Judas Priest, Duran Duran, Pat Benatar Among Rock Hall Honorees
Duran Duran, Pat Benatar, Eurythmics and Carly Simon will enter the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as part of the institution's 37th class.
The performer category inductees will be further rounded out by rapper Eminem, country icon Dolly Parton and R&B singer Lionel Richie. Two acts will earn enshrinement via the Musical Excellence Award: metal giants Judas Priest and the songwriting and production team of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis.
For Judas Priest and their fans, the honor is a long time coming. As one of the most popular and influential metal acts of all time, their resume is untouchable. They've been nominated two previous times without receiving enshrinement. Their inclusion in the 2022 class should dampen - though certainly not silence - criticism that the Hall ignores too many metal groups.
Arguably the biggest story of the 2022 class is the abundance of female honorees. Six women will enter the Hall this year, as Benatar, Simon, Parton and Eurythmics' Annie Lennox will be joined by blues musician Elizabeth Cotten (receiving an Early Influence Award) and record producer Sylvia Robinson (receiving the Ahmet Ertegun Award).
Parton originally declined her nomination, though the Rock Hall confirmed shortly afterward that she would not be taken off voting ballots. While the country legend recently expressed worry that she would be "taking away from someone that maybe deserved it, certainly more than me because I never considered myself a rock artist," she said she would "accept gracefully" if she were inducted because "the fans vote."
In all, five artists in the 2022 class earned induction in their first year on the ballot: Duran Duran, Simon, Parton, Richie and Eminem, who was nominated in his first year of eligibility.
With any new class, there are also those nominees who were not voted in. Notable omissions from this year's group include Devo, New York Dolls, MC5 and Rage Against the Machine, all of whom have been nominees in previous years as well.
The Rock Hall tallies votes from more than 1,000 artists, historians and other music-industry professionals to select its class each year. The public participates by voting for their favorite nominees on the Hall of Fame's website, with the top five vote-getters then making up the fan ballot. Duran Duran topped the 2022 fan ballot with more than 900,000 votes, followed by Eminem (680,000), Benatar (630,000), Eurythmics (442,000) and Parton (393,000). Judas Priest came in a close sixth place, missing the fan ballot by roughly 30,000 votes.
The 37th Annual Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony will take place on Nov. 5, 2022, at Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles. The Induction Ceremony will air at a later date on HBO and stream on HBO Max.