced this notion in a Billboard interview:

To me the real takeaway is that everybody believes Jann has his thumb on the scale when it comes to who gets into the Hall of Fame. And that Jann doesn't go out of his way to disabuse people of that. The biggest red flag, I suppose, is that many people campaign to Jann for their artist to get into the Hall of Fame, because they believe that if Jann would like that artist to be in the Hall of Fame, it will happen.

Ric Ocasek was at the concert, too, trying to butter Jann up about the Cars getting in the Rock Hall. Everyone goes to kiss the ring, because they think Jann runs the thing. The Rock Hall is meaningful to people. Jann obviously has a big influence on this thing and I think he has always enjoyed having these people lavish him with attention and campaign for it.

Over the years, many of the artists Wenner had been rumored to be responsible for keeping out were eventually inducted (Rush, KISS, Chicago, Quincy Jones, the Moody Blues), but there remain others who still think they are blackballed (the Monkees, Toto, Ted Nugent, the Guess Who).

The most notorious case of Wenner putting his “thumb on the scale” is the 2007 induction of Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five. As Roger Friedman reported at the time*:

According to sources knowledgeable about the mysterious ways of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, British Invasion group The Dave Clark Five and not Grandmaster Flash finished fifth in the final voting of the nominating committee and should have been inducted on Monday night.

According to sources, Rolling Stone publisher Jann Wenner, who recently appointed himself chairman of the Foundation after the death of Ahmet Ertegun, ignored the final voting and chose Grandmaster Flash over the DC5 for this year's ceremony.

”Jann went back to a previous ballot instead of taking the final vote as the last word," my source insisted. "He used a technicality about the day votes were due in. In reality, The Dave Clark Five got six more votes than Grandmaster Flash. But he felt we couldn't go another year without a rap act.”

R.E.M., Van Halen, The Ronettes and Patti Smith were the top four vote-getters, with Grandmaster Flash finishing fifth when the votes were counted on the first date ballots were due in to the Rock Hall office.

But when all the ballots were counted a few days later, the DC5 had pulled ahead. Wenner decided to ignore that and stick with the earlier tally.

According to Friedman, after the controversy became public, Wenner had to meet with Dave Clark and guaranteed their induction the following year. Sadly, DC5 singer Mike Smith died 11 days before the 2008 induction ceremony.

Former Nominating Committee member Joel Selvin also alleged Wenner manipulated the process to get the Paul Butterfield Blues Band inducted. Wenner had previously mentioned them as a priority.

For his part, Wenner has consistently denied any wrongdoing, telling Rob Tannenbaum in 2015, “I understand the basis of [the conspiracy theories], but I don’t care about the speculation. After doing this for 30 years, nobody’s ever found any credible charge of chicanery or undue influence.”

The Rock Hall has come under fire over the years about its induction process and its lack of racial and gender diversity in its Hall of Fame classes. Wenner dismissed that criticism today, “I don’t think that’s a real issue. People are inducted for their achievements. Musical achievements have got to be race-neutral and gender-neutral in terms of judging them.”

The Jann Wenner chapter in the story of the Rock Hall may be coming to a close this year, but a full accounting of his legacy has yet to be written.

An article in the New York Times announcing the 1994 inductees provides the clearest criteria for the rule:

In most years, the seven top vote-getters gain induction; this year, there is an eighth inductee, under a provision that allows the hall's board to honor someone who has missed election in seven consecutive years.

The only inductee that year that fits that description is Duane Eddy, who appeared on the first seven Rock Hall ballots. Further evidence of his automatic induction is this rundown of the 1994 nominees in the L.A. Times, written by Nominating Committee member Robert Hilburn, which never mentions Duane Eddy.

The previous year, Billboard listed the 1993 nominees in its July 18, 1992 issue:

Strangely, Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers aren’t included even though they were inducted as Performers that year. It now seems clear that they were inducted using the same “seven consecutive years provision,” because like Duane Eddy, they too had appeared on the first seven Rock Hall ballots without being inducted.

While there are other artists who have been nominated at least seven times, these two artists seem to be the only inductees that fit the “seven consecutive years” criteria required for automatic induction. That would also explain why Solomon Burke and Chic were able to be nominated more than eight times, because they never appeared on a string of seven consecutive ballots.

Is the “seven year rule” still in effect? It seems unlikely, although with the Rock Hall, you never know for sure.

The Midnighters were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2012 in an effort to correct a previous oversight when Hank Ballard was inducted solo in 1990. According to the Hall of Fame’s website, The Midnighters enshrined that night included seven members: Henry Booth, Cal Green, Arthur Porter, Lawson Smith, Charles Sutton, Norman Thrasher and Sonny Woods. Alonzo Tucker and guitarist Billy Davis were notably not included. In January of 2013, Hank Ballard’s son, Daryle even noted Davis’s omission in the comment section of this website, hoping he would be included at some point. Someone at the Rock Hall must have had a change of heart, because later that year, Davis’s name was quietly added to the official website.

As with the Kenny Laguna situation, the result isn’t the issue, it’s the process where the Rock Hall tries to secretly rewrite its own history.

thanks, Jake

In 1999, Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in the “Early Influence” category. For years, the Rock Hall clearly listed all of the Playboys individually on their website as inductees, as this screenshot from 2010 shows:

When the new Hall of Fame exhibit at the Museum was unveiled last year, the Texas Playboys were omitted from the signature plaque and removed from the website:

Why on earth* would the Rock Hall remove Tommy Duncan, Leon McAuliffe, Johnny Gimble, Joe Holley, Tiny More, Herb Remington, Eldon Shamblin, and Al Stricken? We all know the Rock Hall has a problem inducting women, but throwing out dead male inductees doesn’t seem like a good solution. If you’re going to erase history, at least provide an explanation for what you’re doing.

* - Please don’t say it’s because they didn’t fit on the plaque.

Update (May 4, 2019): The Rock Hall Museum’s President and CEO, Greg Harris, tweeted today to say that the Texas Playboys have been restored to the website and will be added to the signature wall soon.

All, thank you for bringing the Bob Wills item to our attention, we’ve checked our records and updated the website to reflect the way we’ve had it since 1999 including the Texas Playboys. Plaque will be updated shortly again thanks.

— Greg Harris (@rockhallceo) May 4, 2019

Update (January 22, 2020):

Happy to report that the Texas Playboys are once again displayed in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Thanks to @KatBoydRocks for the photo pic.twitter.com/5JsAsPOpb5

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) January 19, 2020

It wasn’t just the plaque that was wrong, the Rock Hall’s website never included Laguna as an inductee until sometime last year. The official program from the 2015 induction ceremony didn’t illustrate Laguna among the inductees either.

Contemporaneous reporting around the 2015 induction ceremony never mentioned Laguna as an inductee, and clearly stated which Blackhearts were included. Cleveland.com even speculated that Laguna might be the presenter for Joan Jett.

You know who did know he was being inducted? Kenny Laguna knew. At the induction ceremony, Laguna gave an acceptance speech (even thanking “advocate” Steven Van Zandt).

Why didn’t anyone else seem to know that Kenny Laguna was actually inducted for over three years?

The first evidence on the internet of his induction seems to be on his Wikipedia page, which was updated about three months after the ceremony (the citation referenced for this fact includes a list of eleven Blackhearts, most of whom weren’t inducted). Other than that, there are very few mentions of his induction until last year, when there was some press surrounding the Bad Reputation documentary.

So, a few questions:

• If Laguna was in fact inducted in 2015, why didn’t the press know about it at the time?
• Why wasn’t he listed on the Rock Hall’s website or on the museum plaque for over three years?
• Does the Rock Hall plan to make any other retroactive changes to the inductees?
• Are there other instances of quietly adding or removing inductees?
• Is the canonical list of inductees maintained by the Rock Hall Museum or Foundation? Can it be published?
• Are there any other inductees who are not listed on the signature plaques at the Museum?

This is all so weird and stupid. How does this keep happening?

In Rolling Stone’s article announcing the nominees, reporter Andy Greene wrote that only six members of Roxy Music were included by the Rock Hall, and John Gustafson and Graham Simpson were not among them:

The classic Roxy Music lineup of Bryan Ferry, Brian Eno, Andy Mackay, Phil Manzanera, Eddie Jobson and Paul Thompson made the cut, though none of their many bassists did.

After the inductees were announced in December, John Gustafson’s contributions to the band were still mentioned in the Rock Hall’s biography, but his name disappeared from the inducted members listing:

A month later, Andy Greene spoke with Andy Mackay about the inducted lineup:

RS: They’re taking in Brian Eno, Bryan Ferry, Eddie Jobson, you, Phil Manzanera, Graham Simpson and Paul Thompson. Did they get that right? Did they miss anybody?

Mackay: It’s difficult, isn’t it? Over the band’s career there were many different people. For a period, we worked with American session musicians on a few records. By and large, the four of us there at the beginning were there at the end. That’s probably what counts. And Eddie Jobson obviously did play on three records in the middle of the band’s career. With bass players, it is hard to say who is the definitive bass player. The guy who played on “Love Is the Drug,” John Gustafson, died a few years ago. He was a fantastic player who had been in a Liverpool band before the Beatles. He was a great player that did a lot of session work in London.

The official Rock Hall program doesn’t specifically list which members were inducted, but the front and back covers illustrate each inductee. There are only seven yellow circles for Roxy Music, and Gustafson is not one of them.

The Rock Hall already changed course with this class when they decided to include The Cure’s current guitarist, Reeves Gabrels, but it’s not so clear why Gustafson was removed from the Roxy Music lineup. Did the Rock Hall change its mind? Was there input from the band?

The Rock Hall started announcing the band lineups with the nominations each year in an effort to avoid these types of controversies, but it’s clear they still have no problem making things up as they go along.

Many people are wondering why was John Gustafson dropped from your original list of eight Roxy Music band members to be inducted after the details were displayed on the HOF website during the weeks before the ceremony? 🙄

— Roxy (@Roxysiren) April 7, 2019

For the record, we had been listing Gustafson as an inductee since December, but based on the above information, he has now joined the list of Snubbed Members.

Big thanks to Joe Kwaczala, host of our favorite podcast, for bringing this to our attention.

After the Rock Hall introduced the “Singles Category” at the 2018 ceremony there were no shortage of questions, criticism, and speculation about the purpose and future of the award. After all, the Rock Hall had previously published a list of the “500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll,” so how would this be different? Last year, Steven Van Zandt made clear to state that there was only one rule for a song to be honored: “the records are by artists not in the Rock Hall.” With that in mind, let’s take a look at the 2019 recipients*:

• The Chantels - "Maybe" (1957)**
• The Champs - "Tequila" (1958)
• Barrett Strong - "Money (That's What I Want)" (1959)
• The Shangri-Las - "Leader of the Pack" (1964)
• The Shadows of Knight - "Gloria" (1965)

• The Isley Brothers - "Twist and Shout" (1962)

The whole point of this category is that its artists that aren’t in. Bullshit.

— Who Cares About the Rock Hall? (@rockhallpod) March 30, 2019

As you probably know, the Isley Brothers are in the Hall of Fame, inducted in 1992. So in the second year of this brand new Rock Hall category, the one and only rule gets trashed.*** What are we even doing here?

The Rock Hall’s own website and museum have been slow to acknowledge the category after it was introduced as a surprise at last year’s ceremony. Greg Harris, the Museum’s president and CEO has tried to emphasize that the songs are not inducted into the Rock Hall, and “Singles” isn’t even a Hall of Fame category (what?). A year later, the museum still hasn’t accommodated the song list in its Hall of Fame exhibit (although Harris says the songs will eventually receive a special place of honor). It took months, but their website finally listed last year’s singles on the “Induction Process” page (but they weren’t actually inducted, right?), and hasn’t bothered to add this year’s winners, four weeks after the ceremony.

Just like last year, the artists of the honored songs were not in attendance at the Induction Ceremony, and according to a source close to one of the artists, weren’t even notified about the “honor” in advance.

In January, Joel Peresman, the Rock Hall Foundation’s President & CEO, who is theoretically in charge of this mess, said that this category “will be included again this year and always going forward.” Always! If that’s the case, someone needs to turn Steven Van Zandt’s vanity project into something meaningful. Otherwise, there’s really no point in discussing it further.

* - In his introduction, Steven Van Zandt said they don’t always select the original version of the singles, but they honor “the most iconic versions that time has proven to have had the biggest impact on the soundtrack of our lives.”
** - With this honor, it’s likely the Chantels won’t be back on the Performer ballot, where they had been twice been nominated. The other non-Hall of Famers have never been nominated.
*** - So, out of the hundreds of foundational songs to break the non-Hall of Famer rule, why “Twist and Shout”? It was written by Bert Berns, whom Van Zandt had gotten inducted in 2016. Just one more reason the entire system is broken.

Steven Van Zandt, of course, narrates the new Berns documentary and is a producer for the Broadway show about Berns. #RockHall2016

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) March 24, 2016

[Janet] Jackson is one of only two women being inducted into the hall this year, out of 37 inductees, including the members of the five all-male bands being inducted. The other woman is Stevie Nicks. During the 34 years since the hall was founded by Jann Wenner and Ahmet Ertegun, 888 people have been inducted; 69 have been women. That’s 7.7 percent. The problem is spreading.
...
The Rock Hall is the most obvious offender in what I’ll call the manhandling of musical history. Manhandling is akin to, and often — as with the Rock Hall — intersects with, whitewashing. Manhandling pushes women out of the frame just as whitewashing covers up black bodies. People of color account for 32 percent of Rock Hall inductees, a far better figure than for women, but still not representative of the enormous role African Americans and Latinx people have played in American popular music.

McDonnell makes the case that the gender disparity was baked in from the first induction class and takes aim at one of the Rock Hall’s founding members:

[Buddy] Holly and [Chuck] Berry were both among the first 16 acts inducted in the Rock Hall, in 1986. All their fellow inductees were male. Built on such grotesquely imbalanced footing, the institution may never get itself right. After all, its main instigator was Ahmet Ertegun, an admittedly legendary records man who treated women abominably, according to Dorothy Carvello’s 2018 memoir Anything for a Hit. Carvello is a music executive who began her career working for Ertegun at Atlantic. Ertegun subjected her to crude sexual harassment and once fractured her arm in anger. The Rock Hall named its main exhibition hall after Ertegun. How can this ever be a place where women feel welcome, let alone safe? Just as universities have removed from buildings and fellowships the names of film executives who gave them money, such as USC renaming their Bryan Singer Division of Critical Studies, the Rock Hall should remove Ertegun’s name from the building and from the annual industry executive award that bears his name. It’s an award that has never been given to a woman.
...
Guys like Ertegun, who died in 2006, reportedly manhandled in the workplace, in addition to creating the Cleveland shrine to gender inequity. Carvello’s book documents in scandalous detail how he and other executives created a boys’ club environment where women had to either pretend to be one of the boys, betraying their sisters, or trade sex for promotion. In Ertegun’s world, women were not allowed to step up; they were stepped on. Having systematically excluded and oppressed women from the business of making music, Ertegun and his cronies at the Rock Hall then carved that exclusion into stone by essentially writing them out of history, year after year after year. When women do get let into the Rock Hall boys’ club, it is on the arms of men: Carole King is there for her songwriting with Gerry Goffin, not as the woman who recorded numerous hit songs herself, including those on the record-smashing album Tapestry. Tina Turner was inducted alongside her abusive ex-spouse Ike.

McDonnell also points out that the induction system created by the Rock Hall perpetuates the gender imbalance every year because each inductee becomes a voter, who then “vote in their friends and heroes, who tend to be men.”

Those of us who criticize the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame do so because despite its flaws, the institution does matter. McDonnell feels the same way:

It’s tempting to just say so what. I would like to not care about what institutions such as the Met and Hall of Fame do. They are essentially shrines to white men created by white men, so of course, they honor white men. But they pretend to serve the public — and in the Met’s case, it is in part a publicly funded institution. The Hall of Fame and its associated museum have enormous cultural power, writing in stone the historical importance of individuals in a way that no other institution or publication or organization does. They also create real economic benefits for culture workers. Being inducted into the Rock Hall doesn’t just look good on your resume, it helps sell records and tickets. Most importantly, these institutions provide inspiration — role models — for future generations. And if the only women you’re going to see receiving awards on that stage at the Barclays Center are Janet Jackson and Stevie Nicks, would you, if you were a little girl, go pick up a guitar?

It should be noted here that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Museum is also supported by taxpayers to the tune of over $125 million since 1995.

McDonnell offers a course of action for the Rock Hall:

There are three things the Hall of Fame can do to rectify that imbalance: 1. Flood the nominating committee and voting membership with more women. Six out of 29 members of last year’s nominating committee were women; the notoriously tight-lipped hall has not revealed this year’s committee members. 2. Reduce the voting power of members inducted as players in bands (so, say, the five dudes in Def Leppard each get one fifth of a vote). 3. Nominate a shit ton of all-female bands next year.

Evelyn McDonnell also edited last year’s Women Who Rock anthology.

Although Gabrels has been an official member of The Cure since 2012, he hasn’t appeared on any of their albums (The Cure’s last studio album was 2008, although a new one is due this year). It’s hard to justify his induction when weighing it against the many, many artists over the years who had more significant contributions to their bands’ successes, but were snubbed by the Rock Hall.

This issue reached a fever pitch in 2014, when Paul Stanley was vocal about the Rock Hall only inducting the original KISS lineup. Stanley correctly noted, “The only consistencies are inconsistencies and the rules clearly are there are no rules because the criteria for how and who gets in is purely based upon a personal like or dislike.”

Future inductees can now cite the “Reeves Gabrels Precedent” when negotiating with the Rock Hall over details of their induction.

h/t Chain of Flowers

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.

• 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.

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.

Multifactor authentication ensures votes are cast legitimately, while top-of-the-line encryption protects fan voter privacy and anonymity.

Featuring 100% accuracy and transparency throughout the entire fan vote process, Votem removes any potential for human error or controversy caused by miscounting or mishandling votes.

The Rock Hall updated the vote totals after an internal “audit,” likely prompted by a tweet from Journey which suggested the poll may have been “hacked” after their lead over E.L.O. shrank from 5,000 votes to 2,000 votes over the course of a week.

Don't know what happened but this appears to have been hacked or taken down.
We were 5k in lead and now 2k
Vote... https://t.co/1MdobRqcKL

— JOURNEY (@JourneyOfficial) November 28, 2016

What kind of polling operation holds onto 40% of votes for a month and then releases them all at once with little explanation? Certainly not one that supposedly features “100% accuracy and transparency.” This is the same “transparent” poll that didn’t show vote totals for over a week after voting started. This is the same poll that promises “voter privacy and anonymity,” but then sneakily registers you for the Rock Hall newsletter when you vote with your email address.

This is the same polling company that is supposed to “remove any potential for controversy.” (Did the Rock Hall actually pay for this service?)

As Steve Miller said about the Rock Hall back in the spring, “I think it’s time for the people running this to turn it over to new people, because it doesn’t need to be this difficult.”

Votem did not respond to questions regarding their poll methodology.

Update: The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame offered up additional details about the vote increase, also insisting that the poll had not been “hacked.” The Rock Hall shared their own graph of results for the month of November, which shows the extra votes distributed over the course of the month.

Iconic Rock Talk Show thinks this whole thing could have been handled better.

Keirstead followed up that work with “The Jam Part II - Long Live Rock & Roll” which continued the project showing the following decades of rock stars (with a slightly more Canadian bias).

For many rock fans, this is what the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame should represent (even if it happens to be almost entirely white). If the Rock Hall also saw it that way, they might even have a chance to induct most of those people. But that’s not the way the Hall of Fame wants to represent rock and roll. They choose a far more ambitious path -- to include many of the different branches that sprung from the roots of rock and roll, including disco, electronic music, pop, and most controversially, hip hop. That makes their task exponentially more difficult. It’s hard enough to properly honor and represent the most important artists of one genre, but to try to capture the essence of popular music from the past half-century becomes an impossible task. There will inevitably be important artists who get left behind which leaves fans of all genres eternally frustrated. The current format of inducting just five artists per year does a huge disservice to their mission “to celebrate the musicians who founded, changed and revolutionized rock & roll,” when their definition of rock and roll includes an ever-expanding number of artists and genres. The Rock Hall has created an intractable problem.

The whole process is unpleasant. The whole process needs to be changed from the top to the bottom. It doesn’t need to be this hard. There is nothing fancy going on out there that requires all of this stuff.

They need to get their legal work straight. They need to respect the artists they say they’re honoring, which they don’t. I don’t have any of my paperwork signed, I have no licensing agreements with these people. They’re trying to steal footage. They’re trying to make me indemnify them.

When they told me I was inducted they said, “You can have two tickets - one for your wife and one for yourself. Want another one? It’s $10,000 - sorry that’s the way it goes.” I said, “I’m playing here. What about my band? What about their wives?” They make this so unpleasant.

They came this close - [publicist asks Miller to wrap it up]

No, we’re not going to wrap this up - I’m going to wrap you up. You go sit down over there and learn something. Here’s what you need to know. This is how close this whole show came to not happening because of the way the artists are actually being treated right now. So I’ll wrap it up.

In a separate interview with AP, Miller had further thoughts:

It wasn’t very overwhelming. It was kind of like a lazy kind of night with a bunch of fat cats at the dinner table.

It’s not a real pleasant experience, to tell you the truth. The reason it isn’t is because they make it so difficult for the artists. I think it’s time for the people running this to turn it over to new people, because it doesn’t need to be this difficult.

I don’t know why I was nominated for this, because i’ve said this about the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for 30 years and I don’t get along with the people who run it. When I found out about it, I felt like I was in a bullshit reality TV show.

Miller also said, "My fans take it seriously. I really didn't want to show up... You tell me what the hell is the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and what does it do besides talk about itself and sell postcards?”

Some of Miller’s criticism of the institution came out during his eight minute acceptance speech on stage:

And to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, I’d thank you for your hard work on behalf of all musicians. And I encourage you to keep expanding your vision. To be more inclusive of women and to be more transparent with your dealings with the public. And most importantly, to do much more to provide music in our schools.

If you follow the dealings of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, none of this is news. We have been documenting the Rock Hall’s issues with women, transparency and treatment of artists for years.

The @Rock_Hall seems to have the unique ability to simultaneously honor and an insult an artist's career. #DeepPurple #GNR #KISS #Heart

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) December 22, 2015

Artists have been complaining about the Rock Hall for decades too. In 1997, Neil Young boycotted the ceremony for similar reasons that Steve Miller outlined above:

Young, who was inducted as a member of Buffalo Springfield, boycotted the performance because of a dispute with the rock hall over its refusal to provide him with enough free tickets to bring his family to the $1,500-a-plate dinner.

In a letter to the rock hall, VH1, Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun and his Buffalo Springfield bandmates, Young also said he was upset with the rock hall's decision to sell broadcast rights to VH1, feeling that featuring the ceremony on TV commercialized and cheapened it.

”The VH1 Hall of Fame presentation has nothing to do with the spirit of rock 'n' roll," wrote Young. "It has everything to do with making money. Inductees are severely limited in the amount of guests they can bring. They are forced to be on a TV show, for which they are not paid.”

Let’s also not forget the Sex Pistols letter.

What makes Steve Miller’s statements so important is that he decided to step on the neck of the Rock Hall on the night he was being inducted. Usually any bad feelings get pushed to the side on a night filled with so much positive energy from your peers and fans, but Miller knew that his words would carry the most impact at that moment.

The question now is, will this actually change anything? The Rock Hall has been mismanaging artist relations for years, which has led to numerous lost opportunities for induction ceremony reunions (including two this year alone). When will the Rock Hall board wake up and realize that this isn’t working on nearly every level? The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation’s primary responsibilities are running the induction process, organizing the induction ceremonies and raising money. How much more failure in each of these areas is the Rock Hall willing to endure?

Steve Miller said, “I think it’s time for the people running this to turn it over to new people, because it doesn’t need to be this difficult.” We agree.

As the stars converge and the hype builds for the 31st Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Brooklyn tonight, it's important not to lose sight of an inescapable fact: By any measure, the Rock Hall is an American institution with a tarnished public image. Sad to say, but it's lost hearts and minds. When tickets for your annual watershed gala event are going on StubHub for $12, and the simulcast of said event at the museum isn't sold out, well, those are bad omens.

There's an acute public perception problem here, and the reasons go beyond why your favorite band isn't in the hall yet; in fact, let's please put those reflexive, tiresome, moody blues to rest for now. In considering the Rock Hall gestalt, there are two entities that feed off each other. First there's the museum in Cleveland, which opened in 1995 and is an exceptionally-curated music fan pilgrimage. Secondly and most significantly, there is the organization that spearheaded the museum, The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, NYC-based and formed in 1983 by the late Ahmet Ertegun, Jann Wenner, Seymour Stein, Jon Landau, and others to recognize achievement in popular music.

That mission sounds simple enough. In fact, the early years, marked by the privately-held induction ceremonies at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City, were a relatively non-controversial, celebratory breeze. Elvis! Chuck Berry! Bob Dylan! Aretha! The Beatles! But as decades have gone on, and as Wenner has dubiously claimed "all the no-brainers" are inducted, it seems that myriad issues have cropped up that threaten to irrevocably damage the very idea of "The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame." These issues include, but are not necessarily limited to, transparency, communication, gender equality, credibility, common sense, and conflicts of interest:

• Transparency - Most people that follow the hall closely, as well as casual observers/everyday rock fans, get a sense that most major Rock Hall decisions are being made behind closed doors. This is a non-profit that is driven by donations, but the institution seems to act with impunity and zero accountability. Does anyone on the outside, let alone donors, know what's going on? Sure, financial numbers get disclosed.  But missing is the basic information that would actually matter to the populist masses the Hall is purportedly courting to buy memberships and tickets to the museum/induction ceremonies. The most corrective measure the Hall could take toward transparency would be to disclose the vote counts that decide who gets inducted. A press release is issued, and news outlets and social media are abuzz on announcement day, but it seems no one truly questions the results. (Does anyone truly believe that Steve Miller got more votes than Janet Jackson? That's not to take sides in support of either, but most fan polls outside the Rock Hall's bot-corrupted fan vote had Janet well ahead, and you'd think there would be at least some parallel).
• Communication - The fact that most people believed that N.W.A. would perform at the induction ceremony tonight, only to be highly disappointed yesterday when they saw Ice Cube's interview in the New York Times saying they weren't performing due to disagreements with the organizers, is a prime example of the Rock Hall dropping the ball when it comes to communication. How long was this known? It certainly wasn't in the Hall's best interest to disclose that fact. Going broader in terms of the 2016 ceremony, why are there only five performer inductees this year? Previous years have had quite a few more. A sixth slot could have gone to a deserving artist like Yes. Again, there are no real answers from the Hall, just speculation across the board that maybe they're trying to shorten what have been admittedly long ceremonies.
• Gender Equality - There's not a single female inductee this year, not even a single announced presenter tonight that is female. Furthermore, per the essential Rock Hall resource Future Rock Legends (futurerocklegends.com), "Of the 547 Rock Hall voters we have on our unofficial list, 9.3% are women." Expanding the voting body to include more women is urgent, crucial, and ridiculously overdue. 
• Credibility - The Hall-run, official fan vote for the 2016 induction class was an abject disaster. Overtaken by bots and registering an inhuman 160,905,154 votes, it's exhibit A for the Hall to come up with a more secure, credible fan voting system. (And yes, Chicago fans, the point is taken that you are passionate, and that you voted a bunch. But you didn't vote 37 million times, as the official Rock Hall fan vote would have us believe.) This needs to be fixed before the next set of nominees is announced.
• Common Sense - When choosing which band members to induct (or not induct at all, as in tonight's Steve Miller "sans Band" scenario), the committees apparently need to do more research, consult the bands, and use some common sense. In the case of Deep Purple, vocalist Red Evans is being inducted, but bassist Nick Simper was excluded, which is confounding as they played on the same records and were in the band at the same time. Yet every drummer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers was inducted? Inconsistency at best.
• Conflicts of Interest - The late Bert Berns is being given the Ahmet Ertegun Award for Lifetime Achievement tonight, an honor that is apparently determined not by voting but via the unilateral decision of a nomination committee. Steven Van Zandt and Paul Shaffer are producing a Broadway musical about Bert Berns, and they are both on such a committee. The red flags being raised here, justifiably so, are conflicts of interest, and the overarching sense that the Rock Hall insiders are just going to do whatever they want. Berns, a storied '60s producer, record man and songwriter, has accomplishments that have more than earned him this honor, but it's too bad his induction has this shadow of impropriety over it. 

In closing, the Sex Pistols' Johnny Rotten, upon learning of his band's induction, fired off a burning missive to the Hall in 1996, calling it a "piss stain." He added, "Your anonymous as judges but your still music industry people (sic)." Maybe Rotten's was among the first hearts and minds lost.

That doesn't mean the Rock Hall can't course-correct and win back those that still believe in a credible, well-executed, and balanced recognition of musical achievement. Fixing these issues isn't just the right thing to do; it may even secure the Rock Hall's long-term future.

by Eric Layton -- originally posted on E-Rockracy on 4/8/2016

The 13 members who were let go:

We list the 28 survivors on our Nominating Committee page, and it should also be noted that they did not add any new members to add a fresh perspective.

It seems unlikely there would be another major change in the Committee this year unless there is disruption in the leadership of the Rock Hall Foundation.

1. This year’s performer class includes only five artists, down from the six that have been inducted in recent years. Given the backlog of deserving artists, why the reduction?
2. Was the number of inductees reduced to shorten the length of the induction ceremony?
3. If so, why did you schedule the induction ceremony at Barclays Center the day before a hockey game? The last time the ceremony was at Barclays, you had to cancel the end of show jam session because of the curfew.
4. Regarding the inducted members of Deep Purple, can you explain the rationale for how vocalist Rod Evans can be inducted but bassist Nick Simper is not, despite being in the band during the same era (1968-1969) and performing on the same albums?
5. We have our theories, but can you explain why Steve Miller has been inducted solo, with no one else from the Steve Miller Band?
6. Do bands with a complicated membership history have a disadvantage in getting nominated or inducted?
7. Who were the “experts” you used to determine which members of the inducted artists got in?
8. The official fan poll effectively ended on October 15th after you instituted limits to protect against volume voters (human or otherwise). Why was the fan poll created with no protective measures in the first place?
9. When it was determined that the fan poll had fatal flaws, why wasn’t the poll scrapped in favor of a new, secure poll?
10. Why did you create a poll with unlimited voting (that has almost zero impact on the actual results) that takes advantage of fans’ passions for their favorite artists by wasting their time?
11. Did the fan poll last year have similar unusual voting activity?
12. It has been reported that the Voting Committee was expanded this year. How many new voters were added? How many of the new voters are women? (Of the dozen or so new voters we have seen, none are women.)
13. One of the new voters this year is Howard Stern Show producer Gary Dell’Abate (aka Baba Booey). What are the qualifications for becoming an official voter?
14. Speaking of women, of the 25 people inducted in the Class of 2016, zero are women. Do you feel the Rock Hall has a gender diversity problem? If so, how do you plan to address it?
15. Some of the members of the Nominating Committee have recently complained that the Voting Committee isn’t knowledgable enough about the broad history of rock and roll, and ignores the clear wishes of the Nominating Committee (Chic is example #1). Are there plans to change the composition of the electorate (most of whom are Rock Hall inductees) that would be more in line with the Nominating Committee’s views of rock and roll?
16. Speaking of voters, how many of the over 800 ballots were actually returned this year?
17. Who counted the votes and will you release the voting totals?
18. Official ballots were due from voters on December 15th, but it seems clear that the inductees were determined and notified prior to the voting deadline. Given the reported low return rate of ballots, how could you be sure late ballots wouldn’t change the results?
19. Only inductees in the “performer” category were revealed. When will inductees in the other categories be announced?
20. The induction ceremony locations were previously going to be on three year cycles between New York, Cleveland and Los Angeles. This year was to be an L.A. year. Why was the L.A. ceremony scrapped? Are there currently plans to return to L.A.?

If you have additional questions about the Rock Hall process that go beyond the usual “why isn’t [my favorite artist] in the Rock Hall?”, leave them in the comments.

Notorious KISS antagonist and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominating Committee member Dave Marsh, recently gave an interview to L.A. Radio Sessions, in which he revealed many of his frustrations with the induction process. A portion of the interview was posted on YouTube. Here is our transcript, lightly edited for clarity:

LA Radio Sessions: Let’s talk a little about the procedure, because people forget from year to year. I hear all these wide accusations that it’s all a Rolling Stone magazine Hall of Fame and this and that.

Dave Marsh: I’ve been on the Nominating Committee for more than 20 years and Jann wouldn’t have me in the magazine if I had a gun to his head. And I probably wouldn’t be in the magazine if you had a gun to my head! There are a couple of people from Rolling Stone, as there should be, in every version of the Committee, which did change shape and get a little smaller this year.

LA Radio Sessions: Can we talk about that at all?

Dave Marsh: There was a perception that it was too big and we were spending a lot of time just naming names and then voting on them and not having enough of a discussion. And the whole process… it’s actually... this is one of those moments where it’s unfair to a given individual who everybody, or almost everybody, slams all the time, because it was his perception. But that’s not anybody’s business outside of the Committee, so I can’t talk about it. I think that’s a broad enough hint. [Ed. Note: he is surely talking about Jann Wenner]

Whether you want to go out to dinner with somebody or not is irrelevant if they perceive something and help you make it better. And this is a slightly different approach and I think it’s a much better ballot than the last couple of years. Last year had a very good result off a relatively weak ballot, I think. This year, it’s much more difficult for the voters to make a mistake. And before we go any farther, let me say this, ok? This is… this is a hard thing to say, because I have a real commitment to this institution. And I think it was a wise and important thing to create it. But. The fact of the matter is, it is the only hall of fame in the world that convenes a group of experts to make its ballot and then gives the voting over to people who know less than a smidgen as much as the people who are in that room. It’s an insipid process. It really is.

That’s not the first time a Nominating Committee member has criticized the choices of the Voters, the majority of whom are Hall of Famers. Marsh seems to think that this year’s ballot is deep enough that no matter who the voters choose, it will be a solid induction class.

Dave Marsh: The first Rock and Roll Hall of Fame classes, the first couple years, there were 10, 15 people that got in… What were you going to do, say “yes” to Chuck Berry and “no” to Buddy Holly? But it’s not like there isn’t still the wealth of… some of the people are more obscure and some of the people are more controversial... and keeping the tent as big as it needs to be is a continuing problem. But in the end, doing it five people a year is just completely frustrating. And it takes something that could be really, really great. And because they pay for the event with the TV show, I guess, I’ve never been able to figure it out on any other basis, that tail wags that dog every year.

This is a startlingly frank admission from a member of the Nominating Committee, acknowledging the influence the Rock Hall’s television partners (currently HBO) have over the process.

Dave Marsh: It’s kind of heartbreaking because… one of the things that happens is simple. People die. Darlene [Love] could have died without getting in the Hall of Fame. This has been such a holocaustal year for great musicians dying, that’s really foremost in my mind. Everybody is getting older. It’s not just those early British invasion bands who have turned 70, hell, the early British invasion bands are worrying about 80! It’s a few years off, but it’s going to happen. If you were born in ‘38 or ‘39 it’s gonna happen. Sam Moore will be 80 this year. So you’re going to start losing people that you shouldn’t lose without honoring them while they’re alive. And the longer you wait, the fewer people who actually remember how great something was.

And I’ll just use, because they’re on the ballot, and because it’s been an ongoing conversation, and because it’s the strangest area where the Hall of Fame’s inductees are weak… is hard rock bands. And the notion that Deep Purple [Ed. Note: keyboardist Jon Lord died in 2012], who are a great band by any definition of rock and roll. They made record after record. I know I took them for granted for way too long. And there’s a bunch of people like that, whether it’s somebody whose style is pretty much forgotten and discarded, like Marc Bolan, who is not on the ballot, and to the best of my knowledge has never been on the ballot, but who was the spirit of rock and roll. I would say in historical terms, one of the luckiest things that ever happened to David Bowie was Marc Bolan’s car crash. I don’t mean that to say anything mean about David exactly, but Marc was just something extraordinarily special. And when you’ve got a process that won’t even let you get around to that fact, because there are other even bigger problems that have to be addressed... It’s frustrating. Not because anybody wants it to be frustrating.

Then you got the whole problem… this is something for which radio needs to be taken to task, and particularly the genuinely evil Lee Abrams period. This continuing confusion about what the relationship between white rock and black rock ought to be, or is. And make no mistake, you have to talk about it like that, they have the same root. And they travelled at some points, and the paths have diverged quite extremely, and then again they always come back together. The musicians always know what the connection is. You never have any trouble explaining that to a musician, or at least not a musician who is worth talking to. So these are the all the limits within which that ballot got created.

I say this partly because I’m tired of pretending a whole bunch of things… it’s the Cream magazine person in me that wants to say, hey, there’s right, there’s wrong. Yes, we will never agree with anything the way we all agreed on Elvis. Yes, the same thing should be true of James Brown, and it never will be. And that we need to reckon with. We also need to reckon with the fact that people think they know the history of rock and roll, and I will tell you right now, 750 people are going to get this ballot, there are not 750 people in the world, on the surface of the earth, who can adequately comprehend what has happened since 1955. It’s just simply, you know… God knows, if you stick me in with a bunch of electronic acts, or those brit-pop things from the Duran Duran period, or there’s all kinds of nooks and crannies or sometimes rivers, that missed me.

LA Radio Sessions: Right, of course. Missed all of us.

Dave Marsh: I remember talking to Jon Landau, who is one of the original rock critics who is still alive that I’m closest to, and him saying to me at a certain point, “You know, it’s all going to be different now.” And we were up to about 1966 or 1967. And I thought about it as a person who didn’t much care for what came out of San Francisco, give or take Sly and Creedence. And yeah, it’s going to be different, we’re not going to agree the way we used to. And that’s what he was thinking about too. So when we talk, yes I’m on the Nominating Committee, no, I’m not a person who agrees with everything the Nominating Committee does, or with all the ways in which it’s compelled to do its job, but at the same time, I’m very proud to be part of it. And the institution, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, is not a bad idea, it’s a very good one. Because somebody needs to do this. And we need always to be criticizing ourselves and each other and having people outside the process doing the same thing.

The only thing I can add to that is that I believe this to such a point that after about six months I realized that I should have been been supporting KISS getting into the Hall of Fame all along, for the simple reason that now all those idiots have to shut the f**k up about it. [laughter] I went, “Oh, really? This all dies down? I should have voted for them!”

It’s always fascinating when Nominating Committee members speak on the record about the induction process. It is nice to hear that they can be as frustrated with the system as their critics, but it also seems clear that any major changes will have to come from the top.

To get a sense of how real fans vote (this is the 10th year of our poll!), let’s look at some vote distributions from various internet polls where you can cast a ballot for multiple artists (all results as of 10/14/2015).

First, the Future Rock Legends poll (5100 total votes, must vote for five artists):

Next, the Cleveland.com poll (7277 total votes, can vote for up to eight artists):

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Poll (4920 total votes, can vote for up to six artists):

And finally, the official Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Fan Poll (over 158 million total “votes,” can vote for up to five artists):

Rock Hall Museum President Greg Harris was touting last year’s record 59 million votes in the fan poll, which took two months. This year, they shattered that record in less than 48 hours, but examining the results, it’s not hard to wonder if there aren’t non-human hands at work. The Rock Hall failed once again to publish any rules about the poll, just urging people to “vote often.” Unfortunately, the one poll that is the easiest to game is the one that counts.

One of the reasons this is so outrageous is that there are a lot of real fans of the nominated artists who are spending a lot of time voting and urging others to vote. But they can’t compete with scripts that can cast one million votes per hour.

The Rock Hall needs to remove this poll, scrap the results, and replace it with one that is fair and secure. The first two years of the fan poll, the Rock Hall enlisted online poll professionals PollDaddy to host the poll. Beginning last year, they took the poll into their own hands which has led to nothing but erratic results (last year, Nine Inch Nails received 22% of the vote; this year, just 0.3%, which is strange to say the least).

Let’s also not forget that the lack of rules with the fan poll is symptomatic of the induction process in general. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is the only major award that doesn’t use an independent accounting firm to tally the results from their voters.

On Friday, June 19th, Ed Christman from Billboard broke the story that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has let go many long-serving members of its Nominating Committee. So, what do we know so far?

Q: How many people from the Nominating Committee were let go?
A: The Billboard article’s headline says “at least 16 nominating members” were dismissed, but in the article, it is framed more as speculation from sources that “as many as 16 of the 42” members are gone. In the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Chuck Yarborough spoke to an ousted member who says the letter from Jon Landau stated the Rock Hall intended “to reduce the size of the committee by a third” to allow for “more flexibility in terms of discussion.” Reducing the Committee by a third would bring it down to about 28 members.

Q: Who was let go?
A: Billboard lists four names: “veteran A&R executive Joe McEwen, a blues and R&B expert; Greg Geller, a label executive specializing in reissues; Arthur Levy, a senior writer at a number of major record labels; and Bob Merlis, one of the industry's most renowned publicists who is now independent but was at Warner Bros. Records from the early 1970s through the 1990s.” Former L.A. Times critic Bob Hilburn confirmed on Twitter that he was dismissed as well. (Roger Friedman reports that Joe Levy was also let go, but it seems possible he mixed him up with Arthur Levy.)

Q: Who is still on the Committee?
There are a lot of question marks here, but Billboard confirms that Landau, Questlove, Cliff Burnstein and Seymour Stein are still involved. It’s probably safe to assume that Museum president Greg Harris is still in. Robbie Robertson, Rick Krim, Paul Shaffer and Rob Light are all deeply involved in the Induction Ceremonies each year. Beyond that, it’s difficult to say. Hopefully more names will be confirmed soon. Here is a full list of Nominating Committee members over the last 30 years.

Q: Why did the Rock Hall target the experts on the Early Rock and R&B Influencers subcommittee?
A: Billboard frames a lot of their story around the idea that the Rock Hall “wiped out more than half of the Hall's Early Rock and R&B Influencers subcommittee.” It’s true that four of the seven members on that committee were let go, but that leaves at least 10 other members who were potentially on other subcommittees that are now gone too. As of five years ago, there were three subcommittees: one on progressive rock and heavy metal; one on hip-hop; and one on early rock and rollers and rhythm & blues.

Q: So what does this mean for future ballots? Will early rock and R&B influencers be ignored?
A: Anymore than they already are? At this point it’s impossible to say. McEwen, Geller, Levy and Merlis aren’t the only people well versed in those eras. All of them had been serving on the Nominating Committee for over 24 years. If their recommendations hadn’t been fully reflected on the ballot by now, perhaps it’s time for others to have a chance to sway the overall Committee. We have evidence in recent years that new members are more effective in getting artists onto the ballot.

Q: Does this have anything to do with artists inducted as “Early Influences”?
A: Not directly. Those artists are chosen by a separate committee. The Rock Hall hasn’t named a true “Early Influence” inductee since 2000. The three since then (Wanda Jackson, Freddie King and the “5’ Royales) were all artists who had been previously nominated on the Performer ballot.

Q: Why did the Rock Hall let go of those specific people?
A: Billboard: “But some Hall of Fame watchers worry that this latest move by Landau and Jann Wenner -- widely seen as the dominating figures in the Hall -- is meant to reduce the focus on the pioneers so that going forward the Hall can focus on artists who came to the fore in the 1980s and soon the 1990s, who might still have more cache with mainstream music fans and HBO, which broadcasts the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's show.”

Ever since HBO got involved, we have been speculating about how this may affect the inductions (more stars, bigger names).

Yarborough: “Is this really a move to get younger meat in the seats, or rather, younger rockphiles through the turnstiles, so to speak? Well, I believe it is, just by the evidence in our own back yard. . . What scares me is that it seems the history of rock 'n' roll is going to take a huge hit in exchange for pandering – yes, I said pandering – to the younger masses.”

Roger Friedman believes Jann Wenner may move the eligibility date for artists down to 20 years: “Replacing nominators with younger people who have no attachment or feel for rock origins, and moving up the eligibility means Wenner can continue to skip over acts he doesn’t like and move on to more recent stars.” More Friedman: “There’s also a theory that Wenner will now try to force in groups like Journey or Kansas so that the HBO show turns into 80s nostalgia.” (C’mon Roger, Jann Wenner forcing in Journey and Kansas? Are you insane?)

Before removing his tweets, Rob Tannenbaum speculated that the Nominating Committee cuts were potentially in retaliation for members speaking to him for his recent Rock Hall story.

Some less conspiratorial theories: Maybe these Nominating Committee members didn’t participate or couldn’t make it to the meetings. Maybe they pushed the same names year after year. Maybe they aren’t familiar with some of the more recently eligible artists.

Is any of this true? At this point, we just don’t know. Perhaps Jon Landau will speak to Billboard as he promised on Friday.

Q: Billboard, Yarborough and Friedman all paint this move as a negative for the Rock Hall. But is it really a bad thing to shuffle the deck once per decade?
A: We have long been advocates of term limits for Nominating Committee members. Each person brings their own expertise and experience to the table, but after 10 years, it’s probably time to change the dynamic in the room. Hopefully Landau and Wenner invite new people to the meeting and don’t just try to lock it down to existing members. Ideally, this would create a ballot full of previously overlooked artists who had never had a chance to be inducted before.

Q: Sound great, but will this really change anything?
A: After the 2006 inductions, the Nominating Committee went from a bloated 72 members down to 31. So how did this affect the 2007 ballot? The biggest change was the number of nominees, which dropped to nine, down from sixteen.* But of the nine nominees in 2007, six had been nominated the previous year. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

So, when the nominees get announced in October, don’t expect a ballot full of Def Leppards, Weird Als and Grandfunk Railroads. Any changes will be gradual and cautious, just like they have always been.

* - It would be interesting if the ballot contracts to only nine or ten names again to basically force the Voting Committee to induct who the Nominating Committee wants (*cough* Chic *cough*).

Mark Andes (bass) and Dennis Carmassi (drums) were members of Heart from 1982 through 1993, during the band’s renaissance period when they had a string of hit singles. When the Rock Hall inducted Heart last year, they chose to only recognize the original 1970s lineup, so Andes and Carmassi were not inducted.

Andes and Carmassi claim that although Heart's most public members, Ann and Nancy Wilson, asked the [Rock Hall] foundation to correct its mistake and include the two members in the 2013 induction, it refused without giving a reason. The Hall of Fame, however, proceeded to use images and videos of Andes and Carmassi and the songs they performed to promote Heart’s induction, the pair says.

When their fans around the world congratulated the two after seeing their images and songs used by the Hall of Fame, Andes and Carmassi say they were humiliated by having to inform their fans and peers that they were inexplicably not chosen for induction.

The pair is not asking the Hall of Fame to induct them but is suing it for portraying them in a false light, misappropriating their name and likeness, and for defamation.

“Defendants knowingly and maliciously communicated to the public by implication that plaintiffs were not valuable members of the band Heart when it failed to induct them, but concomitantly used plaintiffs' images and song performances to promote the band's nomination and induction,” the complaint said.

Andes and Carmassi say they wrote a letter to the Hall of Fame in January 2013, asking why they were excluded and pointed out that its biography for Heart extensively references Heart's success in the 1980s, including its four Grammy nominations, to which they contributed heavily.

The Hall of Fame's CEO [Joel Peresman] responded the following day, defending the decision and ignoring the fact that the Hall of Fame was using the band's success with Andes and Carmassi, the artists say.

The pair has also brought additional counts of injurious falsehood and equitable relief.

The duo is seeking compensatory damages for all losses, treble damages on all trademark claims, punitive damages and exemplary damages.

The issue of which band members get inducted into the Hall of Fame has been an ongoing source of controversy for the institution. The 2014 inductions cast a bright light on the issue when the Rock Hall decided that only the original members of Kiss were being honored, which led to the band opting not to perform at the ceremony. In response to the 2014 controversy, Joel Peresman told USA Today that the Rock Hall will change when they announce which members are being included.

"Going forward, we'll be more clear-cut from the beginning and more public about who's being inducted," Peresman says. "(The next time) we announce the nominees, we'll make sure to say, 'Here are the people being nominated.' “

The lawyer for Mark Andes in both cases is Francis Malofiy of Francis Alexander LLC.

Rock Hall Foundation President and CEO Joel Peresman emerged the shadowy back rooms of the Hall of Fame today to defend the selection process for which band lineups actually get inducted. Peresman spoke to Billboard primarily about the controversy surrounding the induction of just the original lineup of Kiss.

Peresman says that the decision about who to induct from any band is made by the Rock Hall's nominating committee as well as an adjunct group of "scholars and historians" familiar with specific inductees and genres. "This isn't chemistry or physics; it's not an exact science," Peresman acknowledges. "Sometimes there's an entire body of work up until (the artists) are inducted, other times it's a specific period of time that established the band as who they are.”

Examples of bands where most, if not all, of the past and current band members got inducted is much shorter: Red Hot Chili Peppers*, Metallica** and Paul Stanley’s favorite example, the Grateful Dead.

Peresman went on to talk about the decision to only induct the original lineup:

”With Kiss there wasn't one person here who didn't agree that the reason Kiss was nominated and is being inducted was because of what was established in the 70s with Ace (Frehley), with Peter (Criss), with Paul and Gene (Simmons). That's what put them on that map.”

Peresman adds that Kiss "is a unique situation where you have artists who wear makeup as part of what the band's about," but the Rock Hall felt that the later members -- including current guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer, who are wearing Frehley and Criss' makeup, respectively -- "are fine musicians who...basically have the same makeup and are the same characters that Ace and Peter started. It's not like they created these other characters with different makeup and playing different songs. They took the persona of characters that were created by Ace and Peter."

Paul Stanley from Kiss doesn’t accept that explanation. He correctly points out there have been many inconsistencies in the induction “rules.”

Nevertheless, Stanley says Kiss feels that honoring the other six musicians who have played in the band is "a very valid argument considering that there are people who played on multi-platinum albums and played for millions of people and were very important for the continuation of the band. And clearly when you've got a busload of Grateful Dead (members) who have been inducted and guys in the Chili Peppers who nobody knows who they are because they played on the very earliest albums are inducted...The list goes on and on of the inconsistencies. Now, I'm not pointing fingers at any of those people, but I'm certainly pointing a finger at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The only consistencies are inconsistencies and the rules clearly are there are no rules because the criteria for how and who gets in is purely based upon a personal like or dislike. And when I feel we're being treated unfairly, I have issues with that.”

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame continues to attempt to restore its questionable credibility and glimpses behind the facade with nonsense and half truths.

The truth is Joel Peresman and the rest of the decision makers refused to consider the induction of ANY former KISS members and specifically the late Eric Carr and Bruce Kulick who were both in the band through multi platinum albums and worldwide tours and DIDN'T wear makeup.

There is no getting around the reality that the Hall of Fame's favoritism and preferential treatment towards artists they like goes as far as ASKING the Grateful Dead how many members THEY wanted the hall to induct and following their directive while also including a songwriter who was never in the actual band.

Let's just accept the truth as it is and move on.

If the Rock Hall had used the strict “significant era” methodology for the Red Hot Chili Peppers (as they are with Nirvana and Kiss this year), they likely would have only inducted Anthony Kiedis, Flea, Hillel Slovak, John Frusciante and Chad Smith. Early drummers Jack Irons and Cliff Martinez probably wouldn’t have been inducted nor would current guitarist (and youngest Hall of Famer) Josh Klinghoffer.

It’s hard to justify special treatment given to the Red Hot Chili Peppers in the light of the all of the examples of smaller lineup inductions. The Chili Peppers first few albums are not more significant than Nirvana’s first album. The Chili Peppers most recent album is not more significant than Dio-era Sabbath or even Chinese Democracy. This is the precedent that Joel Peresman has established which will continue to anger future Hall of Fame bands as well (Pearl Jam will be an interesting one to watch in three years).

Unfortunately, Peresman didn’t address the recent news that Chad Channing was not being inducted with Nirvana or why Channing had to receive the news via second hand text message four months after the inductees were announced. Peresman also didn’t offer any details about the fast-approaching Induction Ceremony except for, "We have other artists, other inductees showing up and performing when they can.” In related news, there are 3400 tickets available for the ceremony on StubHub, with prices starting below face value.

* - It should be noted that the Rock Hall did not include guitarists Jack Sherman and Dave Navarro, who was with the band for five years during their superstar years.

** - Bassist Robert Trujillo had been with Metallica for five years and one album when he was inducted in 2009. It is also worth noting that Nominating Committee member Cliff Burnstein manages both RHCP and Metallica, so it is possible he may have had a direct hand in selecting which members were honored.

Chad Channing, the band’s former drummer who played on Bleach, had been led to believe that he was being inducted with the band as well. Unfortunately that is not the case. Channing passed along to Radio.com this text message that the Rock Hall sent to Nirvana’s management today :

Can you tell whoever looks after Chad Channing that he isn’t being inducted…  It is just Dave, Krist and Kurt.

So how did we get here, where four months after the inductees were announced, that a text message from the Rock Hall is the only confirmation of which band members from Nirvana are actually being inducted?

Ever since Nirvana was nominated in October, there has been speculation as to which members might be honored. Both Chad Channing and Pat Smear appeared on important Nirvana albums so it would not have been a surprise if they were included, especially given the record of previous inductions (see the Red Hot Chili Peppers for a recent comparable example).

So why is the Rock Hall intentionally withholding that information?

Tom Lane relayed a story from former Nominating Committee member Jeff Tamarkin, where in 1994 the Grateful Dead told the Hall of Fame that “all or none” would be inducted, so the Rock Hall gave in and put in all 12 members. Knowing that the Rock Hall has been flexible on this issue, Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons tried to negotiate getting additional Kiss members in this year by using their induction ceremony performance as leverage. The Rock Hall has thus far called their bluff and is moving ahead without a performance by the band, and disappointing fans in the process.

By drawing a hard line with Kiss, there is now a bright spotlight on the Rock Hall’s process for choosing which members get inducted. As with most controversial issues with the Rock Hall, they would be more respected if they were open, straightforward and consistent with their rules. Right now, as we have seen with Chad Channing, it’s the opposite of all of those things.

Future Rock Legends has learned that ex-Nirvana drummer, Chad Channing, will be inducted with the band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 10th. Channing will be included with Krist Novoselic, Dave Grohl and the late Kurt Cobain.

Channing was in Nirvana for two years surrounding the release of their debut album Bleach, but was replaced by Grohl during the recordings of Nevermind.

Chad Channing says he will be in Brooklyn for the Induction Ceremony, but has no plans to perform.

There is often controversy over which band members actually get their names on the Hall of Fame wall in Cleveland. The Rock Hall makes the decision, but doesn’t have any stated criteria for how they make the rulings or have any consistency from band to band or year to year. Look no further than fellow-2014 inductees Kiss to find bitterness and hard feelings over the decision.*

One could infer from their recent decisions that the Rock Hall tends to honor only the band members who were involved in (what they consider to be) significant recordings, although there are exceptions to that vague criteria as well.**

* - Only the original four members of Kiss are being inducted. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons decided not to perform at the Induction Ceremony because of the Rock Hall’s decision to exclude additional current and former members of Kiss.

** - Just last year, John Rutsey, who like Chad Channing, only played on a debut album, was NOT inducted with Rush.

We have previously written about the ridiculousness of the 50% rule here, here, here and here (4 years ago!).

The fact that the Rock Hall had left that requirement on their website for so long (and repeated it often) just shows their general indifference to the rules of induction, which ends up generating a lot of skepticism about the process. The Rock Hall doesn’t use an independent accounting firm to tally the votes like most major award organizations do (the Grammys), and never makes the voting results public (like the Baseball Hall of Fame does).

Q: Doesn’t the Rock Hall have any rules for induction?
A: Yes and no. For years now, this is what the Rock Hall claims is the criteria for induction (emphasis ours):

Artists become eligible for induction 25 years after the release of their first record. Criteria include the influence and significance of the artists’ contributions to the development and perpetuation of rock and roll.

The Foundation’s nominating committee selects nominees each year in the Performer category. Ballots are then sent to an international voting body of more than 600 artists, historians and members of the music industry. Those performers who receive the highest number of votes - and more than 50 percent of the vote - are inducted. The Foundation generally inducts five to seven performers each year.

Seems clear enough, right? The only problem is that the 50% criteria cannot be possibly be enforced when you predetermine the number of inductees.

Q: Why is that?
A: For example, there were 12 nominees for the 2010 inductions and they decided ahead of time there would be five inductees. Mathematically, it’s possible for none of the nominees to receive greater than 50% of the vote. So how can you have a rule requiring a certain percentage of the vote when you’re going to induct exactly five anyway? The 50% rule was meaningless then, and is likely meaningless now.

Q: Why is the rule meaningless now? They haven’t predetermined the number of inductees this year.
A: Take a look at our mock poll, which mimics the Rock Hall’s ballot process. Currently only three artists are polling above 50%. In a year as diverse as this, where there are only a couple of overwhelming favorites to be inducted, it’s very likely there will only be a few artists who appear on the majority of ballots, if any.

Q: So, if no artist gets over 50% of the vote, will the Rock Hall just cancel the induction ceremony?
A: Of course they won’t. HBO has a show to put on. That’s why the 50% rule is completely meaningless and should be removed from their website.

Q: If the only rule the Rock Hall has for induction is meaningless, then what rules do they follow?
A: Um… At this point, the best answer is that there are no rules.

Q: Why did they stop predetermining the number of inductees? That seemed like a reasonable rule if you ignored the 50% requirement.
A: Now that there are no rules to pretend to adhere to, the Rock Hall and HBO can induct as many or as few artists as they want to so they have an acceptable broadcast. For example, if the top five vote-getters turn out to be Procol Harum, Albert King, Donna Summer, The Marvelettes and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, would HBO be happy about an event where so many of the inductees were dead or unknown to a huge part of their audience? And let’s say Rush or N.W.A came in sixth. Isn’t it an easy decision to just go ahead and induct six or seven artists for the benefit of the TV show? Having no rules gives the Rock Hall a lot of flexibility.

Q: Who gets to vote anyway?
A: All 423 living Hall of Famers get a ballot. It’s unknown who the rest of the Voting Committee is, with the exception of a few nice people who go public with their ballots.

Q: But the fans get to vote this year!
A: Indeed they do, but it’s mostly a symbolic gesture from the Rock Hall. The top five vote-getters from the official online poll will be recorded on just one of the 600+ ballots and added to the total.

Q: Are the ballots cast anonymously? Who counts the votes?
A: The ballots are not anonymous. Joel Peresman, the Rock Hall President & CEO, admitted in an interview that they look to see who certain artists voted for, which could influence future nominations. As for who counts the votes, we’re assuming it’s the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation itself. Most award shows use an independent accounting firm to tally the votes to avoid accusations of impropriety.

Q: How many of the 600+ ballots actually get filled out and returned?
A: We don’t know, but would love to find out. We would also like to know the average number of artists voted for on each ballot. You can vote for a maximum of five, but some people vote for fewer than that. Unlike the Baseball Hall of Fame, the Rock Hall has never released any voting statistics.

Q: Didn’t voters used to have to rank their votes in order of preference?
A: Indeed they did, but it was never known why. The Rock Hall dropped that requirement a few years ago.

Q: When will the inductees be announced?
A: Last year, ballots were due December 5th and the inductees were announced on December 7th. As you can see above, this year’s ballots are due December 3rd, so the inductees should be announced shortly thereafter.

We were inspired to delve into this further after reading this recent tweet:

Are you kidding me? Only 4% of the inductees @rock_hall are women??! What can be done about that? #Cleveland

— Folk 'N Great Music(@FolkNGreat) August 26, 2012

Some additional data points:

• Of the 186 performers inducted, 31 include at least one woman (16.7%).
• There are 98 duos and groups that have been inducted in the performer category, accounting for 494 of the inductees. Of these, there are 36 women from 19 groups.
• Of the 88 individuals inducted in the performer category, there are 12 women (13.6%).
• There are no women in the “Clyde McPhatter Club” -- Hall of Famers inducted multiple times.
• In 1986, 1992, 2001, 2003 and 2004, no women were inducted.

It’s difficult to find a similar institution to compare to the Rock Hall. (For example, the Baseball Hall of Fame only has one woman inductee!) Another music industry benchmark might be the Grammy Awards. Their marquee award, Album of the Year, has included a woman 31% of the time (17 out of 54). This issue isn’t exclusive to music. In the U.S., only 5% of the art on display at museums is made by women.

After all of the “Women Who Rock” publicity last year, many of us thought that might inspire a more female-centric 2012 induction ballot. When the finalists were announced, five of the fifteen were women, a relatively high percentage by Rock Hall standards. But after the voting, and when it was all said and done, out of the 69 trophies handed out at the Induction Ceremony in Cleveland this year, just two went to women.

* - We haven’t been able to fully document all of the inducted members of Early Influence groups. This may be where the discrepancy lies between our total number of inductees. The Rock Hall lists 681 and we counted 685. The percentages of women remain largely unaffected either way.

See also: Heart wants to break into the “brotherhood”

Let’s take a close look at what Rose wrote and what he might be trying to say between the lines.

To: The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, Guns N' Roses Fans and Whom It May Concern,

When the nominations for the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame were first announced I had mixed emotions but, in an effort to be positive, wanting to make the most of things for the fans and with their enthusiasm, I was honored, excited and hoped that somehow this would be a good thing. Of course I realized as things stood, if Guns N' Roses were to be inducted it'd be somewhat of a complicated or awkward situation.

Since then we've listened to fans, talked with members of the board of the Hall Of Fame, communicated with and read various public comments and jabs from former members of Guns N' Roses, had discussions with the president of the Hall Of Fame, read various press (some legit, some contrived) and read other artists' comments weighing in publicly on Guns and the Hall with their thoughts.

Under the circumstances I feel we've been polite, courteous, and open to an amicable solution in our efforts to work something out. Taking into consideration the history of Guns N' Roses, those who plan to attend along with those the Hall for reasons of their own, have chosen to include in "our" induction (that for the record are decisions I don't agree with, support or feel the Hall has any right to make), and how (albeit no easy task) those involved with the Hall have handled things... no offense meant to anyone but the Hall Of Fame Induction Ceremony doesn't appear to be somewhere I'm actually wanted or respected.

Axl has a BIG problem with the fact that the Rock Hall decided, apparently without his input, which members of Guns N’ Roses got inducted. The Rock Hall chose to induct the original five members, plus Matt Sorum and Dizzy Reed. With the exception of Reed, none of those guys are still with the band, and Axl appears to feel his current lineup should be included as well. And why shouldn’t he? All he had to do was look at fellow 2012 inductees, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, to see that new guitarist Josh Klinghoffer is somehow getting inducted after just three years as an official member of the band (under the Trujillo precedent). Axl has worked with a bunch of different people since the mid-nineties, but there are members of the current GNR that he has worked with for over a decade now. The Rock Hall has recently been taking a much more inclusive stance with inductees, so why shouldn’t they be inducted? Oddly enough, the Rock Hall may have been waffling on this issue. They hadn’t publicly released the inducted members list, and only updated the Guns N’ Roses bio on their website this week to make it official. They could have changed their mind without having to backtrack.

Axl may have also had a problem negotiating the performance aspect of the induction ceremony. Don’t forget that when Van Halen was inducted in 2007, the negotiations about the song selection caused David Lee Roth to stay home. Rock Hall president Joel Peresman said this about the incident,“"We made every effort and the decision not to come was solely his, not ours."”Hmm… Expect a similar statement from the Rock Hall about Axl Rose to surface soon.

For the record, I would not begrudge anyone from Guns their accomplishments or recognition for such. Neither I or anyone in my camp has made any requests or demands of the Hall Of Fame. It's their show not mine.

Axl makes it clear here that he wasn’t trying to keep Slash or anyone out of the Hall of Fame.

That said, I won't be attending The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Induction 2012 Ceremony and I respectfully decline my induction as a member of Guns N' Roses to the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.

I strongly request that I not be inducted in absentia and please know that no one is authorized nor may anyone be permitted to accept any induction for me or speak on my behalf. Neither former members, label representatives nor the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame should imply whether directly, indirectly or by omission that I am included in any purported induction of "Guns N' Roses”.

Boom. There have been plenty of artists over the years who haven’t shown up to the Induction Ceremony (most infamously, the Sex Pistols), but this is the first time an artist has actually declined the induction. It appears that the Rock Hall is going to ignore Rose’s request and induct him anyway. The glass has already been etched on the Hall of Fame wall in the museum.

This decision is personal. This letter is to help clarify things from my and my camp's perspective. Neither is meant to offend, attack or condemn. Though unfortunately I'm sure there will be those who take offense (God knows how long I'll have to contend with the fallout), I certainly don't intend to disappoint anyone, especially the fans, with this decision. Since the announcement of the nomination we've actively sought out a solution to what, with all things considered, appears to be a no win, at least for me, "damned if I do, damned if I don't" scenario all the way around.

In regard to a reunion of any kind of either the Appetite or Illusion lineups, I've publicly made myself more than clear. Nothing's changed.

Yup, Axl really does hate Slash.

The only reason, at this point, under the circumstances, in my opinion whether under the guise of "for the fans" or whatever justification of the moment, for anyone to continue to ask, suggest or demand a reunion are misguided attempts to distract from our efforts with our current lineup of myself, Dizzy Reed, Tommy Stinson, Frank Ferrer, Richard Fortus, Chris Pitman, Ron "Bumblefoot" Thal and DJ Ashba. 

Again, sticking up for his current band.

Izzy came out with us a few times back in '06 and I invited him to join us at our LA Forum show last year. Steven was at our show at the Hard Rock, later in '06 in Las Vegas, where I invited him to our after-party and was rewarded with his subsequent interviews filled with reunion lies. Lesson learned. Duff joined us in 2010 and again in '11 along with his band, Loaded, opening in Seattle and Vancouver. For me, with the exception of Izzy or Duff joining us on stage if they were so inclined somewhere in the future for a song or two, that's enough.

There's a seemingly endless amount of revisionism and fantasies out there for the sake of self-promotion and business opportunities masking the actual realities. Until every single one of those generating from or originating with the earlier lineups has been brought out in the light, there isn't room to consider a conversation let alone a reunion.

Is Axl waiting for an apology? Do Slash and Steven Adler even know what they would be apologizing for at this point?

Maybe if it were you it'd be different. Maybe you'd do it for this reason or that. Peace, whatever. I love our band now. We're there for each other when the going get's rough. We love our fans and work to give them every ounce of energy and heart we can.

So let sleeping dogs lie or lying dogs sleep or whatever. Time to move on. People get divorced. Life doesn't owe you your own personal happy ending especially at another's, or in this case several others', expense.

No, fans aren’t owed anything. But it’s easy to see a giant missed opportunity and wish it were different.

But hey if ya gotta then maybe we can get the "no show, grandstanding, publicity stunt, disrespectful, he doesn't care about the fans" crap out of the way as quickly as we can and let's move on. No one's taking the ball and going home. Don't get it twisted. For more than a decade and a half we've endured the double standards, the greed of this industry and the ever present seemingly limitless supply of wannabes and unscrupulous, irresponsible media types. Not to imply anything in this particular circumstance, but from my perspective in regard to both the Hall and a reunion, the ball's never been in our court.

”It’s not me, it’s you.”

In closing, regardless of this decision and as hard to believe or as ironic as it may seem, I'd like to sincerely thank the board for their nomination and their votes for Guns' induction. More importantly I'd like to thank the fans for being there over the years, making any success we've had possible and for enjoying and supporting Guns N' Roses music.

I wish the Hall a great show, congratulations to all the other artists being inducted and to our fans we look forward to seeing you on tour!!

Sincerely,

Axl Rose

P.S. RIP Armand, Long Live ABC III

Guns N’ Roses fans were indeed hoping for a reunion, even it was extremely unlikely. Even the original five were never going to perform together at the ceremony, it would have been cool to at least see them on stage together to accept their award. Clearly, Axl Rose didn’t see it that way. Hey, it’s his legacy, he can do what he wants with it.

So, how will the Rock Hall handle the sticky situation of a GNR induction now? We know that Green Day will be doing the induction speech, but what about a performance? We don’t see Green Day covering GNR like they did for the Ramones. Our theory is that now that Axl is out of the way, Slash, Duff and Steven Adler can perform with Kid Rock on vocals. (Supposedly, Kid Rock and Axl are on the outs, so maybe Kid Rock won’t mind pissing off his old friend.) What else is Kid Rock going to do at the ceremony if he’s not doing some GNR songs? We’ll all find out on Saturday night.

In addition to Josh Klinghoffer, the other Red Hot Chili Peppers being inducted are: current members Anthony Kiedis, Flea (Michael Balzary) and Chad Smith; former guitarists John Frusciante and Hillel Slovak; and former drummers Jack Irons and Cliff Martinez.

Notably absent are former members Dave Navarro and Jack Sherman, each of whom were the featured guitarist on one album.

Although it may seem premature to induct Klinghoffer with the band after having only appeared on one album, it’s quite possible he could be with the band for years to come. In that case, it would be unfortunate if he was not included with the band in the Hall of Fame. It’s probably better for the Rock Hall to err on the side of inducting more people rather than few, although you do risk having extraneous Hall of Famers if things don’t work out. For example, what if the Rock Hall had inducted Van Halen during the brief Gary Cherone era? In hindsight that would have been a bit embarrassing. (No one has ever been kicked out of the Rock Hall.)

For some unknown reason, the Rock Hall continues to treat these decisions as classified information. They still haven’t publicly released which members are being inducted for Guns N’ Roses (Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff, Adler, Sorum and Reed), RHCP and the Small/Faces (Steve Marriott, Ronnie Lane, Ian McLagan, Kenney Jones, Rod Stewart and Ron Wood). And don’t expect to hear why Dave Navarro wasn’t inducted with the band, even though he spent five years with the band and appeared on a hit album with three hit singles. How much of that decision was the Rock Hall’s, and how much was the band’s? We’ll probably never know. Someone from the Rock Hall should stand up and defend these borderline decisions.

Uber-Springsteen fan Gary Dell’abate brings up the fact that the E Street Band isn’t in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Bruce. Van Zandt doesn’t personally feel snubbed, but he feels Clarence Clemons, Max Weinberg and the rest of the band deserve to be honored. What Van Zandt fails to mention in the interview is the fact that he is one of the key people responsible for making those Hall of Fame selections! Not only is Van Zandt on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominating Committee, who come up with the ballot each year, he is also one of eight members on the sub-committee which selects the Musical Excellence Award winners each year, the category in which the E Street Band would likely qualify. All of that goes unmentioned by Van Zandt as he tried to defend Howard’s claim that the Hall of Fame is a joke. Van Zandt only said he was a supporter of the Rock Hall.

Listen to the rest of the Rock Hall talk in the next section.

Bear from Cleveland Rock and Roll took the Hall of Fame to task for botching an opportunity to give something back to their biggest supporters.

I used to think about the administration of the Rock Hall as people with good intentions that at times just didn’t seem to get it and they would always seem to come up with an excuse for a mistake or failure but “we are going to make it better.”

Now I look at the Rock Hall as an organization that treats its membership as cattle.

…[snip]…

Okay Rock Hall, I’m going to give you some free advice. This is how you take care of your membership. This is how you grow. No matter what the event you have, offer the tickets to your membership first. If it sells out before it gets to the general public, oh well. Wow so simple!!!! Also make it that tickets are available in chronological order based on how long you have had your membership. Again so simple!!! If I lost out on something to the people who have been members for 15, 20, 25 years how could I be pissed off at them, they have been supporting the hall for years. They should get the first crack. Again a simple solution that would work. It goes back to my original question “Don’t get it or don’t care”, which one is it?

On December 19th, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation President & CEO, Joel Peresman, sat down with outspoken Rock Hall critic Eddie Trunk for a long radio interview. Here are some (paraphrased) revelations from the chat:

• Joel Peresman is not a member of either the Nominating Committee nor the Voting Committee. When Trunk repeatedly asked about famous Rock Hall snubs Rush, Kiss, and Deep Purple, Peresman agreed they should be in, but there was nothing he could do about it.
• Peresman’s involvement in the induction process is limited to administering the process and counting the votes. He claims he has no power to change the members of the Nominating Committee or change the induction process. Peresman implied the process is controlled exclusively by the Nominating Committee chairman (and Bruce Springsteen’s manager), Jon Landau. Peresman also downplayed Jann Wenner’s role in the process.
• Even if Peresman did have the ability to change the process, he wouldn’t do much. The only changes he mentioned were potentially expanding the 600+ member Voting Committee to include more young voters. When pressed about giving the fans a vote, he thought that was a possibility, but the fan preferences would only be a small part of the voting tally, similar to the Heisman Trophy system, where fans get one vote out of 926. Peresman said there was no way the fans would be able effect the nominating process. Peresman also brushed off the suggestion of term limits for the Nominating Committee members, or the possibility of releasing vote totals.
• Eddie Trunk continually pressed Peresman about the process, asking if there are so many obvious artists who should be inducted, or at least nominated, isn’t that a symptom of a broken system? Peresman admitted there are many deserving artists, but he feels the system is basically fine.
• Eddie Trunk asked Peresman about a rumor that he had heard directly from a Nominating Committee member, that as a condition of a Kiss induction, the band demanded some sort of financial compensation. Peresman flatly denied the rumor. Kiss was nominated in 2010, but did not get inducted.
• Peresman said the reason they don’t make the Nominating Committee members public, is because the members don’t to be hassled by fans. Peresman doesn’t have a problem with members acknowledging they are on the committee if they choose. (Of course, we have listed all of the members on our website now for years.)
• VH1 honcho, and Nominating Committee member, Rick Krim, called into the show to discuss the process. Krim acknowledged that this year was his third on the committee, and that he has pushed for Rush each year. He also has lobbied for Chicago, Yes, and Heart.
• Krim admitted he was unaware of how the nominating process worked the first year he joined. He also claims he had never heard of Wanda Jackson when her name came up at the meeting, but was quickly convinced she was deserving of induction. Jackson was inducted in 2009, and Krim was not listed as being on the Committee that year. (As Tom Lane mentioned on Twitter, “Shouldn't a Rock Hall NomCom member know about all genres of music, from the early days of Rock (and pre-Rock) to today's music? I say yes.” )
• Joel Peresman discussed that an artist’s influence on other artists was the primary criteria for the Rock Hall. He admitted to studying the returned ballots from the Voting Committee to see who past inductees voted for. He used the example of looking at Bono’s ballot to see who was important to him. He implied this could influence who gets nominated again.
• A caller asked Peresman about why the Small Faces and Faces were nominated together when they were two different bands with distinct sounds. Peresman admitted that individually they probably wouldn’t have been nominated, but it “made sense” to put them together on the ballot. (Sorry, Mr. Peresman, but that makes NO sense.)
• Eddie Trunk asked about the status of a potential Guns N’ Roses reunion at the induction ceremony. Peresman said he had heard from representatives of all five original members that they would be there. Slash later issued a denial on Twitter, “For the record, I didn't RSVP, or in any way commit to attending the RRHF. I don't appreciate people putting words in my mouth.”

Freddie King was one of the 15 performer nominees for the 2012 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction class. His name was on the ballot right between Joan Jett and Laura Nyro. His name was occupying one of the spaces on that ballot that dozens of other artists have been trying to be a part of for so many years and have been left out. You don’t think Deep Purple fans might have liked to see their name on the ballot there? They’ve never been nominated. Johnny Burnette & the Rock N Roll Trio? Nope. Stevie Ray Vaughan. Judas Priest. We could go on. The complaining wouldn’t be so loud if these artists ever even had a chance.

So why would the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominating Committee waste a space on the ballot for an artist who was going to be inducted as an Early Influence anyway? (More on that in a second.) What does that say to the Voting Committee members who used one of their five precious votes on someone who was already in? Are you kidding? Don’t you think most voters would have liked to use that vote somewhere else? We bet War, the Spinners or Donna Summer would have liked those extra votes.

This really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. The Rock Hall did the exact same thing three years ago with Wanda Jackson.

The reason the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is so maddening to some of us is not because of who is in and who is out (that’s an entirely different discussion). It’s that the Rock Hall doesn’t even respect a defined process for induction. What other institution makes things up on the fly the way the Rock Hall does? Maybe the People’s Choice awards? Say what you want about the snubs of the Baseball or Football Halls of Fame (or even the Oscars), but you can’t say they don’t follow a set criteria and rules for induction.

Since 2005, the Rock Hall has honored five performer inductees every year. Since voters could choose up to five artists on their ballot, there was a logical symmetry between the ballot and the number of inductees. But this year, even though voters could still choose only five names, the Rock Hall decides to induct six artists. Why? Was it because one of the inductees is deceased (Laura Nyro)? No, they only inducted five in 2006 when Miles Davis was posthumously honored. So why are they inducting six this year? It feels like the system is being manipulated for some unstated reasons. The Rock Hall is certainly at liberty to change the rules, but does it need to be in the middle of the game?

And then there’s the issue of inducting Freddie King as an “Early Influence” -- an issue that came up the last time this happened with Wanda Jackson. The Rock Hall’s definition of the category from their website: “Artists whose music predated rock and roll but had an impact on the evolution of rock and roll and inspired rock’s leading artists.” The key part of that definition is that the music “predates rock and roll.” The rest of the definition applies to all Rock and Roll Hall of Famers. Both Freddie King and Wanda Jackson’s important works did not predate rock and roll by any definition. Wanda Jackson was a contemporary of Elvis. Freddie King had most of his hits in the ’60s. So, again, has the criteria changed?

And while we’re discussing the ballot, why were the Small Faces and the Faces nominated together? Yes, they overlapped band members, but so have many other bands over the years. We joked about this on Twitter when the nominations came out, but are we going to see joint Rage Against the Machine / Audioslave nominations? Pearl Jam / Mother Love Bone? Should Guns N’ Roses have waited to be nominated with Velvet Revolver? These are ridiculous examples, but the Small Faces / Faces has now set a precedent for this kind of thing. Bizarre. (Maybe the Baseball Hall of Fame will combine the stats of all of the Molina brothers and put them in the Hall of Fame together.)

Look, when you call yourself a “Hall of Fame,” that means something. It should be something for artists to aspire to achieve. It should deserve respect from fans. But you can’t continue to erode people’s confidence in the institution by bending the rules and looking the other way when there are obvious conflicts of interest without causing damage to your institution. Take a longer view of things. The Hall of Fame should become even more important as music becomes less of a communal experience.

We’re already looking at artists eligible for the 2037 induction ceremony. Will anyone still care?

**The Chili Peppers were also nominated two years ago (prior to Burnstein’s involvement with the Rock Hall) and are clearly strong Hall of Fame candidates, and it’s unknown if Burnstein was directly involved in getting the band on the ballot this year.

This is not a new problem for the Rock Hall Foundation, and they likely don’t see it as an issue. They have been facing accusations of bias since the Rock Hall’s birth and have never taken any steps to remove that perception.

If the Rock Hall wants to get serious about improving its perception with the public, we have some suggestions to improve the induction process:

1. Term limits for Nominating Committee members (5-7 years). The prospect of new voices on the Committee would give hope for neglected artists.
2. Allow the Nominating Committee members to speak about the process publicly.
3. Publish rules for the nominating process and include something to address conflicts of interest.
4. Make the list of Voting Committee members public.
5. Hire an independent accounting firm to handle the vote counting like every other reputable awards show does.
6. Publish complete voting statistics. We understand you don’t want to hurt artists’ feelings, but they will survive. It should be an honor just to be in the discussion for the Hall of Fame.
7. Find a way to engage the fans. There are lots of ways to do this, but a simple way would be to create a fan vote for the last ballot position from four choices you provide. We don’t want the Rock Hall to turn into the Hard Rock Café anymore than you do.
8. Stop being so secretive. You should have publicized the fact that Cliff Burnstein is now on the Nominating Committee. Be proud of who you are and what you are creating.

The new idea is to change the charter so that it only takes 20 years to get in. That would move up a lot of acts on the ballot that are more current and carry some name value, which would be good for TV rights. Believe it or not, the following would then be eligible for the 2011 ceremony: Guns N’ Roses, Green Day, Public Enemy, Nirvana, Kid Rock and Smashing Pumpkins. Also a possibility right away: Keith Richards as a solo artist.

If the Rock Hall chooses to change the rules next year, it could potentially create the best ballot the voters have seen in many years. It would also make it much more challenging for often-nominated-but-never-inducted artists such as Chic and Joe Tex to get in.

Friedman correctly reported months ago that David Geffen would be inducted this year as a Non-Performer, so clearly Friedman has sources close to the Rock Hall's power players. In this report, Friedman's sources say that Wenner is only "considering" this rule change, so it's certainly not a done deal. It seems to us that the decision may not be finalized until this summer just before the Nominating Committee meets to determine the 2011 ballot. Stay tuned. In the meantime, we'll be preparing to update our database of eligibility dates...

Regarding the voting issue, the Cleveland Plain Dealer has the story:

In another curious subplot, Jackson is being inducted as an early influence, although she was nominated as a performer on the ballot.

When Jackson didn't receive enough votes to get in as a performer, she was singled out for induction by a committee that handpicks early-influence honorees, said Joel Peresman, president and CEO of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.

Sidemen inductees are selected by a separate committee.

So, presumably if Jackson had received the votes to be inducted as a "Performer," she would have been gone in under that tag. Then they would have either appointed some other early influential artist or simply not use that category this year (which isn't uncommon). As commenter Philip pointed out in the comments, other artists have been nominated as performers and later inducted in other categories (Carole King as a "Non-Performer"; King Curtis as a "Sideman"), but never has it happened in the same year. If Wanda Jackson was going to be inducted whether she won or lost the vote, then why bother taking up that valuable spot on the ballot with her name?

As to whether or not Wanda Jackson belongs in the "Early Influence" category at all, let's look at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's description of that award.

Artists whose music predated rock and roll but had an impact on the evolution of rock and roll and inspired rock’s leading artists.

Last week, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame announced its annual list of inductees. The news was followed by the annual list of grievances and complaints about those choices in the music business. This year, however, the opposition included a particularly high-profile and vitriolic voice, Courtney Love's.

. . .

Some in the music industry were upset that punk-rock and female acts were not represented in the winners' circle, but Ms. Love had her own ax to grind. Evidently not a fan of the New York Dolls, Black Sabbath or Lou Reed [nominees who weren't inducted that year], she lambasted the Hall of Fame in a telegram: ''How dare you fools not put Lynyrd Skynyrd, Patti Smith, or AC/DC in your Hall of Fame. Damn you to the darkest belly of the underworld. Stop.''

She goes on to demand that the items belonging to herself and her husband, Kurt Cobain, that are in the possession of the Hall of Fame's museum in Cleveland be returned: ''Any of my stuff you stole, I want back immediately. Stop. This includes any of mine or Kurt's clothes, guitars, or debris that you scavenged for. Stop. I hope that no one I know is ever inducted into your idiotic 'Hall of Fame.' ''

One wonders what will happen in 2011, when Nirvana, Cobain's old group, will most likely be inducted into the Hall of Fame.

Ms. Love concludes her telegram: ''You are a sham and you deserve Bush. Stop. He probably has the same taste in music as you.''

An employee for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame said the sentiments expressed in the telegram captured the true spirit of rock 'n' roll.

For the record, Nirvana can't actually be inducted prior to the 2014 Induction Ceremony and Hole won't be eligible until two years after that.

So much for Punk, Prog and Psych: with today’s announcement of nominees for the 2008 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame it becomes clear we’ve reached a tipping point from which a permanent downhill slide in quality seems all but inevitable.

. . .

I think there needs to be a better balance and greater deliberation put into the nomination process. Maybe lengthen the eligibility period to 30, 35 or 40 years instead of 25. Even better, why not have a two-category approach to induction whereby one set of nominees is drawn from the 25-year-criteria pool and a second set drawn from a 40-year pool of so-called Pioneers, thereby ensuring that deserving elders receive a more equitable consideration.

I wasn't even going to bother commenting about this. After the induction of Blondie and Patti Smith and the exclusion of the performance of David Lee Roth. But what's fascinating to me is the BLOWBACK! All over the Net, people aren't debating which of the nominees should get in, but who was LEFT OUT!

Donna Summer didn't go rock until '79, however much we love her, she belongs in the DISCO Hall Of Fame. Where Nile Rodgers and Chic should be enshrined also. Hell, want to honor Nile's production work with the B-52's, bringing them back from the dead, I'm all for it. But if it weren't for Ms. Summer and Chic would there have BEEN that bonfire at Comiskey Park?

And the Beastie Boys... Well, rap is a bit closer to rock than disco, but who's a bigger innovator... The Beasties or Alice Cooper?

I could go on and on about the unjust exclusions, but what's fascinating to me is the cabal which runs this rapidly sinking organization/ship/museum seems to have NO CLUE how they're f*cking it up/eviscerating all its credibility.

If there are no more rockers to be inducted, DON'T!

[E]nough is enough. After the announcement late Friday of the nominees’ ballot for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, there’s only thing to do: Hit publisher Wenner, who controls the Rock Hall, where it hurts.

If you love Rock and Roll, stop buying Rolling Stone until the tremendous insults of the Hall of Fame are corrected.

Wenner’s nominating committee consists largely of his current and former employees from Rolling Stone (Nathan Brackett, David Fricke, Jim Henke, Joe Levy, Brian Keizer, Toure, and Anthony DeCurtis). But they have little say over who really is inducted.

Friedman breaks out his laundry list of artists who have been snubbed, ignored, or forgotten by the Rock Hall, any of whom he feels are more deserving than this year's nominees.

Of the new crop, I don’t have much to say that’s positive. Madonna is a steamroller because of the cult of personality. She’s not a rocker, she has a thin voice and she doesn’t write her own material. But she’s a force of nature.

There’s no stopping Madonna when she wants something. Chances are good she won’t bring Steve Bray, Patrick Leonard, William Orbit and all her writers and producers to the stage. They are Madonna.

Chic is a fun idea with great songs, but it was really producer-writer Nile Rodgers and his partner Bernard Summers who made it work as a dance group. Rodgers should be in as a hugely successful producer of music by David Bowie, Ross and others. Summers can be thanked. Chic, however, is not rock.

The rest are totally off base given the above list. Summer was a disco act. For her to get in before Ronstadt is a joke. Mellencamp at least plays rock. But he’s a minor note in the genre’s history.

Afrika Bambaataa and the Beastie Boys: Are they kidding? Even the latter must be laughing. They had one big hit, "You’ve Got to Fight for Your Right to Party." The former, while I’m sure quite lovely, is a record-scratcher with a great name. Each of these belongs in a Rap Hall of Fame.

In 1987, Rolling Stone devoted a special issue to the "100 Best Albums" of the past twenty years. Critics were polled; results were tabulated. At the top of the list was Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Second was Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols, an album which sold less than one tenth as many copies as Sgt. Pepper.

The results angered Jann. Though he had never actually listened to more than a few minutes of the Sex Pistols' record, he could not fathom its lofty rank in the poll. Besides, he demanded, "where's Loggins and Messina on this poll? Where's Hotel California?"

When the magazine ran its "100 Best Singles" special issue a year later, the editor took matters into his own hands. He ordered music editor David Wild to put singles by his friends Billy Joel and Foreigner's Mick Jones on the list. Then Jann personally manipulated the tabulations, a puppetmaster jerking his subjects up and down the list. Thus did the deathless classics "Uptown Girl" (by Joel) and "I Want to Know What Love Is" (by Foreigner) receive the respective designations of 99 and 54, while Stevie Wonder's "Superstition" -- originally given the 6 rank -- languished at 73.