2025 Rock n Roll HOF Inductees

[Buckeye Randy]

The choices have been made for the 2025 RnR HOF.  It's always a debate if chart success is more important than overall quality or being influential or even longevity.

The inductees with some of my comments.

Bad Company - A supergroup born from Free, Mott The Hoople and King Crimson.  Four top ten albums in both the U.S. and U.K..  I think they are the most denim sounding band ever and not very influential.  Bad Company should be the low bar to pass for future bands from the '70's.

Chubby Checker - Chubby didn't write any of the seven songs that landed in the Billboard Top Ten.  All could be described as novelty songs. He's the beneficiary of a catchy name and recording the definitive remake of 'The Twist'. 
 
Joe Cocker - Will this be the last Woodstock inductee?  Moderate chart success surpassed by iconic images and cover versions.  Leon Russell made this guy a star!

Cyndi Lauper - Cindi helped define MTV in the '80's and was on the cover of every magazine.  Only two albums made the Top Ten in the U.S. but she did have eight singles in the Top Ten.  Certainly influential.

Outkast - I don't have a problem with non RnR acts being in the HOF.  I know very little about the band but they were successful and influential from everything I've read.

Soundgarden - Three of their five albums landed in the Billboard Top 5.  "Black Hole Sun" was a video everybody remembers.  How many grunge bands will end up in the HOF?
 
The White Stripes - Considered groundbreaking and influential.  Three of six albums in Top Ten, "Seven Nation Army" is played by High School marching bands. 

[Saulaac]

Well spotted and thanks for posting it, Buckeye. That's an interesting list for SCD to mull over.

I remember @DJChameleon posted a big list of artist awards for 2025 but I don't remember which categories they were in.
DJ, is there any update on those awards?

[SGR]

Soundgarden - Three of their five albums landed in the Billboard Top 5.  "Black Hole Sun" was a video everybody remembers.  How many grunge bands will end up in the HOF?

Outkast - I don't have a problem with non RnR acts being in the HOF.  I know very little about the band but they were successful and influential from everything I've read.

Outkast were a special, special group. Their song "B.O.B. (Bombs Over Baghdad)" released in 2000 and had elements of rap, funk and R&B, and included a goddamn guitar solo and a gospel choir to end off the track. That track alone qualifies them as deserving to be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in my opinion, not even accounting for the fact that the song was prophetic of what the rest of the 2000s would bring. Those damn drums don't quit!

The track, along with their later released (and even more commercially successful) "Hey Ya!" would feature on many rock and pop stations. They were a certified crossover success.

[Buckeye Randy]

The track, along with their later released (and even more commercially successful) "Hey Ya!" would feature on many rock and pop stations. They were a certified crossover success.

I thought about the "Hey Ya!" video after making my initial post.

It's interesting that videos from early MTV days are cemented in my memory banks as are things from the 90's and early '00's due to the weekly VH1 countdown show. I have no current 'go to' source for new videos.

BTW, I've been to the RnR HOF in Cleveland a few times and it's a really good way to spend half a day with a fellow music lover.

[Lexi of the Dawn]

I went there in 2008 and had a fun time. I took these two pics during that trip.





My 19 year old ass posing like I'm the Jimi Hendrix of the air guitar. 

Edit: found another one.