Heroes of the Hall: David Bowie

Despite being one of the most innovative and consistent performers for almost three decades, it took the Rock Hall brain trust 10 years to induct David Bowie.

And when they finally did it, he had to go in with overbloated, overrated old-farts Pink Floyd, the important-but-not-that-important Velvet Underground and freaking Jefferson Airplane, which bookended its career by starting off using drugs to make their only good music and finishing it off with the insipid (but enjoyable in an evil-clown-kind-of-way) vehicle Jefferson Starship, which was shortened to Starship (see below right), and then Star, and then S.

Maybe the Hall voters kept Bowie out for so long for the very reason he's a Rock Hall Hero to us: He had the gnads to criticize the joint and the process, saying music shouldn't be treated as some kind of Olympic event.

"I think it's very nice, I don't give it much thought actually," he told Rueters some time before voters finally let him in.

"I don't really think I feel anything much. I just am very anti-institution, of any nature. I don't know ... Frankly, I don't know what it means," he told MTV.

Byrne probably wanted to burn down the house.

Why we really love the Artist Formerly Known As Ziggy Stardust? When the voters offered the proverbial olive branch and enshrined him in January 1996, Bowie flipped the finger and didn't show, leaving mega-douche David Byrne to induct him and hand his trophy over to ... Madonna. Hahahaha.

She opened her pinch-hit acceptance speech with this: "Excuse me David Byrne, but it’s also how totally f*cking gorgeous David Bowie is. Thank you. This is a beautiful man."

Yipes.

Yeah, you wanna mess with David Bowie, Rock Hall? Let's Dance, futhermuckers.