YEAR
1997
INDUCTED BY
Steven Van Zandt (E Street Band)
CATEGORY
Performers
The epitome of blue-eyed soul.
The Rascals set themselves above the pack with their excellent songwriting and instinct for adaptation. Their masterful pop-soul singles landed them a string of Sixties hits.
Felix Cavaliere
Dino Danelli
Eddie Brigati Jr.
Gene Cornish
HALL OF FAME
ESSAY
By Lenny Kaye
The Long Island Sound.
Let us caress it: thick slabs of Hammond B-3 organ, all furniture polish and drawbars and majesty; a chopping rhythmic guitar; a precise, almost clockwork sense of percussion; a vocalese whose tremolo vibratos as if doubling back on itself, riding a wave form of infinite shimmy. Pure show and go.
Surely the crowds at Shea Stadium waiting for the Beatles had no idea they were witnessing the birth of a phenomenon when, in the summer of 1965, promoter-manager Sid Bernstein flashed the Young Rascals are coming on the scoreboard.
