Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2025 led by Soundgarden, Cyndi Lauper… and surprise inductee Salt-N-Pepa — but no Mariah Carey

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2025 inductees were announced Sunday during a live, Rock Hall-themed American Idol episode mentored by James Taylor, and while the Performer category includes six artists that Gold Derby predicted correctly, the overall class still features some surprises.

This year’s Performer inductees are arena-rockers Bad Company, dance-craze pioneer Chubby Checker, late British blues belter Joe Cocker, pop diva Cyndi Lauper, Southern rap pioneers Outkast, grunge heroes Soundgarden, and Detroit garage-rock duo the White Stripes. Bad Company, Checker, and Outkast are all first-time nominees; Lauper, the Stripes, and Soundgarden were all on the 2023 ballot, and Soundgarden were also previously nominated in 2020.

The nominated artists passed over this year were the Black Crowes, Mariah Carey, Billy Idol, Joy Division/New Order, Maná, Oasis, and Phish. The snubs of previous nominees Carey, Joy Division/New Order, and Oasis are somewhat surprising, but the biggest shocker, or at least the omission that will likely rile up a certain fandom the most, is Phish. The beloved jam band (who this weekend headlined three shows at the Hollywood Bowl, only two miles away from the TV studio where American Idol is taped) had topped the fan vote leaderboard by a whopping 330,000 votes, the second-biggest margin in Rock Hall history. While the fan vote technically doesn’t have much impact on the official Hall results — it counts as exactly one ballot vote, total, among the 1,200 ballots cast by music industry insiders — it is still interesting that the ongoing fan vote tally, which was viewable daily on the Hall’s website, didn’t seem to influence those 1,200 professionals’ decisions. (Billy Idol placed third on the leaderboard.)

The more delightful surprise this year is the Musical Influence Award, a committee-determined category that recognizes “artists whose music and performance style have directly influenced, inspired, and evolved rock ’n’ roll and music impacting culture.” The 2025 Musical Influence honor will go to late singer-songwriter Warren Zevon and hip-hop group Salt-N-Pepa. Zevon has long been considered one of the Hall’s most egregious snubs (he was nominated only once, in 2023, and didn’t get in despite a letter-writing campaign led by Billy Joel and David Letterman), but even more surprisingly, Salt-N-Pepa have actually never been nominated. Salt-N-Pepa’s name was mentioned often two years ago, when Missy Elliott became the first female rapper to be inducted by the Hall before many women who had been in the hip-hop game longer. Salt-N-Pepa will now become the first female hip-hop group to enter the Hall, and only the second female hip-hop inductee overall.

Salt-N-Pepa’s inclusion is also good news in light of the fact that there are so few female inductees this year — in the Performer category, there is only Lauper and the White Stripes’ Meg White. The only other female honoree is legendary Wrecking Crew bassist Carol Kaye, who is receiving the committee-elected Musical Excellence Award, which goes to “artists, musicians, songwriters, and producers whose originality and influence have had a dramatic impact on music.”

This year’s other two (posthumous) Musical Excellence Award recipients are Philadelphia soul producer/arranger/songwriter Thom Bell and British keyboardist Nicky Hopkins, while the Ahmet Ertegun Award, which recognizes non-performing industry professionals, will go to veteran record producer and label executive Lenny Waronker.

“Each of these inductees created their own sound and attitude that had a profound impact on culture and helped to change the course of rock ‘n’ roll forever,” Rock Hall chairman John Sykes stated Sunday. “Their music gave a voice to generations and influenced countless artists that followed in their footsteps.”

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2025 induction ceremony will take place Nov. 8 at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles and will stream live on Disney+, with an edited special airing at a later date on ABC and Hulu.