{"id":611887,"date":"2026-04-17T01:07:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T01:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/611887\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T01:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T01:07:11","slug":"2026-class-mariah-carey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/611887\/","title":{"rendered":"2026 Class & Mariah Carey"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThis year\u2019s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction class, announced on Monday (April 13) is the largest in nearly 40 years. There are 18 honorees, the most since 1987 \u2013 the Hall\u2019s second year \u2013 when there were 22. This year\u2019s total includes eight inductees in the Performer category, a record five in the Early Influence category, a near-record four in the Musical Excellence category and one in the Ahmet Ertegun<\/a> category.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis is the sixth year in a row that there have been 13 or more honorees. In the eight years before that, it was in single digits every year.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohn Sykes<\/a>, who has been chairman of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame since 2020, has pushed for the larger class sizes. \u201cWe\u2019re still playing catch-up,\u201d he explained in a conversation with Billboard on Wednesday (April 15).<\/p>\n

\n\tSykes, who also has a day job as president of entertainment enterprises at iHeartMedia, Inc., readily concedes that his Rock Hall<\/a> duties entail more work than he envisioned when he signed on, but he clearly relishes the gig. \u201cThis has been an incredible, full opportunity for me to hopefully help some of these deserving artists finally get recognized. If that\u2019s what I get out of this job, it\u2019s something that money couldn\u2019t buy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSykes especially enjoys working with the experts on the Rock Hall\u2019s four nominating committees \u2013 the main one that selects the nominees in the Performer category and smaller sub-committees in Early Influence Award, Musical Excellence Award and Ahmet Ertegun Award categories.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI am just in awe of their talent,\u201d he raves. \u201cTo be able to just oversee it is a gift.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHere are highlights of our conversation, which has been lightly edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe size of the induction class has gotten larger since you became chairman. Is this at your direction?<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, it is my direction, because there\u2019s a backlog of deserving candidates \u2013 artists, not candidates \u2013 who were long overdue. We try to look at the ones that are glaring omissions, and that really, in many cases, should have been in a long time ago. Some of them are new, but for the most part, we\u2019re still playing catch-up. So, I don\u2019t think we\u2019re putting too many artists in, because if you look at the track records of these producers, writers and performers, it\u2019s remarkable. And so, I just think it\u2019s time to honor it.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

\n\tSadly, we\u2019re honoring many of them after they\u2019ve passed away. After a while, we will catch up, and it\u2019ll probably balance out. But for now, there\u2019s just so many that haven\u2019t been recognized. And I felt that it was time to honor them.<\/p>\n

\n\tCombining all four categories, this is your largest class since 1987. This year you had five Early Influence Award honorees, the most you\u2019ve ever had in that category.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition to the [main] nominating committee, which consists of 30 people that give us the performers that go out to the general voting group to be voted in, I also set up three special committee groups of six people, and I\u2019m the tiebreaker for each one of those. These are highly accomplished music executives and artists themselves, and they\u2019re the ones who decide and nominate, and then eventually vote in these categories. When you have this incredible group of committee members with such deep knowledge of music, it\u2019s amazing the names that they bring up.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen do you get the list showing how your voters voted in the Performer category? I guess that\u2019s the start of the process, and then, your committees meet and pick the other honorees to bring balance.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere is a little look at the balance, but these artists really are chosen on their own merits. It\u2019s primarily on their own merits. [That said,] it\u2019s very important to me that we always have that balance of all the sounds and genders that made rock & roll \u2013 rhythm and blues, gospel and country \u2013 and men and women. So, I do try to look at the final group, to see how balanced it is, because that\u2019s the core of how rock & roll was created. There is no one sound or one look of rock & roll. So that\u2019s what we try to we try to remind fans and the industry alike that rock & roll has always been a diverse group of artists and sounds.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn past years, some people who didn\u2019t get voted in in the Performer category went on to receive one of these other awards<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf you\u2019re nominated in the performing category, then you\u2019re not considered in one of the special committees [that year]. In future years, though, they could be considered for the special committee categories, because those look at not only their relevance and their power as a performing artist and songwriter, but their influence on other artists and the genres included.<\/p>\n

\n\tDo you call all the nominees in the Performer category and give them either the good or bad news?<\/p>\n

\n\tI try to speak to everyone, to really congratulate them on even being nominated. It\u2019s so hard to even get nominated. For many artists, that\u2019s the beginning of the process of hopefully getting inducted \u2013 getting on the ballot, and like Cooperstown or Canton, Ohio for football, it takes some artists years to finally get inducted, but they\u2019re in the conversation. Many artists who have been on the ballot but have been unsuccessful being inducted eventually do get voted in.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo, nobody finds out whether they got in or not in USA Today.<\/p>\n

\n\tWell, we try to [contact everybody], and for most of them, we do. We reach out and listen. It\u2019s like everything, it\u2019s like the government \u2013 there\u2019s leaks everywhere, and so some of the artists know before I know that they know, because someone has told them. Especially the ones with good news, it somehow finds its way to them. <\/p>\n

\n\tBut with the artists that are not inducted, what we try to say to them, is, \u201cYou\u2019re now in the running, you\u2019re now in the conversation.\u201d There\u2019s between 45 and 60 artists whose names are brought up in that nominating committee. Only 16 [17 this year] make the ballot [in the Performer category]. So just to get on that ballot is really a mark of success \u2014\u00a0and the beginning, hopefully, of being inducted.<\/p>\n

\n\tI was surprised that Sade got in on their second nomination. Great artistry, of course\u2014\u00a0but how is that rock, even with your new, expanded definition of rock?<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019m old enough to remember when we were starting MTV [in 1981] when I was 25 years old. Sade was one of our biggest artists on MTV. I firsthand remember how powerful she was for us at MTV, putting us on the map. Her music was loved by young people watching. That\u2019s when we were playing Duran Duran, The Police, Michael Jackson. It was a young channel, and Sade fit in beautifully.<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019m sure you see lists of snubs and surprises.<\/p>\n

\n\tEvery year, and you see them in the Baseball Hall of Fame and the Football Hall of Fame, and we see him in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. There are always surprises. There are ones that surprised me.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat surprised you this year?<\/p>\n

\n\tI really believed that Mariah Carey should have, would have been inducted this year, because I think she\u2019s deserving. But I don\u2019t run this by myself. It\u2019s a democratic system of voters. There\u2019s no backroom politics in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis is the third year in a row she has been nominated and failed to get in. What do you think the resistance to her is rooted in?<\/p>\n

\n\tI have no idea. I think she\u2019s a genius artist. She\u2019s written [18] No. 1 songs [on the Billboard Hot 100]. She\u2019s moved a generation of young people. I just think she\u2019s incredible.<\/p>\n

\n\tI think her enormous success, in this case, works against her. Maybe there\u2019s a sense that she doesn\u2019t need it; that other people could use it more.<\/p>\n

\n\tWell, like I said \u2013 please, please write this \u2013 I think every single one of those nominees is deserving. If you ask me for one that really stands out, I think because her first record was put out in 1990, 36 years ago, I think that she\u2019s deserving. But again, we have a very open voting process and it\u2019s determined by committees of music executives, writers, artists, and they make the decision, not me.<\/p>\n

\n\tHave you talked to her since the voting?<\/p>\n

\n\tI talk to her all the time.<\/p>\n

\n\tHow is she handling it?<\/p>\n

\n\tAll I can say is, I spoke to her about it, as I would speak to others. That\u2019s part of the process, and many artists have taken years to get in. AC\/DC [Class of 2003] should have gotten in earlier than they did. Neil Diamond [Class of 2011] should have gotten in earlier than he did. But that\u2019s the beauty and the credibility of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. It really is a group of your peers.<\/p>\n

\n\tIs it her decision whether to compete again in the Performer category next year? I assume she could be in line for a Musical Excellence Award. Do you present that as \u201cHere\u2019s a choice you have?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThis process is so grueling and so time-driven, exhausting, you don\u2019t even think of anything till the following year. I\u2019m so happy that this group was announced \u2013 all 18. I\u2019m so proud of these names. I wish other artists could be included. But that\u2019s the way we run the Hall. We just have a certain number.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s a process, it\u2019s a journey. And for many of these artists, getting on the ballot gets you in the game. And every single one of these artists, and that\u2019s what makes me most proud, deserves to be in and whether it\u2019s today, or five years from now, or 10 years from now, these are deserving candidates. I really believe that most of these will eventually get in, because this nominating committee takes this very seriously. <\/p>\n

\n\tThey prepare for this meeting for months, and they only have two choices a piece to present in that room. And you\u2019ve got to go into that room, and you\u2019ve got to sell it hard. You\u2019ve got to convince 29 of your peers why your two names deserve to be on the list. I always say it\u2019s a combination of intelligent conversation and WWE, because they go at it in these meetings. So just getting on the list is an incredible accomplishment.<\/p>\n

\n\tWould you ever release the names of the other people who were considered that year in the other three categories?<\/p>\n

\n\tNo, that\u2019s private. I have to respect the people who vote on those committees, because they\u2019ve worked hard to make choices. And sometimes there\u2019s a disagreement. This whole thing is democracy. They fight it out and the majority rules. It\u2019s very much like the performer category. If you don\u2019t make it in one year, you\u2019re not forgotten the next.<\/p>\n

\n\tGram Parsons and Ed Sullivan both died in the 1970s; Linda Creed in the \u201980s; Fela Kuti and Jimmy Miller in the \u201990s. Why do you think they got in now?<\/p>\n

\n\tI think we\u2019ve got to play catch-up. There\u2019s some glaring omissions over the past 25 years that we need to rectify. They came up with the names. I may come up with a couple names a year with these meetings, but I really leave it up to these committees, which are top publishers, record company executives, journalists, artists themselves. These people are very, very aware and have a very, very deep knowledge of music. It\u2019s amazing the names that come up, and when some of them come up, I go, \u201cMy gosh, how do we miss this one?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI thought Sullivan was a smart choice. I assume that was due to the Netflix documentary, Sunday Best, which reminded people of his significance.<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, it reminded people, but we were going to put him in last year before the documentary was released. But for many reasons, we wanted to wait for this year. We were going back-and-forth. He was going to go in last year, but because he had passed [in 1974], I think we were thinking we\u2019d like to get many of these inductees while they were still with us. [Editor\u2019s Note: Last year\u2019s Ahmet Ertegun Award recipient was Lenny Waronker.]<\/p>\n

\n\tIt seems to me that your main legacy in the six years you\u2019ve been in charge is broadening people\u2019s view of rock & roll.<\/p>\n

\n\tI really don\u2019t think I\u2019ve widened the aperture of rock & roll. What I hope I\u2019ve done is to return to the original ethos of what rock & roll is, how rock & roll was created, which was a collision of rhythm and blues, gospel and country. Somewhere along the line, rock & roll became rock and it became like white guys playing guitars. I\u2019m not putting that down at all, but that\u2019s one cornerstone of what rock & roll was.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou had Hank Williams, you had Brenda Lee, you had Mavis Staples. You had this wonderful amalgam, this wonderful collision, all the sounds. All I tried to do was to remind people of [that] when I took over. I wasn\u2019t expanding. I was reminding people of the breadth and the width of artists that were part of the genesis of rock & roll. A lot of people said like, \u201cWow, you\u2019ve really gone beyond rock & roll.\u201d I go, \u201cNo, we haven\u2019t. We\u2019ve actually gone back to look at the original incarnation of rock & roll, which was this wonderful amalgam of races, sounds and genders that created this this sound that is alive and well 70 years later.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDo you think Frank Sinatra could get in as an Early Influence? I remember Bono\u2019s speech when he presented Sinatra with a Grammy Legend Award on the Grammy telecast in 1994: \u201cRock & roll people love Frank Sinatra, because Frank Sinatra has what we want \u2013 swagger and attitude.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThat\u2019s why I\u2019ve got a great committee of 30 people. They could take that \u2013 they could take any name that they believed in \u2013 and sell it in that room. I leave it up to this team. Attitude is one of the cornerstones of rock & roll. If you look at Merle Haggard \u2013 who is also not in the Hall of Fame, by the way \u2013 talk about being a rebel.<\/p>\n

\n\tAndrew Unterberger wrote a great piece for us in which he said that one trend he saw<\/a> this year is the \u201980s taking over. He mentioned Billy Idol, Phil Collins, Iron Maiden, New Order, Sade and Luther Vandross as examples of artists who really hit their commercial and artistic stride in the \u201980s and concluded \u201cIt seems that after a long period of being treated as not as weighty for rock history as the decades that preceded it, the \u201980s has finally assumed default status as the Rock Hall\u2019s decade of choice for new inductees.\u201d Do you see that too?<\/p>\n

\n\tYeah, but that\u2019s what happened, because we had Rick Krim [chair of the Rock Hall\u2019s nominating committee] coming in, overseeing the nominating committee and working on the general voting committee. We basically, we modernized the fleet, and we put some younger voters in \u2014\u00a0because it was time we felt to shine a light on the \u201980s and these great artists, because we had spent a lot of time in the \u201960s and \u201970s and some artists in the \u201990s. We had kind of leapfrogged over the \u201980s. So, I think this year reflected the fact that we had some younger voters on the general voting committee that put in some of these artists that maybe would have not gotten in five years ago.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd if we do this, right, when you and I are speaking in five years, you\u2019ll be saying, \u2018Wow, the \u201990s are really shining.\u2019 Because my goal, my vision, for the Hall of Fame, is that the nominating committees and the voting bodies all evolve with the music that\u2019s eligible, because that way we continue to remain relevant. The moment we stop dead, we become the Old Person\u2019s Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

\n\tAndrew also wrote that \u201cThe induction of Queen Latifah and MC Lyte as early influences \u2014\u00a0after Salt-N-Pepa\u2019s entrance in 2025 \u2014 suggests that the Rock Hall wants to make sure these bedrock women rappers get in, without waiting for the voters to make it happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSome of these artists were responsible for the spark of hip-hop that changed the world, they changed the game. We just thought about the importance of hip-hop, the importance of rhythm and blues, and who are the artists that really inspired those that followed. Queen Latifah and MC Lyte, just like Salt-N-Pepa last year, really sparked a generation of artists.<\/p>\n

\n\tI have to give credit to the committees that I\u2019ve assembled now, because they thought just that way, let\u2019s start putting artists in while they\u2019re alive, while they\u2019re still young, relative to others. While we\u2019re not going to forget those that have overlooked in the past, like Gram Parsons [who died in 1973], like Celia Cruz [in 2003] \u2013 that there are some still living that have been around doing this for 30-plus years, that have impacted culture. So again, I think that\u2019s a credit to the committees we have now that are not just thinking about the deep past, but those artists who are still with us, who sparked a generation of those that followed.<\/p>\n

\n\tBilly Idol\u2019s guitarist Steve Stevens is being inducted alongside Billy?<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, he was part of the original Billy Idol band. He was only one to stay with Billy the whole time. So, Steve will get a statue, and he will be there.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis is only the second time that a collaborator has been inducted alongside a solo artist, after Neil Giraldo, alongside Pat Benatar.<\/p>\n

\n\tPat Benatar was very vocal that Neil was her partner in that band. I think that we\u2019ll be looking more towards that in the future, to look at [collaborators]. Their names may not have been on the album, but if they stayed with the artists for 40 or 50 years, I think, I think we would recognize them well.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo, you might be doing more of this.<\/p>\n

\n\tEverything is open for conversation. We\u2019ve got committees, and they fight it out. And sometimes I join the fight. Sometimes I watch. Because they\u2019re so smart, these committee members are so good and so convincing. It\u2019s amazing to hear them, hear them debate.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou have had seven or eight inductees in the Performer category in each of the last five years. You have a little more flexibility in where to draw the line in each of the other categories. This year, you have five Early Influence Award recipients, four Musical Excellence Award recipients and one Ahmet Ertegun Award recipient. I assume you could tinker with those numbers and get to your 18 total in various ways.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou know, it changes every year. I have no idea when we enter into the special committee meetings how many we\u2019re going to have. There are certainly names that come up. It all depends on the committees. They can outvote each other. They can argue against certain names or add names, but these are the ones that came out of the meetings. And so, there is no there\u2019s no quota, there\u2019s no number.<\/p>\n

\n\tIs this class your favorite of the time you\u2019ve been in charge?<\/p>\n

\n\tWell, the greatest thing about being a chairman the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is I\u2019m a fan. I\u2019m a fan of all of these artists and so many that are not inducted yet. So, it\u2019s hard for me to choose my favorite year, but there\u2019s always parts of each year that I go, \u201cWell, finally, they\u2019re getting their flowers.\u201d But there\u2019s never one year better than the other. This has been an incredible, full opportunity for me to hopefully help some of these deserving artists finally get recognized. If that\u2019s what I get out of this job, it\u2019s something that money couldn\u2019t buy.<\/p>\n

\n\tIs this more work than you envisioned when you signed on?<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, but, but you know Bob Pittman [chairman and CEO of iHeartMedia, Inc.]. We have worked together, on and off, since we started MTV. Together here at iHeart, my day job, he has been incredibly supportive of me taking over [the Rock Hall job]. He\u2019s on the board of the Hall of Fame, and I couldn\u2019t do this without his support and without Rich Bressler [president and COO of iHeartMedia, Inc.] and the rest of the company that allows me to do this. When I told him about the offer in 2020, he said, \u2018You can\u2019t turn this down. You got to do this.\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tAnything we didn\u2019t touch on that you\u2019d want to add?<\/p>\n

\n\tI would just like to make sure that it makes it in the story that we really walk into every year with an empty page. There\u2019s no backroom politics at this place. It\u2019s these committees that fight it out. So what happens is not me sneaking a name in there. I may suggest someone, but this is really a group of experts that I am just in awe of their talent, and to be able to just oversee it is a gift.<\/p>\n

2
\"Billboard
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This year\u2019s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction class, announced on Monday (April 13) is the largest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":611888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[64,63,1703,134,7448,136,43543],"class_list":{"0":"post-611887","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-awards","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-genre-rock","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-rock-hall"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=611887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/611888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=611887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=611887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=611887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}