R.E.M. are to record their 14th studio album with Grammy-winning producer Jacknife Lee - the man behind the recent CDsВ of Bloc Party and Snow Patrol.

Singer Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck and bassist Mike Mills hope to release the follow-up to 2004's "Around the Sun" before the end of the year. As for now, the band's original line-up - Stipe, Buck, Mills and original drummer Bill Berry, who quit in 1997 - will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame by Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder in a ceremony at New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel today.