If I Had An Official 2021 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Ballot, I'd Vote For....
It’s been well over a month since the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame announced its Class of 2021 nominees. As someone who follows and writes about the Rock Hall, I felt this year would be a crossroads moment in the history of the institution. Under new leadership, the landscape seemed wide open and quite exciting for the first time in a long while. Well, the nomination committee produced arguably one of the strongest and most diverse ballots in recent memory.
Last year I started an annual tradition where I cosplayed as one of the voters receiving an official Rock Hall ballot (for the record, I’m not a voter). It’s a great exercise as it only limits me to select 5 artists. Sounds easy, right? It’s insanely tough because you’re bound to leave off artists you like and make some difficult decisions. Taking a line from Ricky Nelson hit “Garden Party,” “You can’t please everyone, but you got to please yourself.” To be fair, 4 out of the 5 artists appear in the top 10 of my Top 100 Rock Hall Prospects Project, so it was a lot easier this year than I initially thought. I place greater emphasis on artists who I feel are the most worhty and overdue for induction. Well, here’s the five artists I’d vote for if I had an official 2021 Rock Hall ballot (in order):
Tina Turner: Upon the release of Private Dancer (1984), Tina Turner made the single greatest comeback in rock and roll history. She is the personification of empowerment, resilience and strength. It’s shocking it took this long for her to appear on the ballot as she is one of modern music’s most iconic stars. Given her recent health problems, I say give Turner every award imaginable and she absolutely deserves it. She might actually get the most votes from the larger voting body this year and she should. Nobody’s more deserving of a Rock Hall induction than Tina.
Carole King: If Carole King only released Tapestry (1971), she’d still be inducted into the performers category. Previously nominated in 1989 as a performer and swiftly inducted as a non-performer the following year (alongside her songwriting partner and ex-husband Gerry Goffin), King penned and performed the quintessential soundtrack for the baby-boomer generation. Songs of sorrow and growth, Tapestry is a monumental and game-changing album that’s preserved in both the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry and the Grammy Hall of Fame. Even after Tapestry, she made consistently excellent music and became a live concert staple for decades. Like Tina, she’s a no-brainer selection.
Dionne Warwick: Although she’s the reigning Queen of Twitter, Dionne Warwick is one of pop music’s greatest and most consistent hitmakers. She famously served as the muse for Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s greatest compositions and it’s some of the greatest songs ever recorded. She’s a brilliant interpreter with a keen sensibility to work in different styles and genres so effortlessly. Very few performers can do that and maintain the high-level of success that Warwick had done for decades. Warwick needs to join her other “Friends” (all of whom are inductees) in the Rock Hall where she truly belongs.
Kate Bush: An iconoclast in every sense of the word, Kate Bush pushed the sonic and visual possibilities of popular music over the last four decades. She has all the markers of someone who should be inducted into the Rock Hall: unique, innovative and highly influential. Bush’s impact on artists across different genres and styles is a testament to her status as a trailblazing originator. Even if she isn’t a “name” here in the United States, who cares. Bush is the type of artist that adds to the Rock Hall’s credibility if they value art over commerce.
LL Cool J: For the final spot, I’m going with someone who’s been nominated multiple times and just missing out on induction each and every time. And that’s LL Cool J. Arguably hip-hop’s first solo superstar, LL ranks among the genre’s greatest MCs with an ability to remain relevant when most of his contemporaries fizzled out. He might lack the same critical acclaim of his genre’s peers that are already inducted into the Rock Hall, but LL’s simply too big of a household name to ignore. To put it another way, it’s embarrassing the Kennedy Center honors LL before the Rock Hall. Jay-Z is thought to be a shoo-in (it’s hard to imagine the same voters who went with Biggie last year passing on the opportunity to induct Jay-Z; stranger things have happen but I doubt that will happen) and maybe those same voters will throw a vote LL’s way. It’s a gamble but it might work out in LL’s favor. He needs the votes and he’s got mine.
My last 5 cuts (in order): Chaka Khan, Devo, Rage Against the Machine, Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige
If you had an official ballot, which 5 artists would you select?
Thoughts? Comments? Let me know me in the comments section below and/or on Twitter.
