NEW YORK — The punk trio Green Day, poet of the New York underground Lou Reed and "Lean on Me" singer Bill Withers will lead a new class of inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame next year.
The hall announced Tuesday that it will also welcome Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, who famously sang about loving rock 'n' roll, and make Ringo Starr the fourth ex-Beatle enshrined as an individual. Besides Reed, the class includes other posthumous inductees Paul Butterfield and Stevie Ray Vaughan.
The 30th annual induction ceremony will be held at Cleveland, Ohio's Public Hall next April 18. Public tickets go on sale Thursday.
Green Day made it in the group's first year of eligibility. The Bay Area band led by Billie Joe Armstrong made the 1990s slackers-anthem album Dookie and hit a peak with the politically-themed concept disc American Idiot a decade later.
Inductees are chosen by a vote of more than 700 artists, historians and music industry representatives. An artist needed to have first released material no later than 1989.
The Rock Hall of Fame, which is based in Cleveland, will open a new exhibit dedicated to the 2015 inductees.