Before there was the Clash, Nirvana or Rage Against the Machine there was the MC5.

“The MC5 was playing punk rock music before there was a name for it,” says Tom Morello, a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame guitarist for bands like Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave.

“They built the lattice on which bands like the Stooges, the Ramones, the Clash, the Sex Pistols, Rage Against the Machine and System of a Down ply their trade.”

The MC5 — short for Motor City Five — are getting into the Rock Hall this year, only months after the deaths of the two last original members, drummer Dennis “Machine Gun” Thompson and guitarist and singer Wayne Kramer.

The Detroit-based MC5 are part of the class of ’24 that includes Peter Frampton, Foreigner, Cher, Mary J. Blige, A Tribe Called Quest, Kool & the Gang, Ozzy Osbourne, Big Mama Thornton and others. The induction ceremony is Saturday.

The band — which also included Fred “Sonic” Smith on guitars, Rob Tyner on vocals, Michael Davis on bass — had little commercial success and put out just three albums, but its legacy endured, both for its sound and for its fusing of music to political action. During the chaos of the 1968 Democratic National Convention, only the MC5 showed up to play.

“The reason why they deserve to be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is not because of the depth or breadth of their catalog. It’s because of their influence. Without them, there is no punk rock music,” says Morello. “They’re on the Mount Rushmore of founders of this particular brand of music.”

“Kick out the Jams” was their most famous song — with the lyrics, “Put that mic in my hand/ And let me kick out the jam,” and “Let me be who I am/ And let me kick out the jams.” A live album of the same name reached the top 40 in 1969, their highest-charting release. They also released the studio albums “Back in the USA” and “High Time” before breaking up at the end of 1972.

In quiet honor of the MC5, Rage Against the Machine would nickname their band’s fastest song “MC5” when they were recording albums. For months, that’s what “Sleep Now in the Fire” from the album “The Battle of Los Angeles” was called.

Grammy-winning producer Don Was grew up in Detroit and vividly remembers catching MC5 live, calling what he heard “a tsunami of sound.”

“To me, they unleashed a power,” he said. “You could taste the music and see it. It was never really captured on any recordings. It was a big, monolithic wall of distortion and groove.”

Morello and Was are among several musicians appearing on a new MC5 album, “Heavy Lifting,” which comes out this month and includes songs by Kramer and Thompson. Slash, Vernon Reid and William DuVall of Alice in Chains also contributed.

Oct. 17 birthdays: Singer Gary Puckett is 82. Actor Michael McKean is 77. Actor George Wendt is 76. Singer Alan Jackson is 66. Animator Mike Judge is 62. Singer Ziggy Marley is 56. Singer Wyclef Jean is 55. Rapper Eminem is 52. Actor Sharon Leal is 52. Actor Matthew Macfadyen is 50. Actor Felicity Jones is 41.