The 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame class features an array of acts often identified with other genres including George Michael, Missy Elliott and Willie Nelson.
Rage Against the Machine was probably the most rock of the seven inductees and they had been nominated five times already. Rock/pop singer Sheryl Crow in her first year as a nominee and R&B legends the Spinners on its four try as a nominee also made the cut.
And Kate Bush, the artsy experimental British pop star, got in in her fourth year as a nominee. It certainly didn’t hurt her cause that Atlanta-based Netflix show “Stranger Things” prominently used incorporated her 1985 tune “Running Up That Hill” into the show, propelling the song back onto the charts last year. It ultimately peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States and No. 1 on its global chart.
This was country star Nelson’s first year as a nominee though he has been eligible for decades and recently turned 90. (An artist needs to have released their first commercial album 25 years ago.)
Missy Elliott, a trailblazing female hip-hop icon going back to the 1990s, was also a newcomer to the nominees list, as was the late George Michael, who started with the bubblegum pop of Wham! before graduating to more substantial solo work.
Those who were nominated but didn’t get in were Cyndi Lauper, New Order/Joy Division, Warren Zevon, the White Stripes, Soundgarden, a Tribe Called Quest and Iron Maiden.
The Hall has greatly expanded its voting pool and has made a more concerted effort to diversify its nominations and inductions in recent years, expanding well beyond what is purely defined as rock.
In other categories, The Musical Excellence Award was bestowed to multiple nominee and R&B great Chaka Khan, Lynyrd Skynyrd manager and producer Al Kooper and part-time Atlantan Elton John’s long-time songwriting collaborator Bernie Taupin. The Musical Influence Award was given to DJ Kool Herc, a Jamaican American DJ who was instrumental in the development of hip-hop music in the 1970s and Link Wray, considered a groundbreaking guitarist in the 1950s.
The late “Soul Train” host Don Cornelius will receive the Ahmet Ertegun Award.
The ceremony will be held on Friday, Nov. 3, at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
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