2010 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductees

Filed in National by on December 15, 2009

The full list here. The Performer Inductees are:

ABBA
Genesis
Jimmy Cliff
The Hollies
The Stooges

Arguments around the internets include speculations about why Kiss did not make it after being snubbed (?) for so long, Red Hot Chili Peppers did not make the list (really?) and neither did LL Cool J.

I’m definitely down with the inclusion of Jimmy Cliff and the Stooges (who took a long time to get here!) and I have no idea if this Genesis is the Phil Collins Genesis or the Peter Gabriel Genesis (looks like the Phil Collins one — oy).

What do you think?

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Comments (38)

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  1. johnny longtorso says:

    Wow, Genesis. Their description down the page focuses on the Peter Gabriel years. I didn’t think any prog-rock would ever make it into the hall of fame.

  2. Eric says:

    I definitely believe that The Stooges and Genesis should be rock hall inductees and for the most part the composers inducted made very significant contributions to rock. The rock hall faces much scrutiny and from me it is largely for overlooking the great instrumentalists. Lonnie Mack, Davie Allan, Dick Dale and to finally Induct Link Wray!

  3. cassandra_m says:

    I’m pretty much gobsmacked by ABBA.

    I gather that Darlene Love was on the shortlist and I think I can see her inducted before ABBA. Also Nick Cave was eligible this year.

  4. John Young says:

    OK, insane. ABBA? It just isn’t a HOF without Warren Zevon. Also, If ABBA is in so are my boys Hall and Oates.

  5. Mark H says:

    John, I’m with you concerning Hall and Oates. The picture that the HOF is using is an old Genesis pic, so I’m assuming the its at least inclusive as far as the Gabriel/Collins years 🙂

  6. John Tobin says:

    I think Little Feat & Average White Band deserve consideration as performers.
    Nicolette Larson & Wendy Waldman as a “sidemen” for all of the backup vocals they did for people like Jackson Browne.
    Son House for early influence.A lot of his stuff is on Youtube to verify his influence.

  7. PBaumbach says:

    I was turned onto Little Feat by my freshman college roommate (from Virginia, nicknamed ‘the Hick’)–Waiting for Columbus, the album (no DVDs back then). Little Feat songs are on all three of my MP3 players.

  8. Bill Dunn says:

    How in the Hell did Genesis, The Hollies and Jimmy Cliff piss off induction committee enough to receive the humiliation of by being inducted the same year as ABBA?

    For that matter, tell me one redeeming quality to their music (and that’s a stretch in itself) to induct them (ABBA) in the first place?

    Why don’t we start a boycott the induction campaign unless they remove ABBA and add Little Feat & Average White Band?

  9. a.price says:

    “I didn’t think any prog-rock would ever make it into the hall of fame.” actually, Floyd was inducted in 1996.

    and ABBA? are you kidding me? everything they have every recorded makes me want to stab myself in the ears.

  10. cassandra_m says:

    The Average White Band? Little Feat is worthy, but AWB?

    While I don’t get abba, I remember that amazing list of essential music from Elvis Costello in Vanity Fair some years back includedan abba record and an interesting reason for including it. Wish I could recall that reason, tho.

  11. Geezer says:

    Floyd is called prog rock only because they never play a meter fast enough to qualify as regular rock. There’s nothing “prog” about them in the sense of complicated composition.

    Genesis is Genesis, meaning both lineups are part of the band’s heritage. The question now is, how can you add Genesis but not Yes?

    Hall & Oates suffers because their music is hard to categorize, but you’ll notice a distinct lack of blue-eyed soul in the Hall.

    There is no suitable excuse for not inducting Little Feat. No group was more respected by fellow musicians. Maybe the fact that Lowell George died young has some effect.

    ABBA belongs in the pop, not the rock ‘n’ roll, Hall of Fame. A. Price, save your ears; once you’ve got that bubble-gum music stuck to the bottom of your brain, deafness is no solution.

  12. anon says:

    I’m OK with ABBA. Good pop was always part of rock, and ABBA represents the peak of pop rock. I love a well made pop rock song as much as any other kind of rock.

    You could quibble that other artists should get in before ABBA, but who cares, this isn’t the Nobel Prize.

  13. anon says:

    Floyd is called prog rock only because they never play a meter fast enough to qualify as regular rock.

    Prog rock is usually characterized by sudden dynamic shifts and shifts in meter, arranged to tell a story like an orchestral symphonic composition. The best old Yes and Genesis is like that. Spacy sounds alone don’t make you prog.

  14. a.priceFLOYD_FAN says:

    “Floyd is called prog rock only because they never play a meter fast enough to qualify as regular rock. There’s nothing “prog” about them in the sense of complicated composition.”

    *fills with rage*
    Floyd INVENTED prog rock with albums like Atom Heart Mother, Ummagumma, and Meddle.
    And as far as speed, “One of these days” comes to mind. At about 160 bpm that makes it faster than Kasmir.
    You COULD argue that the Wall qualifies as prog rock based on the story line alone, but the music is very bare bones rock and roll (other than Bring the Boys Back home and the Trial of course) making it more of a rock opera….
    But, is Floyd prog-rock? Is Glenn Beck a crazy moron?

  15. anon says:

    a.priceFLOYD_FAN is correct… I tend to forget about those early Floyd albums. Never liked DSOM though.

  16. a.price says:

    you dont like DSOM? is it that you are adverse to perfection? or maybe musical bliss bothers you? I can understand not liking Animals (which i love) or Piper…
    jeeze i guess i just assumed it was common knowledge that Dark Side is one of the top 5 best things a human can experience.

  17. Geezer says:

    Sorry, AP, I forgot about the early Floyd. Which of course was not the Floyd that got them elected. They had to dumb it down for the Quaalude crowd. Which makes me wonder if Genesis gets in without the Phil Collins coda to their period of Gabriel-fronted brilliance.

  18. Let’s face it. There are plenty of inductees who shouldn’t be in the Rock Hall of Fame.

    But this isn’t like the Baseball HOF, where every statistical scintilla is examined with a microscope.

    If you’re commercially viable, you are electable, even if most of what you produced is dreck.

    Re ABBA. Music critic Robert Christgau summed it up best: “We have met the enemy, and it is them.” FWIW, if ABBA is in, then the Archies deserve consideration (they don’t).

    Genesis made a lot of shit albums before “Lamb Lies Down on Broadway”, and were merely Phil Collins’ band after Peter Gabriel left.

    Little Feat was a far better band than Genesis, and one of the best live bands I’ve ever seen. And Lowell George was with them for several albums. They’re really not in?

    Eric is right about instrumentalists. Everyone he mentioned deserves to be in. And, is the great N’Awlins sax player Lee Allen (Little Richard, Fats Domino) in?

    And Zevon’s not in? That’s an (wait for it…) OUTRAGE!!

  19. anon says:

    Look at the timeline:

    1971: Yes Album, Nursery Cryme (Genesis)
    1972: Foxtrot (Genesis), Fragile (Yes)
    1973: DSOM, Topographic Oceans (Yes)

    71-72 were the gold standard for prog fans.

    1973 was the year that gave prog rock its reputation for being pompous and overblown and started the punk/garage band backlash. The Ramones were formed in 1974.

    I didn’t start listening to any of this stuff until 1977 at the earliest, when I bought an 8-track double album of Nursery Cryme and Foxtrot from Woolworth’s for $1, not even knowing what it was. I played on my fuzzy modular stereo it in my bedroom in my parents house until it broke.

  20. a.price says:

    “Sorry, AP, I forgot about the early Floyd. Which of course was not the Floyd that got them elected. They had to dumb it down for the Quaalude crowd.”

    I kind of agree… DarkSide-TheWall is what got them in, but i dont think it was dumbed down.
    Musically, those albums were made better for radio play, but songs like Time were so far above the heads of the typical stoner Floyd fan. (the song is basically admonishment of people who “fitter and waste” their time doing drugs)
    I think Roger Waters took things conceptually in a direction that no one has every really appreciated…. that and most of their catalog (i.e Shine on you crazy diamond, the character Pink, Eclipse etc…) is a tribute to Syd Barret.

    speaking of prog rockers who SHOULD be in the HoF, why isn’t Rush in? (gosh, I love taking a break from politics to talk about the OTHER thing i have obsessive opinions about :p )

  21. a.price says:

    “1973 was the year that gave prog rock its reputation for being pompous and overblown and started the punk/garage band backlash. The Ramones were formed in 1974.”

    Waters spitting in a fan’s face on the Animals tour didn’t help much either.
    That is about the time disenfranchised rock fans rebelled and the Punk movement was born (only to be killed by the creation of the Sex Pistols)
    It is interesting to look at the direction Rap is moving in. The stars are getting more and more detached from the fans (lil wayne, lil john, lil whatever) and there are some very good rappers out there who reject what i consider rap’s “glam” movement. I think hip hop is in for it’s own punk-esqu revolution

  22. Geezer says:

    You’re right again: Not dumbed down but slowed down. I agree that a lot of the fans didn’t seem to appreciate the music on any kind of intellectual level. It’s the same thing that made me swear off Led Zeppelin at the height of their stadium-filling influence (didn’t last, of course). It reminds me of a refrigerator magnet my son has: “I love Jesus, it’s his fan club I can’t stand.”

  23. John Young says:

    Daryl hasn’t stopped: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlyvxSYTn1Q

    Also, Here’s how they feel about Blue Eyed Soul:

    Hall and Oates have always appealed to both black and white audiences. That’s led them to be dubbed “blue-eyed soul,” a tag Hall finds “very annoying. It’s made up by white people. And I think it’s inadvertently racist.

    “The premise is that you are an anomaly or some kind of freak of nature if you are a white person that sings soul music. A soul singer is a soul singer. There is no color involved.”

    Great article HERE: http://www.popmatters.com/pm/article/115097-hall-and-oates-have-gained-fans-across-generations-and-genres/

  24. Geezer says:

    Uh-oh. The Sex Pistols were overhyped, but I don’t think punk died immediately. The Clash wasn’t punk enough? And yes, I realize they were rooted in pub rock.

    El Som: Little Feat was a better band than most of those already in the HoF. They head the list of the overlooked.

    Meanwhile, WTF is Blondie doing in there? Even if you don’t like ABBA, they were the best at what they did. Blondie is just a bleached-out imitator of better bands that inducted before them.

  25. Geezer says:

    JY: Blue-eyed soul isn’t the same as regular soul, no matter what Daryl thinks. It’s not just white guys singing black music. Beyond that, though, H&O branded their music as “rock ‘n’ soul,” and the fact that nobody followed them down that path hurts their chances of election.

  26. John Young says:

    I guess Daryl would just call you a racist and move on along.

  27. John Young says:

    I agree with your rock and soul, pathway observation….it is that no one followed them down the path that, to me, means they should get in…..

  28. a.price says:

    Geezer, i dont think punk DIED with the sex pistols, but they were the record company creation that started to kill it (Dead Kennedy’s and the Clash did a great job keeping it alive for a few more years)
    I think punk is still around today but if you listen to the Casualties or the Exploited, you’d wish it was dead.
    I agree with you on Blondie. I’m sure there were hits other than “call me” but they don’t come to mind… and i can recall quite a bit when it comes to rock and roll.

  29. a.price says:

    I think it should be based mostly on influence. H&O IMO is a perfect example of a hit group that had no significant influence on future bands. I would say you dont even need to have been a major act to be important in rock history. Take the Yardbirds for example. They are the MOST important rock band that no one knows about (and the fact that Jeff Beck is not an inductee pisses me off)

  30. anon says:

    I agree with you on Blondie. I’m sure there were hits other than “call me” but they don’t come to mind… and i can recall quite a bit when it comes to rock and roll.

    The influence came in the NYC club scene in the early 1970s before signing any record deals. Blondie was quite the underground club band for a while. There were lots of bands like them, but Blondie stood out. Punk coexisted with glam rock for a while. And by glam rock I mean club bands like the NY Dolls, not Bowie stadium acts.

  31. a.price says:

    interesting. I did not know that about blondie. I shouldnt have used “glam”. I think i mean meant “Hair” Bands like Warrant, Cinderella, Poison, and Van Halen (late 70s into the 80s) that were all about showing off how much money, girls, drugs, bling etc they had. It set the perfect stage for punk to move to Seattle and incubate for a few years.
    Bowie Rules.

  32. a.price says:

    ok, so im seeing a lot of (well deserved) praise for the band. As far as influence he offers up the (what i consider a reach) lone example of Maroon 5…
    I’m not denying they were entertaining to their millions of fans, most of whom I’m SURE moved out of their parent’s basement and found love at SOME point. I just don’t see how rock and roll would be much different without them.

  33. John Young says:

    ok, ok, I know I am a fan, and I moved out at 18 never to return…..

  34. John Tobin says:

    How about Taj Mahal and both of the Winters brothers-Johnny & Edgar?
    Along with the Allman Brothers they all had an impact on making blues accessible to rock & roll listeners.

  35. Geezer says:

    So Blondie deserves induction not for its recorded output but for its underground scenedom? Spare me. Without them the already overrated New York new wave scene is different … how?