NICKO MCBRAIN On IRON MAIDEN's Latest ROCK AND ROLL HALL OF FAME Nomination: 'It's A Great Accolade To Even Be Considered Again'

In a new interview with Rock Of Nations With Dave Kinchen & Shane McEachern, longtime IRON MAIDEN drummer Nicko McBrain commented on the band's nomination for the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame's class of 2026.

While MAIDEN has been eligible to join the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame since 2004, McBrain and several other former and current members of the band have only been nominated three times: in 2021, 2023 and 2026.

After one of the interviewers noted that the Rock Hall has "gotta get it right this time" and finally induct MAIDEN, Nicko said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Yeah. You just never know, do you? I mean, it has been a long road. Many nominations — I'm not sure how many this is; maybe the third or fourth one, perhaps."

Referencing the fact that the 2026 nominees for induction into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame include rap, metal, R&B, hip-hop, Britpop, blues rock and pop artists, Nicko continued: "Yeah, in the greater scheme of things, it's not really a Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame anymore, but it's still a wonderful accolade to be given finally to hopefully — the guys may go, 'Yeah, we're gonna induct them.' But at the end of the day, it's really something that the whole of the band have talked about over the years, and it's not something that's voted for by your fans, although they do open it up to its fans to be voted in. At the end of the day, it's the board that decide. And so that kind of puts a bit of a question mark about the authenticity of fans voting you in. But, yeah, it's still, in my book, something that's a great accolade to even be considered again."

After one of the interviewers observed that many musicians are getting older and passing away before they get a chance to be inducted into the Rock Hall, Nicko concurred. "There is that," he said. "I mean, mind you, if you think to yourself, there's so many great bands out there that have not been inducted or even nominated over the years, and as you say, certain members are getting along in the tooth or passing away, and you look back and go, in retrospect, man, these guys should have been [inducted] and they weren't. But, yeah, it's something that there's a lot of controversy over it, and there has been."

Apparently addressing the fact that Jann Wenner, who co-founded Rolling Stone magazine and was a co-founder of the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, and who had long faced accusations of bias against metal, prog-rock and other genres, was removed from the Hall's board of directors in 2023 after making comments that were seen as denigrating black and female musicians, Nicko added: "And if somebody that was very controversial is no longer a part of the voting board as such, then who knows where it may go? As I said, for me personally, it's a lovely accolade to have, but one that it's steeped with controversy in terms of what the MAIDEN camp feel."

The official 2026 Rock Hall inductees will be announced in April, along with the "Musical Influence" and "Musical Excellence" awards, as well as the "Ahmet Ertegun Award" reserved for a prolific music industry veteran.

Artists must have released their first commercial recording at least 25 years before they're eligible for induction.

Nominees will be voted on by more than 1,200 artists, historians and music industry professionals.

The Hall Of Fame previously said the IRON MAIDEN members that would get inducted include the current lineup of singer Bruce Dickinson, bassist Steve Harris and guitarists Adrian Smith, Dave Murray and Janick Gers, along with former guitarist Dennis Stratton, ex-singer Paul Di'Anno and former drummers Nicko McBrain and Clive Burr.

Even though artists are eligible for the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame 25 years after the release of their first album or single, iconic hard rock and metal bands like MAIDEN and MOTÖRHEAD have yet to be recognized by the institution, which inducted GUNS N' ROSES in that group's first year of eligibility.

IRON MAIDEN was on the ballot for the second time in 2023, but the institution's voters snubbed them once again.

The only metal or metal-adjacent acts to have made it into the Rock Hall so far have been BLACK SABBATH, LED ZEPPELIN, METALLICA, AC/DC, JUDAS PRIEST, KISS, VAN HALEN, RUSH, GUNS N' ROSES, Ozzy Osbourne and DEEP PURPLE.

IRON MAIDEN finished in the fourth place in the fan vote for the 2023 Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction class.

Seven years ago, Harris said that he didn't care that his band had yet to be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame despite the fact that it had been eligible since 2004.

"I don't mind that we're not in things like that," he told Rolling Stone in an interview. "I don't think about things like that. It's very nice if people give you awards or accolades, but we didn't get into the business for that sort of thing. I'm certainly not going to lose sleep if we don't get any sort of award, not just that one, any award. I don't think we deserve to have this or that necessarily. With what we do, whatever comes of it is great. Whatever doesn't come of it is great, too."

Dickinson made headlines in 2018 when he referred to the Rock Hall as "an utter and complete load of bollocks" during a spoken-word gig in Australia, insisting that the Cleveland-based institution is "run by a bunch of sanctimonious bloody Americans who wouldn't know rock and roll if it hit them in the face."

Bruce later told The Jerusalem Post that he was "so annoyed with that coverage because they took my statement out of context to make it seem like I was upset that we weren't in the Hall Of Fame.

"I'm really happy we're not there and I would never want to be there," he continued. "If we're ever inducted, I will refuse — they won't bloody be having my corpse in there.

"Rock and roll music does not belong in a mausoleum in Cleveland," Bruce added. "It's a living, breathing thing, and if you put it in a museum, then it's dead. It's worse than horrible, it's vulgar."

Harris previously told "Rock Talk With Mitch Lafon" that he wasn't concerned about whether IRON MAIDEN would eventually be inducted into the Rock Hall. "I don't really think about it, to be honest. I think awards are things that are nice to have when you get them, but it's not something you're really striving for — it's not what it's about it," he said. "It's never been about that. It's aways been about just trying to make good music and go out and play good live shows, and that's it, really. Hopefully people will appreciate it. It's probably nice when people give you awards — don't get me wrong; I think it's great — but it's not something that you would lose sleep over if you didn't get any.

"It's the way that I am," Harris added. "I don't know. Maybe the rest of the guys [in the band] might think differently to me, but that's the way I think. It's not that I don't care about [awards]. It's just… And it's not that they're not meaningful when you do get 'em — it's nice. But I certainly don't worry about it or anything like that. I think other people are the ones that make a bigger deal out of it than us, about whether we got one or not."