Agreed.
Fair enough; in my opinion, Trick of the Tail and Of Wind and Wuthering are not as good as Nursery Crime or The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, but they are worlds better than And Then There Were Three. I actually had some hope with Duke, but ABACAB killed it dead, dead, dead.
Seconds Out was the best thing they did after PG left, but again, and this is my personal opinion, something happens to good musicians when they start thinking of themselves as The Lead Singer… It happened when Sting started thinking of himself as the lead singer who happens to play bass instead of the bass player who happened to sing and I think that’s what happened to Phil Collins.
I don’t wish to show disrespect to Steve Hackett, but I don’t think he was assertive enough to pull the band away from where the rest of them saw it all going.
And I love ‘Voyage of the Acolyte.’
So, I’m not trying to tick you off, and I’m sorry for stepping on your pet peeve, but for me, much of it comes down to Phil Collins.
And I even liked him in Brand X, which is why it’s a mystery how he became so poppy. Then again, in Brand X he was only the drummer, not a lead singer.
That’s about the time when their music started to suck, though. I much prefer their good songs with screech to their crappy songs without.
Prog rock, short for “progressive rock” is a form of rock music that decided to break out of the typical 3-chord, 3-minute song forms that dominated the early era of rock. Basically, it was an attempt to elevate the rock artform into something more creative, intellectual, expansive, complicated. Among other signatures of the genre, there was an emphasis placed on instrumental (technical) virtuosity; longer, more involved song structures that went beyond the verse-chorus blueprint of popular rock; an expanded harmonic vocabulary; rhythmic complexity (no longer bound to 4/4 or 3/4 of most popular music); and lyrical themes beyond sex, drugs, and rock & roll. Prog rock was, in a way, trying to bring the sort of respect that classical music got to rock, by creating a more complicated and more virtuosic art form. It has nothing to do with the presence or absence of keyboards, but they seem to be a favored instrument of progressive rock bands.
…or, more derogatorily, “Rock by Nerds.”
I kid because I love.
But really, depending on your definition (and FTR, I think pulykamell’s is pretty spot on), bands like Queen and Jethro Tull fit right now, the former of which is in fact in the RRHOF. I’ve heard the Who’s “Tommy” cited as one of the earliest prog albums and, certainly, “Baba O’Reilly” has prog elements (though that isn’t on “Tommy,” I realize). Two things I’d add to the above definition is prog’s tendency towards non-traditional arrangements (i.e. a couple guitars, a bass, and drums) and high fallutin’ concept albums.
I envy you.
Ditto.
I’d like to further the opinion that KISS should be in. Sure, their music wasn’t exactly excellent songwriting, but they did a lot to further the whole over the top stage show presence.
Although I don’t think that Gene Simmons is losing any sleep over it. I think I saw a clip of him once on A&E where he basically said “those guys can make me a sandwich”.
Though once they do get inducted, I’m sure Gene will launch a whole new line of t-shirts to sell.
He’s not an android, silly. He’s a Randroid!
I think ELO is at the intersection of the prog rock and arena rock genres. The problem with attempting to put every band into a single genre is that it simply doesn’t work. Too many bands span genres. You don’t want to make things too complicated, of course. Otherwise, you lose the value of genrefication. But you also lose the value if you oversimplify.
Are you joking? I was most definitely not a Rush fan until quite recently, but even I could name quite a few of their songs, tell you the names of at least two band members, and tell you that they were a Canadian trio who were renowned for their musical virtuosity. Anecdotal? Yes. But so is your assessment.
See astorian’s comments above about how well-known Rush is compared to many others that have been included in the RRHoF.
I totally agree. I call it Geek Rock myself. 
Canada.
If by “modest level of success” you mean “have more consecutive gold albums to their credit than any band except The Beatles, KISS, and Aerosmith”, then yeah, okay 
A matter of opinion, of course. Rush fans themselves are divided as to what the band’s best “era” is, and I myself am among the group that doesn’t care so much for their “synthesizer-dominant” period, circa 1982-1989. They unfortunately started piling on the synths around the same time I started getting into metal, and as far as I was concerned they’d gone all “new wave” on me (I was 16-17 at the time). I didn’t get back into them until 1991 when their then-current CD, Roll The Bones, was on the jukebox where I worked. That CD made me a Rush fan all over again. I eventually went back and bought all the CDs I’d skipped, and soon discovered that those “new wavey” albums are actually a lot of fun to play along with on my bass. There’s a lot of interesting stuff going on under the synths.
There’s very little question among Rush fans that their latest, Snakes & Arrows, is the best album they’ve put out in a long time. A lot of that can be credited to their new producer, Nick Raczulinek (or however its spelled). He’s much younger than them, and has been a Rush fan since he was about 12 years old, and the guys give him a whole lot of credit for yanking them out of their comfort zone.
Lemmy sez that he visited the hall of fame once, and he sez that the biggest display there was the souviner (sp?) shop.
In his opinion, it’s kind of corporate, commercial and anti-rock and roll by it’s nature.
I like to watch the inductions, and perhaps I’ll visit. I don’t, however, care if an act makes it there or not.
all these posts about Rush and not one mention of Neal Peart, arguably the greatest rock drummer of all time??!!
hell for that alone they deserve to be inducted, that mans drum work has influenced ungodly numbers of drummers over the years
See post #26, which I quoted in post #88.
Anyway, I would have said that Neil Peart’s mad drumming skillz don’t even need to be mentioned as it’s a given that he’s arguably the greatest drummer of all time.* But when you have people who think that Rush has had “modest success” and aren’t particularly well-known…well, I guess it does need to be explicitly mentioned.
You know, I really hadn’t paid a bit of attention to who’s been inducted into the RnRHoF and who hasn’t been. But now that I know–it’s pretty mind-blowing. What the hell are they thinking? What possible criteria are they using? It’s totally bizarre. How could they not include Rush when they include Run D.M.C.? Now, I absolutely feel that Run D.M.C. should be included in some way–they deserve an honorable mention or something for what they did with Walk This Way, and the way it influenced the world of rock. I mean, hell, even Geddy did some rapping in Roll the Bones! But to be inducted themselves? That’s ridiculous. I love 'em, but they shouldn’t be in there.
*I personally put Keith at #1. Neil get’s #2. Poor Neil.
It is kind of ironic that the Hall is in Cleveland, the city where Rush got their first foothold the USA.
What?
You are dead to me… and I don’t even like Run DMC.
Master Rik: I’ve always thought “Grace Under Pressure” was sorely underrated. Pretty much every song on it is great and the lyrics are, well, the lyrics are hilarious and ridiculously Rush-y. In fact, I’m listening to it now. All this “Rush in the RRHOF” has me all hot and bothered.
OK, what about Styx?
What about 'em? If you’re suggesting inclusion into the RRHOF, I’d probably start laughing pretty hard.
Beyond just sheer popularity, they have no argument, far as I see it. Including them forces you to include other bands that were simply popular without a whole lot of, shall we say, meat on the bones: Creed, for example. Boston. Linkin Park. I’d rather see Def Leppard in there than Styx, quite honestly. DL were shockingly successful, were my favorite of all the hair metal bands (with the exception of Van Halen) and, you know: ONE. ARMED. DRUMMER.
Oh, it doesn’t tick me off, don’t worry about that. And, you clearly have an opinion based on actual knowledge of the catalog.
I’ve just known too many people who have only heard the most saccharine Genesis songs from the 80s, and so approach Genesis with the idea that ‘Phil Collins sucks!’ without actually listening to a hugely important body of his work.
Kind of like if I listened to Wings and then declared that Paul McCartney was the epitome of what was wrong with The Beatles.
As an aside, I really only have “Selling England By the Pound.” I like it but am not salivating over it. Next Genesis album? Suggestions?
Lamb Lies Down or Trick of the Tail. Although, if “Selling England By the Pound” doesn’t do it for you, this era of Genesis might just not be for you.