Bradenton’s Graeme Edge will be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

Bradenton’s Graeme Edge is heading to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Edge is the drummer for the classic rock band the Moody Blues, and he’s lived in Bradenton since the 1970s. On Tuesday, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame announced that the Moodies would be among the 218 inductees. The other new inductees are Bon Jovi, The Cars, Dire Straits and Nina Simone.

Edge is the only remaining member of the original lineup of the band, which scored its first hit with “Go Now” in 1965. Denny Laiine, later of Wings, was part of the original band. The band’s classic lineup, fronted by Justin Hayward and John Lodge, debuted in 1967 with the orchestral-rock album “Days of Future Passed.”

Longtime members Ray Thomas and Mike Pinder left the Moody Blues years ago. Thomas played flute and other wind instruments, and Pinder was the band’s keyboardist.

“They’re having health problems,” Edge said in a 2016 interview with the Bradenton Herald. “And that’s all I’m going to say about that.”

The Moody Blues continued as a trio, comprising Edge, Hayward and Lodge. They played a sold-out concert at Sarasota’s Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall last year. It was billed as the band’s 50th anniversary concert, marking a half-century since the Hayward-Lodge lineup of the band rehearsed together, Edge said at the time.

According to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, a 2013 Rolling Stone readers poll ranked the Moody Blues as one of the10 bands that most deserved to be inducted into the Cleveland-based Hall of Fame.

“So whether you are a fan of progressive rock Moodies from the 1960s, the band’s synthesizer-driven rock sounds of the 1980s, or have recently seen them playing for multiple generations of rock and roll fans, one thing is clear – the Moody Blues have created more than 50 years of exhilarating and significant music,” a post about the band on the organization’s website said.

In 2018, the Moody Blues will tour the United States to mark the 50th anniversary of “Days of Future Passed.” The closest that tour is slated to come to Bradenton is a Jan. 13 show at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater.

This story was originally published December 13, 2017 at 4:47 PM with the headline "Bradenton’s Graeme Edge will be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame."