The ultimate 2019 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees playlist

One can be forgiven for lumping "A Forest" into the dark post-punk landscape that the British rock scene was mired in in the 1980s. Yet while many define this era as overly moody, there were many different perspectives and levels to be found within that subgenre. With "A Forest," The Cure finally discovered its potential -- the band crafted a striking, propulsive atmosphere that it would soon embellish and expand upon. What was the reward for creating such a distinctive number and making it the lead single for its sophomore album "Seventeen Seconds"? The Cure's first Top 40 hit in the U.K. (and most assuredly not the last).

The Cure's embrace of pure pop music has long been one of the band's most distinct dynamics. "In Between Days," the band's chart breakthrough in the U.S., mixed an instantly recognizable '80s pop sheen with furiously strummed acoustic guitars to create an earworm that houses somewhat bleak, somewhat dark lyrics about lying, aging and unrequited love. It makes for a mess of contradictions which, as we all know, often results in some of the best Robert Smith songs.

While "Lovesong" is often cited as the group's big pop number, the lead single off its classic 1989 album "Disintegration" is one of the more idiosyncratic songs in the group's discography. The faux-string plucks and moody guitar reverb take a back seat to Robert Smith's quiet whispers about how much we should fear the Spiderman (not to be confused with "Spider-Man," of course). It's a weird, offbeat little number that just so happens to rank among The Cure's best.

Real fans know that the Lep's legacy is so much more than this classic horndog rocker, but can you blame the record-buying masses? "Pour Some Sugar On Me" is basically a clever rewrite of The Arrows' "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" (later made iconic by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts), but you can sing along to the chorus after hearing it just once. We all remember that hook, but the song's real character comes from Joe Elliot's quirky injections and vocal levels reached during the verses. The way he plays with the line "squeeze a little, squeeze a little, tease a little more" is what really gets us hot and bothered and shows why Def Leppard had that extra edge of a real personality that so many of its peers lacked.

"Have You Ever Needed Someone So Bad" is not necessarily one of the best Def Leppard songs — it was an '80s power ballad that came out in 1992 after all. But its history is one of the more interesting aspects of the tune. The song is solid, but those very rock historians who inducted the Lep into the Rock Hall may or may not know about the single release where the B-sides consisted of nothing but songs by a group called The Acoustic Hippies From Hell. Why would this band show up on a Def Leppard B-side? Cause the group was actually a collaboration between Def Leppard and the Celtic-rock greats Hothouse Flowers. How they managed to pull covers of both "Little Wing" and "You Can't Always Get What You Want" together in such a fashion we may never know, but it makes for some stellar rock history trivia.

The Sheffield boys behind Def Leppard were moderately popular with their first two albums, but it took them until 1983's legendary "Pyromania" to become nothing short of hair metal kingpins. Lead single "Photograph" has that extra kick of that killer guitar key-drop in the chorus. It showed the group was capable of a kind of rich melodicism that, let's be real, was sorely lacking on its first two efforts. "Photograph" isn't only one of Def Leppard's best songs, but it's also the one that absolutely kicked down the doors to radio and allowed the boys to score what seemed like an endless string of hits.

The year of Janet Jackson's induction into the Rock Hall just so happens to coincide with the 30th anniversary of this landmark single from what is arguably her best album. With lightning-bolt electric guitar stabs, clanging percussion, group vocals and chant alongs, "Rhythm Nation" remains a striking, stunning slice of dance-pop. It showed how Jackson was always a next-level performer. When coupled with the military-precise choreography featured in the music video, it only served to show how powerful Jackson was at the close of the '80s. Three decades later, "Rhythm Nation" retains all of its power, all of its punch, all of its energy. It's truly one of the greatest dance songs ever made, full stop.

While Jackson was a dance-pop diva first and foremost, she still managed to nail some ballads, too. Those slower songs touched less on romantic themes and more on societal or personal ills. Yet "Got 'til It's Gone," the lead single from 1997's "The Velvet Rope," showed a level of maturation and sophistication that few were expecting. Sure, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis were in the producer's chairs per always (with a controversy still surrounding J Dilla's part in this). But this barebones, dimmed-lights, low-key number was so unlike anything Jackson had done before that people had to reassess their expectations of what "The Velvet Rope" was gonna be and what Jackson, at the peak of her powers, was capable of.

Reunited with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis for the first time in what felt like forever, Jackson and the team immediately got back on its creative groove, unleashing a synth-driven dance number that immediately recalled her '80s and '90s dance-pop peaks. As a whole, the album "Unbreakable" was astonishing, recalling Jackson's storied dance past while still making modern and contemporary poses without once feeling out of place or forced. Jackson is just the gift that keeps on giving.

Call it overplayed (it might be) or call it absolutely genius (it is), but "Edge of Seventeen" still kills even in 2019, the year Nicks is inducted into the Rock Hall. From that instantly memorable guitar intro to the building piano chords to the pounding drums, there is nothing quite as propulsive or as striking as this expertly crafted slice of disco-indebted band rock in all of Nicks' discography. Her soaring vocals only seal the deal. Producer Jimmy Iovine always had Nicks pegged as a rocker-in-waiting, and this proved beyond a doubt that she was up to the task. Heck, you're probably singing it in your head right now, aren't you?

No one will gonna deny that Stevie Nicks had star power, but her first proper solo offering (and lead single from her debut solo release) just so happened to be a collaboration with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. It oozed with soul and sass and instantly set her apart from her time in Fleetwood Mac. Petty proved to be a perfect co-conspirator, and the groovy little song shot straight up the charts upon release. In fact, this number proved to be so successful that on sophomore album "The Wild Heart," they basically tried to recapture the magic with another duet titled "I Will Run to You." To put it lightly, it was notably less successful.

In 2004, the first of many remastered/deluxe editions of Fleetwood Mac's "Rumors" came out, and tucked away on that list of almost-made-it songs was a simple piano-and-voice number by Stevie Nicks called "Planets of the Universe." It's an earnest number that plays to Nicks' strengths: It's as spiritual and sprawling as it is personal, and it assuredly would've made for an interesting inclusion onto the album proper. Never fear, however: The track eventually did show up on Nicks' 2001 solo record "Trouble in Shangri-La," where it was given a full-band rock treatment. The solo piano demo is clearly the better iteration, but credit Nicks for recognizing a great song when she wrote it . She saved it for decades, holding onto it for just the right moment. That kind of self-editing is a rock star superpower all its own, and it's one that Nicks clearly possesses and wields with expertise.

It's one of the more polarizing songs in Radiohead's entire discography, with lead singer Thom Yorke's obsession with Warp Records coming through with this alienating, thumping little electro-number that is all paranoia, worry, and ... shaking your groove thing a bit? It's a dark song, but those bass pads really give this number (which can be found on the infamously "guitar-lite" 2000 record "Kid A") a thump and groove that we never really got to see from the band until Yorke started his solo career. For a lot of rock fans, however, this was the band's first step into a whole new world where genres bend to the point of breaking — or in Radiohead's world, just a normal day.

"You broke another mirror / You're turning into something you are not." The lyrics to this almost-tranquil, mid-tempo acoustic number are a bit on the bleak side, but such sentiments didn't derail "High & Dry" from becoming one of Radiohead's all-time standout numbers, leaping over the pseudo-Britpop poses of its debut for something much more mature, exploratory and dynamic. While its sophomore album "The Bends" may show the group at arguably its most accessible, takeaways like this only demonstrate that no matter how weird the guys got, they never failed a good pop melody when they came across one. Radiohead wouldn't leave us high and dry like that, no sir.

Radiohead's songs are frequently about alienation and dehumanization, which is why "All I Need," in effect, is a love song. Of course, this is Radiohead we're talking about, so lines like "I'm an animal trapped in your hot car" don't exactly scream romanticism. Yet this barebones production, with a low-key synth and Thom Yorke's largely unadorned voice (and the band chiming in with other instruments when it feels like it), makes for a kind of groovy number. It also shows that our favorite critical darling rock group still manages to surprise even the most hardcore fans.

Roxy Music went through many different iterations, with songwriters and band members fighting and leaving and ultimately imprinting a part of themselves on the group's distinctive, sprawling sound. There were wild sax solos, avant-pop, cheeky synth numbers — you name it. Yet once the '80s hit and the group essentially turned into a slick Bryan Ferry vehicle, some wondered if it would create bland smooth-pop. And while Roxy Music did make smooth-pop, the 1982 swan song of the album "Avalon" has been hailed as a generation-defining masterpiece by some, with the yearning "More Than This" its striking thesis statement.

It might be only the second track off its debut album, but "Ladytron" has taken on a life all its own. With oboe solos and a cacophony of synth sounds, the song gets a majority of its power comes from the surreal soundscape that was largely crafted by one-time bandmate Brian Eno. Although Bryan Ferry wrote the song and sings it with his early-day nervy energy, so many textures and styles are cycled through in its run time that it almost feels like the band put an album's worth of ideas into a single track. Not too surprisingly, this same template would make up for a good amount of Eno's solo debut (1973's "Here Come the Warm Jets"). That still doesn't diminish its status as one of Roxy Music's greatest numbers.

What's perhaps most remarkable about Roxy Music's cover of this solo John Lennon number is how, following the tragic passing of the beloved Beatle, the band simply added this into its touring sets. Roxy Music eventually snuck away to do a quick studio version as a non-album single. The result? The group's only U.K. chart-topper. The song is especially memorable for that whistled vocal line near the end. While Roxy Music's original track was six minutes, most compilations feature a more standard four-minute edit.

The Zombies came back in the early 1990s, but their legacy is based off albums released in 1965 and 1968. "Time of the Season" is special. Its snap-and-breathe percussion and the clever background vocal add-ins of "What's your name? Who's your daddy?" — to say nothing of that canyon-sized vocal chorus — all come together in a song that's been overplayed and used in so many films that you forget how utterly immaculate the production is on this all-time pop number.

While initially the B-side to the band's 1968 single "Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914)," "This Will Be Our Year" has grown in stature and influence over the years. It was somewhat spurred by the band OK Go doing a cover of it in the mid-2000s that showed up on a lot of compilations. Yet when you go back to the original, the anthemic "This Will Be Our Year" feels like the blueprint for all of modern power pop; it is the kind of piano-rocking sound that would soon lead to groups such as Badfinger and Cheap Trick basing their whole careers off it. It's a stellar number that sounds fresh today despite being more than 50 years old.

Clocking in at just a hair over 90 seconds, this almost-a capella number from frontman Rod Argent is a sweet, unadorned tune. It mainly features Argent's single vocal take with some light keyboard and even lighter bass work accenting his earnest lyrics. It deals with longing and unrequited feelings, but it is presented so simply and so beautifully that it's no surprise that this one-time B-side has taken on a life all its own in the decades since it was released. Covered by many, but never bettered.