Rock Hall of Fame inducts Green Day, Joan Jett, Lou Reed

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has announced its latest batch of inductees with Green Day sure to cause the most debate in a class that also features Lou Reed, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, Bill Withers, Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band.

Ringo Starr will be given the Award for Musical Excellence while the "5" Royales will be inducted in the early-influences category.

Green Day

This was Green Day's first year of eligibility, and those who tend to write them off as bubblepunk will no doubt spend at least the next few days mocking the rock hall's decision on Facebook and Twitter. But here's the thing:

Dozens of punk acts with more credibility did what Green Day got famous for doing earlier and better without earning an induction to the Hall of Fame. But Green Day took it to the masses, going 10-times-platinum with their breakthrough album, "Dookie," while inspiring two generations of young pop-punk artists (most of whom are just not very good) and conquering Broadway with a rock opera that probably introduced the idea that something called punk even happened to a whole new audience.

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

A decade down the road from "Dookie," in 2004, they scored a six-times comeback with a concept album, "American Idiot." And they've sent nine singles to the top of Billboard's modern-rock-tracks chart, from "Dookie" singles "Longview," "Basket Case" and "When I Come Around" to 2009's "Know Your Enemy."

That's impact. And that's what the rock hall is supposed to honor. People who think it's more about how good the records are have never understood the stated purpose of the Hall of Fame.

Lou Reed

Reed, who died in October 2013, will be inducted for a second time. He's already enshrined as a member of the Velvet Underground.

He revolutionized the scope and possibilities of rock and roll as poetry the day "The Velvet Underground & Nico" hit the streets in 1967. It didn't set the world on fire, barely denting Billboard's album chart, where it lost steam at No. 171. But the impact of the Velvet Underground's first move was such that by the early '90s, the critical shorthand surrounding that album was that everyone who bought a copy formed a band (a notion first advanced in 1982 as an off-the-cuff remark by Brian Eno to Musician magazine).

If that first album would remain the Velvets' calling card, they followed through with three more masterpieces, none of which out-charted that first poorly charting effort. But all four were featured in Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time

Reed launched his solo career with the 1972 release of a self-titled album but really hit his stride with that same year's "Transformer," which spawned a most unlikely pop hit in "Walk on the Wild Side." Even now, that song remains a safe bet for the highest-charting U.S. single to make reference to both transvestites and male prostitution (although the radio edit did lose the oral-sex reference).

Although he never had another mainstream pop hit, Reed remained a hugely influential and respected artist who commanded a high profile in the rock press through such classic releases as "Berlin," "Coney Island Baby," "Street Hassle," "The Blue Mask," "Legendary Hearts," "New Sensations" and "New York."

Joan Jett & the Blackhearts

Jett was all of 16 when her all-girl jailbait group, the Runaways, kicked off their first release with "Cherry Bomb," a punk-rock classic Jett had written with Kim Fowley. But more people know her for a song she didn't write, the Arrows' B-side "I Love Rock n' Roll," which put in seven weeks at No. 1 in 1982 and was followed by more hits with covers (Gary Glitter's "Do You Wanna Touch Me" and "Crimson and Clover"). Her reputation goes beyond hit singles, though. She has been an inspiration to several generations of female musicians who'd rather die than sound like Jewel.

Bill Withers

Withers peaked at No. 3 on Billboard's Hot 100 with his breakthrough smash, 1971's "Ain't No Sunshine," a track produced by Booker T. Jones, with backing from Stephen Stills and the MG's. The following year, he spent three weeks at No. 1 with "Lean on Me," a soulful classic Rolling Stone ranked as one of the 500 greatest songs of all time, and followed through with the funkier "Use Me," which peaked at No. 2.

Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble

When David Bowie saw Stevie Ray Vaughan in 1982, he said, "I probably hadn't been so gung-ho about a guitar player since seeing Jeff Beck in the early 60s." The following year, Vaughan was memorably featured on Bowie's "Let Dance," the legend's biggest-selling album. A respected blue guitarist who wore his love of Jimi Hendrix like a badge of honor, Vaughan led Double Trouble through a string of classic albums before a helicopter crash took his life, at 35, in 1990, as the guitarist was leaving a concert he'd just played with Eric Clapton.

Paul Butterfield Blues Band

Speaking of the blues, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band blew out of Chicago with Butterfield on blues harp and the great Mike Bloomfield squeezing out the sparks on lead guitar. The blues-rock pioneers had a run-in with destiny at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival when Bob Dylan famously borrowed Bloomfield and the Butterfield Band's rhythm section of drummer Sam Lay and bassist Jerome Arnold (both of whom had played with Howlin' Wolf) to go electric. That same year, they released a self-titled debut that decades later turned up on a list in Rolling Stone's 500 greatest albums of all time.