The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted five more songs into their Singles Category this year, despite not mentioning them in a press release or the televised induction special. The lack of information about the category prompted reporter Troy Smith to ask the Foundation about it in October. When asked specifically about the category, the Rock Hall Foundation said, "it is something that we preferred to have done live, so we are skipping it this year with the plan to return it next year.” The Foundation seemed to have forgotten that it had in fact selected five songs for induction in 2020 (they were printed in the souvenir book), and shortly after their denial added the singles to their website without any official announcement, beyond a wordless Tweet from one of the Museum's Vice Presidents.

pic.twitter.com/tvte92hYyY

— Jason Hanley (@jasonhanleyrock) October 30, 2020

The five songs selected are:

• Irma Thomas - "Time Is on My Side" (1964)
• Junior Walker & the All-Stars - "Shotgun" (1965)
• Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs - "Wooly Bully" (1965)
• The Troggs - "Wild Thing" (1966)
• The Box Tops - "The Letter" (1967)

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On a recent episode of the podcast Who Cares About the Rock Hall? ceremony director/producer Joel Gallen was asked about the Singles Category's exclusion from the 2020 HBO induction special. He said that he had initially planned to include a short segment during a live ceremony, but after that was canceled, he was never asked to include it in the shortened induction special. Gallen was surprised to learn that the only premise of the category had been undermined in 2019:

Here’s the moment when the Joel Gallen (the Rock Hall ceremony producer/director) realizes the entire premise behind the Singles Category was undermined when an Isley Brothers song was selected last year. ⁦@rockhallpod⁩ pic.twitter.com/pM80YVXth8

— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) November 21, 2020

The Rock Hall has already said they are continuing with the category in 2021, but by the way they continue to treat it, they make it easy to forget.

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)

And lastly...

• 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.

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* - 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

The biggest news to come out of the 2018 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony was the introduction of a surprise new category honoring Singles by non-Hall of Famers. Nominating Committee member Steven Van Zandt was on hand in Cleveland to induct the first six songs:

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.

Van Zandt then welcomed the first six singles into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame:

• 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)

Three of the six honored artists have been on the Rock Hall ballot in recent years, including 2018 nominee Link Wray.

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.

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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.