All 214 Artists in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Ranked From Best to Worst
This is a massive article, (at least it is all on one page) which it is impossible to present here in it's entirety. What I am going to do is post the bottom 10, with a brief excerpt from the article about that artist.
Music criticism can be fun to read, as long as the writer has good arguments for their opinions.
I looked through the entire list, but didnt read all of it. What he calls the top 10 someone else could reasonably and easily disagree with. Same for his bottom 10. etc.
But some of his comments are insightful and interesting, and maybe informative about the RocknRoll Hall Of Fame.
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http://www.vulture.com/2018/05/rock-and-roll-hall-of-fame-artists-ranked-from-best-to-worst.html
All 214 Artists in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Ranked From Best to Worst
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These are the acts that the writer finds the LEAST worthy of being in the RocknRoll Hall Of Fame, but are.
Bottom 10
text edited for space
205. Red Hot Chili Peppers—Flea, John Frusciante, Jack Irons, Anthony Kiedis, Josh Klinghoffer, Cliff Martinez, Hillel Slovak, and Chad Smith (2012)
Few things in rock irritate me more than how these critically unacclaimed frat-boy funksters with a palpable contempt for women cleaned up their image and started sucking up to the rock Establishment. Wan bits of off-pitch poesy like “Under the Bridge” became their respectability calling cards; today they are supposed to be naughty and street, but they’re safe enough to show up at a Super Bowl halftime, and probably lip-syncing, too. I know they can play their instruments; still a dink band. And with eight inductees! (The band’s manager, Cliff Burnstein, conspiracy theorists point out darkly, sits on the nominating committee.)
206. Joan Jett & the Blackhearts — Joan Jett, Gary Ryan, Lee Crystal, and Ricky Byrd (2015)
Of course one applauds the inclusiveness of this selection in an outfit that is too macho. And who doesn’t like her? But seriously: Jett never recorded a better-than-not-unlistenable album, much less a great one; her hits were covers; and live the Blackhearts were what? Decent? Jett’s another performer who has unquestionably benefitted from showing up to hall events in the past. (Irony alert: One of her covers was “Crimson and Clover,” a hit by Tommy James and the Shondells, who were yuge … and aren’t in the hall.)
207. N.W.A — DJ Yella, Ice Cube, MC Ren, Eazy-E, and Dr. Dre (2016)
I know Ice Cube is a formidable performer; he’s also the author of the dulcet couplet, “You let a Jew / Break up our crew” and an adherent of other anti-Semitic nonsense I don’t recall him ever disassociating himself from, much less apologizing for. I know that Dre is one of music’s most important producers; he’s also a guy who beats up women. And I know “Fuck Tha Police” is a great song; but I also know that its genesis came when Dre and Eazy-E were driving around Compton with a paint gun, shooting at people at bus stops — that is to say, ruining the clothes of working folks going to a crap-paying job to feed their lame kids. N.W.A is more than a footnote in rock history, but there’s not much to the group beyond their first album.
208. The Moody Blues — Graeme Edge, Justin Hayward, Denny Laine, John Lodge, Mike Pinder, and Ray Thomas (2018)
The Moody Blues were fine for what they were, and had quite a few hits above and beyond their ponderous, slow, numerous, and forgotten albums. The operation should just change its name to the Classic Rock Hall of Fame. Another Boomer nostalgia band getting the hall tongue bath to help push tickets to the Cleveland facility. Why the Moody Blues and not the Replacements or T. Rex? The Jam or Kraftwerk? Roxy or Gang of Four? Ian Hunter or Lucinda Williams? Laine, incidentally, whom most people know from his time in Wings, sang on the band’s first hit, “Go Now,” a cover. He was left out of the hall’s original announcement, but later added back in.
209. Kiss — Peter Criss, Ace Frehley, Gene Simmons, and Paul Stanley (2014)
Another band with two-and-a-half decent songs and many decades of pointless recording and touring. Today, they are not a rock band anymore, just a screechy PR operation in front and some guys who go through the motions of recording once in a while before going out on the road, which is where the money is. I suppose there’s some argument to be made that cartoons are a fine rock tradition, maybe starting with Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and proceeding to Alice Cooper, Kiss, and then — who? Marilyn Manson? But, is that the argument, that Marilyn Manson should be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Gene Simmons is so low rent his reality show makes Keeping Up With the Kardashians look like The Wire .
210. Rush — Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson, and Neil Peart (2013)
I take the point that both Peresman and Wenner made that the nominators work in good faith and the voting committee makes its decisions on its own. Still, it’s hard not to see this as the hall’s “We Need a Big Name to Sell Tickets for Our Annual Show in the Barclay’s Center Award.” (As far as I can tell from the hall’s tax filings, the concert brings in about $3 million each year.) Rush are unique among galumphy prog-rock bands in that they lack a single song (you know, like “Roundabout,” “Court of the Crimson King,” “Freebird,” “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway”) you could play for someone to try to convince them of the band’s import. These guys were inducted, incidentally, by Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters and his drummer, Taylor Hawkins, who performed similar duties for Queen; don’t be surprised if Foo Fighters are unexpectedly early inductees after they become eligible, in 2020.
211. Chicago — Peter Cetera, Terry Kath, Robert Lamm, Lee Loughnane, James Pankow, Walter Parazaider, and Danny Seraphine (2016)
So appropriate the band was inducted by Rob Thomas. Chicago was a self-indulgent, lite-rock ensemble known first for bringing horn charts into the mix, right around the same time as the Electric Flag and Blood, Sweat and Tears, and second, for a seemingly unending string of two- and even four-record sets in the ‘70s. You can’t argue with their hits — some quite sweet (“Wishing You Were Here,” “[I’ve Been] Searching So Long”), but most of them much more shlocky than they had to be. (Like “Saturday in the Park” [guess what that one was about!] and, get this, “Harry Truman” [guess what that one was about].) This is probably why, though they were by far the biggest American band of the 1970s, they never made the cover of Rolling Stone .
212. Journey — Jonathan Cain, Aynsley Dunbar, Steve Perry, Gregg Rolie, Neal Schon, Steve Smith, and Ross Valory (2017)
Journey is the ultimate guilty-pleasure band. “Lights” is a great song every once in a while, and I don’t mind admitting it: I like “Don’t Stop Believin’,” too. But a guilty pleasure by definition is when you like a song by a bad rock band. Journey were a third-generation prog-rock outfit–cum–not-so-supergroup, Pointless Division, populated by a bunch of comically dressed nimrods and sorta led by Gregg Rolie, who had actually done credible work in Santana. Then tiny, big-voiced Steve Perry joined, contributing an admixture of cloying sentimentality; it had nothing to do with what the band was about, but they took it and ran with it. They were inducted by… Pat Monahan, the lead singer from Train. Chad Kroeger had a previous engagement.
213. Queen — John Deacon, Brian May, Freddie Mercury, and Roger Taylor (2001)
When popularity is factored in, Queen is the most overrated band in the history of pop music. This preposterous aggregation looked and sounded awful from the beginning, their music a pastiche of pastiches of things no one in the band were inclined to understand, all of it culminating in “We Will Rock You.” Queen haters love to say the song is appropriate for a Nuremburg rally, but you can also sort of see Leni Riefenstahl giving it a listen, cocking her head and saying, “Nein. A little too much.” Their popularity in the U.S. went down quickly after their heyday, but they remained unaccountable super-duper-stars in the U.K. and in time became the rock equivalent to the beloved ugly toy you had when you grew up. Docked 30 notches because of this: After the band’s closeted lead singer, Freddie Mercury, died of AIDS, the entire rock universe held a televised tribute show, broadcast on MTV, during which mentions of homosexuality and AIDS were kept closely under wraps. The band (and everyone else at the show) let a new generation of vulnerable kids — and thousands of the unloved, dying alone on the streets — know that, yes, they should be ashamed of who they are. Thirty years earlier, the Lovin’ Spoonful, in one of the best songs about rock and roll, captured it this way: “Believe in the magic that can set you free.” By that wholly credible standard, Queen aren’t rock and roll at all and don’t belong in the hall of fame.
214. Bon Jovi — David Bryan, Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, Alec John Such, Hugh McDonald, and Tico Torres (2018)
The guys in Bon Jovi aren’t in a rock band. Bon Jovi are the guys in the movie about the rock band. All the members are good at their job; but however effectively they have postured toothless outlawry (“Wanted Dead or Alive,” as if), pouty naughtiness, and dangerous hairstyles, they have produced only one passable chorus in a 30-year-plus history, and that’s with songwriting help from Desmond Child . (If you like “Living on a Prayer,” “You Give Love a Bad Name,” or “Bad Medicine,” you like Child, not Bon Jovi. As with Aerosmith, Child should be being inducted into the hall with the band.) The outside songwriting help frees up the band to concentrate on things like hairdos, and marketing. Leader Jon Bon Jovi spent a decade trying to make himself a film star; the irony is that he was much better acting in the part he already had. Of late he’s been testing the waters in Nashville, following in the footsteps of Darius Rucker. In ten years he’s going to be purveying annuities on Fox News commercials. “Hi — I’m Jon Bon Jovi. And I want to tell you about an exciting new opportunity ….”
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I will comment about Chicago.
The writer says Chicago was soft rock pablum, but that is not how they started and were through their first 3 or 4 albums.
And they had one of the greatest guitarists of all time, the criminally under-recognized Terry Kath.
Kath guitar solo at 2:15
ABBA’s a punch line, and a remunerative one, but not a band that left much of a mark on history. Really??
Four totally talented people, two hot lady singers with heavenly harmony, had lots of hits in all kinds of genres, sold millions of albums, and are still very popular to this day.
One group that I didn't see on the list was, in my opinion, one of the best....Atlanta Rhythm Section, with their delicious distinctive sound, best enjoyed if your mind was altered a bit.
Amusing. Wish I had time to read them all. Kiss fans around the country want to meet this guy in a dark alley.
I guess he abandoned the criteria when he reviewed N.W.A, among others.
When you look at a list of all the members of the RnR Hall Of Fame, it is obvious that their "credentials" span various sorts of criteria. The writer of the article seems to think that only those who were "influences" on other later artists really belong, but that is just one man's opinion. "Fame" is not only a product of being groundbreaking, it is also a product of being popular.
To me, the main issue with the RocknRoll Hall Of Fame comes from how they decide what is rocknroll. Since the beginning the term "rocknroll" has included most modern forms of popular , or "pop" music. The Supremes are in the Hall Of Fame, but are they really "rockers"? But then the Hall Of Fame also has jazz musicians and blues musicians. Should say, Glen Campbell, be in the rock and roll Hall Of Fame? Given some of the other ones that are in, I would say "why not?" . Besides all his own pop hits he was a major session musician of the 1960's.
But there is no real answer to these things, just debates about it.
He has Billy Joel rated quite low.
One of the things I always really liked about Billy Joel is that his writing and performing spanned multiple genres within pop/rock music. He could write rock, and he could write stuff appropriate for Broadway. I also think Joel has always been an under rated singer. Among these 214 acts, I would have ranked him a LOT higher.
I so totally disagree with his list.. this is why I hate critics.. it's just one man's feeling about something that is subjective.
Btw..Billy Joel is da bomb. Gerrrr.
Appreciation of music is indeed subjective. (there are people I would rather see in the Hall Of Fame at all than some of those that are in the top Ten) but it is interesting I think to see what critics who have a somewhat encyclopedic knowledge have to say.
The author mentions War as a group that should be in the Hall Of Fame but is not. I have to agree with him.
Watch "Hired Guns" (it's a documentary interviewing back up bands / band members). When they got to Billy Joel's they all started as if he was great, but near the end they didn't have too many nice things to say about him.
But don't get me wrong, I love his music.
This alleged music critic is completely fucked in the head.
I totally agree with you!
Rush in the lower 10?
No way on the planet. What an idiot!
The guy who made this list is a damn grouch
A deaf grouch.
My list would not have Nirvana at #8 (they would be MUCH closer to the bottom) or The Animals at 138 (they would be much higher), Black Sabbath much higher than 144, Genesis higher than 173, Alice Cooper MUCH higher than 178.... Hell my list would look NOTHING like this.
Just my opinion as this article is the authors opinion.
Queen at 213?
WT actual F?
So, the author of this article seems like an arrogant wannabe that never suceeded at music, so he writes about it instead. All the artists listed have talents across the spectrum. Seems the author only has one talent.