Getting Into the Rock Hall of Shame

"...Ritchie Valens, singer of "La Bamba," who perished "The Day the Music Died" in 1959, also has no award. Neither do R&B groups The Dells, The O'Jays, or The Manhattans. Also missing from the Rock Hall's self-made history: Bob Seger, Alice Cooper, Mitch Ryder, Iggy Pop with and without the Stooges, the MC5, Jack Scott, Cat Stevens, Carly Simon, Black Sabbath, The Guess Who, Blue Öyster Cult, Electric Light Orchestra, Yes, Chicago, the Moody Blues, Jackson Browne, Linda Ronstadt, Carla Thomas, Irma Thomas, Sonny and Cher, Jimmy Webb, Paul Revere and the Raiders, Three Dog Night, Leon Russell, Randy Newman, Gram Parsons, Genesis, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Jethro Tull and Hall & Oates.

According to the Hall of Fame's charter, all of those acts should have preceded this year's crop by several years. Artists are supposedly eligible 25 years after their first release. Nevertheless, Paul Simon, Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson each have been inducted twice — once as part of a group, the second time as a solo act"