At the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, lovefests ranged from Carole King reciprocating Taylor Swift’s love to Drew Barrymore on the Go-Go’s.
At the 36th annual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony Saturday night — which marking the return of the event to a live setting in Cleveland, after last year’s strictly virtual edition — there were plenty of surprises among the performance choices, which included Taylor Swift opening the show with Carole King’s “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” and Paul McCartney and Foo Fighters closing it with “Get Back.” Among those unexpectedly joining jams were Eminem and Jennifer Lopez for LL Cool J, and Keith Urban filling in for Bryan Adams in a Tina Turner medley. Among speeches, the intrigue included Dave Chappelle in person and Barack Obama on tape helping to induct Jay-Z. The class of 2021 was being honored at Cleveland’s 12,000-capacity Rocket Mortgage Financial Fieldhouse in Cleveland, ushering Carole King, LL Cool J, the Go-Go’s, Tina Turner, Todd Rundgren, Randy Rhoads, Gil Scott-Heron, Kraftwerk, Billy Preston, Charley Patton and music executive Clarence Avent into the hall. While the action was plentiful on stage, backstage inductees and inductors fielded questions and posed for photos in the press room going on in the press room. Carole King, who made history as one of three women inducted twice into the Hall, was still clearly moved by Swift’s performance. “I came in briefly when she was rehearsing,” she said. “The version that she did tonight was amazing. She just owned it and she made it her own in a way that I have never heard done that way, and that is my joy as a songwriter, to see how different people interpret a song.” King is already in the hall as a songwriter alongside one-time partner Gerry Goffin, and made history as the third woman to be inducted twice, along with Stevie Nicks and fellow 2021 inductee Tina Turner. Backstage, she talked reverently of Goffin, who died in 2014. “Had he been here tonight, he would be here cheering me on just like in the musical ‘Beautiful’: ‘You’re going all the way.’ He really was a supporter of me, long after we weren’t married anymore,” she said. Being inducted a second time is different, she said, because she was being inducted for something she never thought she would do, “which was to be a performer.… I feel that as a performer, after all the years I have been actually doing it, was just part of the way that I bring music to people,” she said. “I understand what an audience comes to see. I know they don’t expect perfection, so that’s good. They get the song from the heart with great players.” King was clearly the belle of the ball backstage, posing for photos and getting hugs backstage with Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl, Jay-Z, Keith Urban, Jennifer Lopez, Swift and Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson, who portrays Aretha Franklin in the film “Respect,” and performed the Goffin-King-written classic, “(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman.
