Nominees For Our February, 2010 Election

Here is out February ballot.  Vote for up to 20 artists or groups.

Any artist or group named on more than 50% of the counted ballots will be inducted to The People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame.

The cutoff year for eligibility is 1961.  To be eligible, an artist or group had to have released their first single or album no later than '61.

Write-in votes are allowed.  You may list any artist or group not included on the ballot, and the vote will count, so long as they meet the 1961 cut-off date.  If an ineligible name is included on a write-in ballot, that ballot may be counted as a "short" (less than twenty) ballot.

Balloting ends at 12:00 noon PST on Wednesday, February 17, 2010.  Post your ballots in the comments section at the bottom of this post.

LaVern Baker
Hank Ballard & The Midnighters
Ruth Brown
Johnny Burnette & the Rock 'n' Roll Trio
The Cadillacs
The Chantells
Ray Charles
Chubby Checker
The Coasters
Eddie Cochran
Sam Cooke
Dick Dale
Dion & the Belmonts
Fats Domino
The Dominoes
The Drifters
Duane Eddy
The Everly Brothers
Aretha Franklin
Bill Haley
Screamin' Jay Hawkins
John Lee Hooker
Howlin' Wolf
The Isley Brothers
Wanda Jackson

(list continues below Etta...)

 

Etta James
Louis Jordan
Little Willie John
Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers
Clyde McPhatter
The Moonglows
Ricky Nelson
Roy Orbison
Carl Perkins
Lloyd Price
Otis Redding
Smokey Robinson & The Miracles
The Ronettes
Del Shannon
The Shirelles
The Supremes
Big Mama Thornton
Big Joe Turner
Richie Valens
The Ventures
Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps
Muddy Waters
Hank Williams
Jackie Wilson
Link Wray

Open Discussion: February ballot and voting

I think the first round of voting for the People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame went off wonderfully. We got 61 ballots counted when I was hoping for at least 20, and we ended up with seven very deserving inductees.

If I could do things differently, I would have allowed write-in candidates too (so long as they met the 1960 cut-off date), which would have eliminated any complaints of voters being restricted. While I don't believe anyone not listed on the 25 name ballot could have gotten enough support to get in this time if we counted the votes, I do like the idea of letting people do it because it points us towards who maybe should be a nominee that we might have overlooked for one reason or another.

I would like to make three changes to the process starting in February. The first is to allow for write-ins. As I said, an artist still has to meet the cut-off date (which will be 1961 this time around) for the vote to count, but all qualified votes will be counted. The second is that I'm expanding the list of nominees from 25 to 50. If that sounds a bit drastic, consider how many worthy candidates are out there already, with only more coming in big waves as we get into '62-67. With the write-in option, we're essentially opening it up to any artist who came up by 1961 but I still think a nominee list is essential. There is a certain prestige with "just being nominated", as they say, and I like to be able to give credit to artists and groups who may not ever get elected into our HOF, but still deserve to be honored in some way.

The third change is in the number of candidates we're allowed to vote for. Ten obviously won't make it from here on out. I think that if we kept it at ten, especially considering the expanded nominee list, we'd likely end up with even less inductees this time around. When we look at how many deserving artists there are waiting, I don't think that would do, and several of you have already expressed the same concern here and on the Facebook page. At first I was thinking that a moderate increase to 15 would be appropriate, but when I look at our list for February, I believe we should up it 20. The thing that convinced me we needed it to be at 20 was that when I looked at the list of February nominees I saw that the voting could largely split off into separate stylistic blocks, and one could easily fill a 15 name ballot with performers all from one or a couple of related sub-genres while completely ignoring another. The result would be a split electorate and less inductees. If we have 20 however, I think there's a better chance of most of the ballots showing a broader cross-section of artists.

So, to sum up my long explanation, I'd like to make the following changes:

• Allow write-in votes.
• Increase the nominee list from 25 to 50
• Increase ballot size from 10 to 20.

In the comments below, I'll post my proposed list of nominees. Please do not submit any votes at this time. The list won't be official until I post it again at the end of the month. I want to post it here so some of our diligent rock 'n' roll historians can have a look and let me know if there's anyone obvious I should be including.

Please feel free to comment on the proposed nominee list and/or any of the other changes I'm proposing. I plan on posting the ballot officially on one of the last days of this month.

Hall of Famer James Brown

James Joseph Brown

born: May 3, 1933, Barwell, SC
died: December 26, 2006, Atlanta, GA

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Jerry Lee Lewis

Jerry Lee Lewis
born: September 29, 1935, Ferriday, LA

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Little Richard

Richard Wayne Penniman
("Little Richard")

born: December 5, 1932, Macon, GA

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Bo Diddley

Elias McDaniel

("Bo Diddley")

born: December 30, 1928, McComb, MS
died: June 2, 2008, Archer, FL

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Elvis Presley

Elvis Aron Presley

born: January 8, 1935, Tupelo, MS

died: August 16, 1977, Memphis, TN

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Buddy Holly

Charles Hardin Holley
("Buddy Holly") 

born: September 7, 1936, Lubbock, TX
died: February 3, 1959, Clear Lake, IA

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

Hall of Famer Chuck Berry

Charles Edward "Chuck" Berry

born: October 18, 1926, St. Louis, MO

INDUCTED JANUARY, 2010

The Results Are In! Announcing the January 2010 Hall of Fame Class...

The first ever election for The People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame has been completed. 61 ballots were submitted from fans around the world, and seven artists were named on more than half of them, making up our stellar inaugural class.

In order to be eligible for this first election, an artist or group had to have released their first single or album no later than 1960, and anyone would be hard-pressed to come up with a better list of the seven most important artists from that era.

Without further ado, we present the first seven members of the Hall of Fame (vote totals and percentages in parentheses):

Chuck Berry - 53 votes/87%



Buddy Holly - 48 votes/79%



Elvis Presley - 44 votes/72%



Bo Diddley - 40 votes/66%



Little Richard - 40 votes/66%



Jerry Lee Lewis - 39 votes/64%



James Brown - 35 votes/57%



The following artists finished with 50% or less, and will be returning for another shot on our February ballot:

Sam Cooke - 30
Ray Charles - 27
Carl Perkins - 25
Everly Brothers - 24
Fats Domino - 23
Roy Orbison - 21
Gene Vincent - 19
Eddie Cochran/Bill Haley/Link Wray - 14
Screamin' Jay Hawkins - 10
Big Joe Turner - 9
The Drifters/Etta James/Smokey & the Miracles - 8
The Coasters - 7
Jackie Wilson - 6
Lavern Baker - 3

Nominees - January 2010 Election

The following 25 artists and groups are eligible for our first election. Vote for up to ten. Anyone who is named on more than 50% of the submitted ballots will be enshrined.

Balloting ends at 12:00 noon PST on January 20, 2010.




LaVern Baker
Chuck Berry
James Brown
Ray Charles
The Coasters
Eddie Cochran
Sam Cooke
Fats Domino
Bo Diddley
The Drifters
The Everly Brothers
Bill Haley
Screamin' Jay Hawkins
Buddy Holly
Etta James
Jerry Lee Lewis
Little Richard
Roy Orbison
Carl Perkins
Elvis Presley
Smokey & The Miracles
Big Joe Turner
Gene Vincent
Jackie Wilson
Link Wray

How it all works

We're about to embark on our first election, so there's no real timetable yet on how long balloting will be open. I think a minimum of 20 voters is reasonable before we can call it.

The list of eligible artists includes only performers who were eligible at the time that the Cleveland HOF voted on their initial class for induction in 1986. On each new ballot, we will include artists that became eligible in 1987, 1988, 1989, and so on.

Select up to ten names from the list of nominees, you can select less than ten if you don't think there are that many worthy candidates on the current list.

Anyone named on more than 50% of the submitted ballots will be enshrined.

The People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame

The People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame was founded in 2010 as an alternative to that big money tourist attraction in Cleveland.

The People's Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame will conduct our own elections on a mostly monthly basis over the next couple of yars to induct worthy candidates into the ONLY Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame for and by the fans themselves, without whom none of this would be possible.

About once monthly, the HOF will announce a ballot of eligible performers, and members of our voting body will submit ballots with the names of the groups and artists they think should be inducted. Anyone who is named on more than 50% of the submitted ballots will be enshrined.