Finally caught up with this HBO special that started airing last weekend. I had DVR’d it to buzz through later but it was on Wednesday night so I stayed up utnil after midnight to watch it all. There were seven inductees: Peter Gabriel, Linda Ronstadt, KISS, Cat Stevens, Hall & Oates, The E Street Band and Nirvana. Here are my observations and lessons learned from this Induction Ceremony:

Want to know why it lasted until after midnight? I blame The E Street Band.  Bruce Springsteen did the inducting (he entered the Hall Of Fame in 1999) and HAD TO SAY AT LEAST 5 MINUTES ON EACH BAND MEMBER. And if you know The E Street Band, you know that there are a lot of them. Members include Clarence Clemmons, The Guy From The Sopranos, Bruce’s Wife After Julianne Phillips and Max Weinberg of the Max Weinberg 7. Plus at least ten more. After Bruce’s speech, the band came on stage and ugh, started to give speeches! The producer of the show wisely intercut their speeches with their musical performance. They must have spoken fast in order to get all the speeches in during a song, right? Not if the song was ten minutes long. My big lesson from The E Street Band segment was this: I don’t like long, extended jam-session-y songs. Yes, you are all great musicians but wrap it up, OK? Now it might just be that I’m not a Springsteen kind of gal. I love the song “Born To Run” but I might have to hack my ears off if Bruce and Co. decided that it should be Born To Go On And On And On And Oh Yeah Now We Are Going To Ask You To Sing Along And Clap I CAN’T HEAR YOU.

Chris Martin inducted Peter Gabriel and bless him, he tried to do some schtick. I get the feeling that Martin is that guy who every once in a while says something genuinely funny and people laugh so he thinks he can do schtick at the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. So it went like this: he read from the “Book Of Genesis” (you know where this is going) and the angel Gabriel spoke to Phil Collins and then made a bunch of bad Phil Collins puns. Yes, a Sussudio reference was in there. Thankfully, he got back on track and eventually Peter Gabriel sang “In Your Eyes” like he should.

The Linda Ronstadt tribute was the first of two segments with awesome women being awesome. EmmyLou Harris, Bonnie Raitt, Sheryl Crow and Stevie Nicks, all rocked out to Ronstadt’s ‘70s hits like “It’s So Easy ”, “When Will I Be Loved”, “You’re No Good” and “Blue Bayou”. And even though I’m not really a fan of Carrie Underwood, the fact that she wanted to participate gives her some points. This segment sent me back to being a little girl in Florida and hearing Ronstadt all over the radio. I’m sure my mom had an 8-track, too. I think it was the one where she was on roller skates on the cover. Because…the 70’s.

Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine feted KISS. He is an unashamed fan of the band and gave an enthusiastic intro to The Demon, The Cat, The Star Child and the other one I can’t remember. The Accountant? Something like that. What was weird about that segment was that they didn’t perform. They said their thank yous and then left. Actually the E Street Band could learn something from KISS. (Side note: remember when Gene Simmons was the villain in the movie Runaway with Tom Selleck and Cynthia Rhodes? Look it up!)

Cat Stevens was also inducted. Art Garfunkel made the speech and made it about him. It was kind of uncomfortable. He even said something like Stevens was lucky that Simon and Garfunkel broke up when they did so Stevens could have success. Not that exactly but man, it sounded like it. Then Stevens made a few remarks before performing. The only thing I kept thinking about during all this was back when the Ayatollah issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for writing The Satanic Verses and Stevens who converted to Islam basically said, “Yep, that’s what you get, Rushdie.” I always thought that was weird for a guy known for “Peace Train”.

Hall & Oates! Their video montage before their segment included a clip from Saturday Night Live of Will Forte as Hall and Fred Armison as Oates. Odd. Anyway, Hall berates the Hall Of Fame for not having more Philly acts and then they perform. Man, they had a lot of infectious, singable hits. And lots of hair back in the day. Not much more to say about this.

The Ceremony ended with the induction of Nirvana. I love Nirvana and just recently saw the exhibit on them at the EMP Museum in Seattle where, yeah, I took pictures of their instruments. Because it was Dave Grohl’s drum set! While watching the other night, Grohl made me say “Aw Dave, that was sweet” when he acknowledged the previous drummers of Nirvana that came before him. Did you know that he was the fifth drummer of Nirvana? I did because I saw the exhibit. Museums for the win!

Wow, Courtney Love was there, too. She hugged Krist Novoselic and Grohl like they never did go to court over music rights. I do love Hole’s first two albums (especially Live Through This which is a GREAT album and I will not hear otherwise) but Love is looking a little…pulled. I don’t get it. She’s not that much older than me. There’s no need. Why look like Barry Manilow? Sorry that was catty. Because she looked like a cat.

Let me try to redeem myself by talking about the best part of the whole show: the second set of Awesome Ladies. Joan Jett, Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth, Annie Clark AKA St. Vincent and Lorde all came out and sang Nirvana songs with Grohl and Novoselic playing. Damn. Who could ask for more, right? They all rocked it. Jett and Gordon are female rocker legends but I hadn’t seen Annie Clark perform before and I’m a fan. She did an incredible version of “Lithium”. She came out again as well as Jett and Gordon to play on the last song “All Apologies” sung by Lorde. Lorde was wearing a slouchy pink suit and she seemed very self-conscious. Then she closed her eyes and sang and did some “I’m really into it” movements. Then the song ended and she got awkward again. So my conclusion: Lorde before and after singing is my spirit animal. Here’s the thing. I’ve made fun of adults (especially guys in their 30s) who like Taylor Swift’s music. Well, I love Lorde. I have her Pure Heroine album and am slowly learning all the words. I first heard “Royals” in an Edinburgh H&M waiting for my friend to try on clothes because the airline lost her luggage. I thought, “Who is this?” Later I found out she was only 17 and I felt a tinge of hypocrisy but that quickly passed when I realized that Lorde’s songs are good and Swift’s are not. Boom! (Hit with your comments.)

Overall, an enjoyable (albeit long, Bruce!) show. Check it out this month on HBO.