Rock & Roll Hall of Fame continues to challenge ignorant definitions of ‘rock and roll’

Beyonce and Jay-Z "On the Run II" Tour - Houston

Jay-Z becomes the latest high-profile hip hop artist to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.Getty Images for Parkwood Entert

CLEVELAND, Ohio – There’s a common thread that comes with the headlines announcing the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s Class of 2021. Many have inductee Jay-Z, one of the biggest names in music for the last 25 years, near the front.

That’s led to some complaints in comment sections and on social media by “rock” purists pushing the same ignorant criticism they have for more than a decade: “Hip hop isn’t rock and roll!”

It only gets louder once they find out rap legend LL Cool J and jazz-poet Gil Scott-Heron are being inducted as well. Some even go as far as to suggest the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame change its name to the Music Hall of Fame.

This sort of thing has gone on since the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame began inducting hip hop acts in 2007. The debate over what constitutes rock and roll has become a heated pastime with music fans.

Merriam-Webster defines “rock and roll” as “popular music usually played on electronically amplified instruments and characterized by a persistent heavily accented beat, repetition of simple phrases, and often country, folk, and blues elements.”

You could probably pick and choose elements from that definition that benefit whatever side of the argument you sit on. To truly understand what rock and roll is, you need to examine how the art form began and how it has evolved.

The origins of rock and roll date back to the late 1940s. The genre grew out of various other genres such as gospel, jazz, blues, boogie-woogie, rhythm and blues and country music.

From its inception, rock and roll was an expansive genre that pushed boundaries, defied classification and influenced various aspects of popular culture, from fashion to politics to language. This calls to mind the definition Ice Cube gave for rock and roll when his rap group N.W.A. was inducted in 2016:

“The question is are we rock ‘n’ roll?” Ice Cube said. “Rock ‘n’ roll is not an instrument. Rock ‘n’ roll is not even a style of music. Rock ‘n’ roll is a spirit...Rock ‘n’ roll is not conforming. Rock ‘n’ roll is outside the box, and rock ‘n’ roll is N.W.A.”

Ice Cube was defining rock and roll as a vibe, a feeling that can’t necessarily be quantified. But there are technical aspects of the music that back up his argument.

The rock and roll pioneers of the 1950s took elements of other genres, especially blues, to create something refreshing and edgier, but still a lot of fun. The earliest image one might have of rock and roll is that of Chuck Berry and his guitar. With the release of songs like “Maybellene” and “Johnny B. Goode,” the instrument became synonymous with this new genre.

However, the chords on “Johnny B. Goode” and other early rock and roll songs were based around jump blues, which was played on a piano. The guitar is an awesome instrument. But rock and roll was never beholden to one device. Fats Domino, Pete Johnson, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and other artists had just as much to say about the genre’s formation as Berry.

Berry’s status as the man who invented rock and roll also shows that the genre and hip hop have a key thing in common: Neither would exist without the blues. In fact, you could argue hip hop’s connection to the blues runs even deeper from a cultural and thematic standpoint. If you can’t draw line from blues – an art form whose origins date back to the 16th-century slave trade – to the music of Tupac Shakur, Jay-Z and Kendrick Lamar, you’re not looking hard enough.

When you connect the dots between all of these genres, you’re left with something similar to a family tree. And this is the construct the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame works with. If rock and roll is the trunk of the tree and genres like blues, jazz, gospel and country the roots, hip hop rightfully takes its place in the branches alongside genres like heavy metal, punk, new wave, alternative and progressive.

If Jay-Z isn’t rock and roll, is Nine Inch Nails? If LL Cool J doesn’t belong in the Rock Hall, does Depeche Mode?

In my experience, most of the people who have a problem with hip hop being in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame stopped listening to new music after the classic-rock era that ran from the mid-1960s to the 1980s.

It was during that time that “rock” replaced rock and roll. Never mind that, structurally, they’re different. Rock as it was called was all about hard sounds and the upbeat. Rock and roll was built around the downbeat as something you could dance to.

Rock and roll became that teen fad that consumed the 1950s. “Rock” was more sophisticated and cool. “Rock” was Led Zeppelin. “Rock” was The Rolling Stones. And, unfortunately, “rock” was confined to the image of a white guy with a guitar.

For all the criticism it gets, the beauty of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is that it’s remained true to the origins of rock and roll even if some of the fans got lost along the way. Rock and roll was created as something meant to evolve and become wide-ranging with a boundless worldview. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame should be praised for keeping it that way.

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