“I was really going to try not to cry and be tough."

That's how legendary rocker Joan Jett started her acceptance speech Saturday night (April 18) at the induction of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Class of 2015.

“I come from a place where rock and roll means something. it means more than music, more than fashion, more than the pose,” she told the audience in Cleveland. “Rock and roll is an idea and an ideal. Sometimes, because we love the music and we make the music, we forget the political impact it has around the world."

Jett has always been a pioneer: She was a female rocker in an era when male singers dominated the genre, managing to release colossal '80s hits like "I Love Rock and Roll" and "Bad Reputation" that remain widely played to this day. And when she started Blackheart Records in 1980, she became the first woman to own a record label.

"She was the first major female artist to start her own record label and that was only because the other major labels said there wasn't a market for this kind of music," Miley Cyrus, who presented Jett with the honor, said.

Jett was also a fascinating part of last year's Hall of Fame ceremonies: Along with St. Vincent and Kim Gordon, she joined the surviving members of Nirvana on stage to perform some of the group's hits; Jett took the mic for the iconic "Smells Like Teen Spirit":

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