Judas Priest and Rage Against The Machine Didn’t Make the Top 5 on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Fan Ballot
Back in February, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame released their line-up of 2022’s nominees for induction. Included on that list were seminal heavy metal band Judas Priest and influential rap-rockers Rage Against The Machine. Unfortunately, the Hall of Fame’s fan vote has been tallied, and neither of these metal bands made the cut.
According to Blabbermouth, the fan vote leaders are as follows:
- Duran Duran – 934,880 votes
- Eminem – 684,237 votes
- Pat Benatar – 631,299 votes
- Eurythmics – 442,271 votes
- Dolly Parton – 393,796 votes
If you remember, Dolly Parton initially backed out of her nomination because she wasn’t a rock musician, leading Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider to singer her praises and Judas Priest’s own Richie Faulkner to hail her as “classy.” However, the Rock Hall then refused to take her off the ballot, and she has since told NPR that she would “accept gracefully.”
Apparently, the Rock Hall’s “fan ballot” that will be tallied with the other ballots when the 2022 inductees are announced in May. Says the organization’s officials:
“Nominee ballots are sent to an international voting body of more than 1,000 artists, historian, and members of the music industry. Factors such as an artist’s musical influence on other artists, length and depth of career and the body of work, innovation and superiority in style and technique are taken into consideration.”
So there’s a chicken-and-egg situation here. On the one hand, metal fans are dubious of the Rock Hall because it’s snubbed their favorite artists repeatedly in the past — so maybe they didn’t vote for Judas Priest and Rage, because they figured, What’s the point? On the other hand, if you don’t come out and vote in huge numbers, then it doesn’t look great for your favorite bands, and therefore they might not get inducted. Either way, with the fan ballot looking like this, it seemingly puts to rest a lot of potential metalhead ire about Priest and Rage not getting inducted. If you cared, you should’ve voted more, right?
Anyway, there you go. Good luck to those who topped the fan ballot; I’ll always rep some Pat fuckin’ Benetar.