Van Halen

This year's new additions in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will be R.E.M., Van Halen, Patti Smith, the Ronettes and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. The ceremony will be held on the March 12 at New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. To be eligible for induction, this year's class had to release their first single no later than 1981.

The 2007 event will also pay tribute to late Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun, who served as the chairman of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.

Michael Stipe and Mike Mills of R.E.M. said that they were quite pleased to be find themselves in the same class of inductees as Patti Smith, an acknowledged influence on the band who called Stipe today (Jan. 8) to congratulate the band on the Hall of Fame news. "It was really greater to be able to say 'Congratulations to you' back to her," Stipe says. Mills added that, "She's been up (for induction) before and hasn't gotten in. I was afraid that her lack of huge record sales might blind people to her influence."

R.E.M. and Van Halen also face the decision of whether to perform at the ceremony with ex-members. R.E.M. reunited with former drummer Bill Berry last fall to celebrate its induction into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame and even hit the studio with him to record a track for an as-yet-unreleased charity album.

For Van Halen, the situation is more complex. The group is without a lead singer, although rumors are swirling that original frontman David Lee Roth will tour with the outfit this summer. In addition, Eddie Van Halen's teenage son recently replaced longtime bassist Michael Anthony in the band.

Black Sabbath, the Sex Pistols, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Blondie, Miles Davis and record moguls Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss were enshrined in the Hall in 2006.