LOS ANGELES (AP) — Phil Collins gave a tearful acceptance speech and got an electrifying tribute from Cynthia Erivo, Oprah Winfrey inducted the late Luther Vandross, and Wu-Tang Clan made the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles a rowdy celebration at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony on Saturday night.
Queen Latifah, Oasis, MC Lyte, Sade and Joy Division/New Order were also inducted along with producer Rick Rubin, who got a long-bearded tribute
from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Billy Idol and Iron Maiden were set to enter the hall later in the evening.
U2 was the night’s surprise opener, playing their new single “Silencio” while surrounded by dancers in riot squad gear with helmets and shields. They then launched into their 1984 classic “Pride (In the Name of Love)” as singer Bono alternately raised a peace sign and fist.
Collins, whose mobility issues and other health problems kept him from performing, took the stage slowly using a pair of canes and cried at a huge ovation from a crowd that included his daughter, actor Lily Collins.
Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker inducted Collins and praised him for his unprecedented dual stardom as a drummer and a hit-making pop singer in the 1980s.
“I grew up just wanting to play the drums,” Collins said. “Everything else has been a really happy accident. I can’t believe, when I look back, how life has gone.”
Barker said Collins' song “In the Air Tonight” gave the world “arguably the most badass drum fill of all time.”
Minutes later, Barker played that drum fill himself as Erivo gave a slowed-down, epic rendition of the song with a wailing crescendo that brought the crowd to its feet.
Collins was already in the hall as a member of Genesis, but now gets the solo honor.
He hasn’t been able to take the stage since 2022, but assured the crowd that “you haven’t heard the last of me.”
Winfrey said with relish that Vandross was “the maestro of the love song” and said he was once correctly named “the top artist that people make looove to.”
Vandross, an R&B singer with a velvet voice, was one of the definitive singers of the 1980s and ’90s. He died in 2005.
“Luther Vandross sang with such passion and soul it could reach something deep inside that you didn’t even know needed to be reached,” Winfrey said.
Usher then took the stage and sang a sultry medley of Vandross hits, including “Here and Now” and “So Amazing.”
Wu-Tang Clan, the epic hip-hop collective from New York's Staten Island, filled the stage with its 10 current members, giving a memorable acceptance speech and a performance that had the crowd on its feet and dancing. Backed by a big jazz band, the musical medley included “C.R.E.A.M.," “Method Man" and late member Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s “Shimmy Shimmy Ya."
“Wu-Tang rewrote the rules of hip-hop and did it without a big machine behind them," said comedian Chris Rock, who inducted them.
“We took Staten Island to the world,” the group's leader RZA said. “We had a desire to conquer."
He added, “We wanted to make a mark. We made our mark.”
MC Lyte, a trailblazing female rapper starting in the late 1980s, was the first artist inducted, with hip-hop star Remy Ma doing the honors and calling her “one of the first women in hip-hop to make sure there was room for the rest of us.”
MC Lyte said she was a “B-girl from Brooklyn just looking for my chance to inspire and motivate.” She did not perform at the moment of her induction but may be part of an ensemble later in the evening.
Her contemporary and fellow groundbreaker Latifah was inducted later in the evening by Megan Thee Stallion, who said Latifah “taught us to recognize royalty within ourselves.”
Latifah wore a leather crown that matched her leather trenchcoat and tie. She said, for a long time, she would not have believed this night was possible.
“It’s difficult enough being a woman in hip-hop, let alone being a hip-hopper in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame,” she said.
Latifah and MC Lyte then took the stage together to perform a medley of their hits, including Latifah's “U.N.I.T.Y.” and Lyte's “Ruffneck,” as members of Wu-Tang and Chuck D of Public Enemy danced and rapped along in the audience.
Latifah and Lyte entered the hall as recipients of the Early Influence Award along with posthumous inductees Gram Parsons, Fela Kuti and Celia Cruz, who were all inducted via video tribute.
Legendary rock, hip-hop and country producer Rubin accepted his induction with a one-sentence acceptance speech.
“You can’t kill rock ‘n’ roll,” he said, and left the stage.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers then appeared, all four of them wearing white wigs and long white fake beards to match Rubin’s signature look as they played their breakthrough hit “Give It Away,” one of many he produced for them.
Longtime Hall-of-Famer Neil Young inducted Rubin, making fun of his tendency to work while lying barefoot on the couch and praising him for the unmatched care he takes with his artists, including the Beastie Boys, Run DMC, Johnny Cash, the Chicks and Adele.
Oasis, the youngest of the inductees, didn't show up. Guitarist Noel Gallagher is playing a gig back home in Britain, and his little brother, Liam Gallagher, just didn't want to come.
“Anybody surprised they didn’t show up?” asked actor and Oasis superfan Bob Odenkirk, who inducted them. ”It would’ve been out of character if they had. I would’ve been worried about them.” Stephen Wilson Jr. gave an acoustic rendition of their biggest hit “Wonderwall.”
Joy Division, a dark and seminal post-punk band, and New Order, which was formed by its members after singer Ian Curtis died in 1980, got a joint induction.
Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails inducted them, saying Joy Division's members were “the authors of an unbreakable archetype” followed by countless young bands, and that New Order took that band's monochrome and turned it into “vivid color.”
Only the bassist for both bands, Peter Hook, appeared at the ceremony. He performed Joy Division's “Love Will Tear Us Apart” and New Order's “Bizarre Love Triangle,” with the Deftones and singer Lauren Mayberry of the band Chvrches.
Hook said the young musicians “made an old man very happy.”
He has had long-running feuds with his fellow bandmates and, other than Curtis, didn't mention any of them in his acceptance.
Sade also decided to skip the induction. The singer and her band that’s named after her were inducted by singer Andra Day and celebrated by singer Sienna Spiro, who sang the group’s beloved hit “Smooth Operator.”
Iron Maiden, to be inducted later Saturday night, was on tour in Australia.
After streaming the ceremony live the past few years, the Rock Hall returned to its previous model, where the public won’t see it until an edited version airs on ABC and Disney+ on Dec. 9.
