Riding high from the mammoth success of their most recent album, 'Death Magnetic,' Metallica can add one more accomplishment under their belt: Rock and Roll Hall of Famers.

The rockers, along with Run-D.M.C., Jeff Beck, Little Anthony and the Imperials, and Bobby Womack were selected as this year's inductees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The ceremony will be held on April 4 in Cleveland, home of the Rock Hall, and televised on Fuse TV.

"It's about unity," said drummer Lars Ulrich, who along with fellow members singer James Hetfield, guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Robert Trujillo, was present at the Rock Hall press conference in New York on Tuesday. "We are part of a bigger picture. I personally love rock 'n' roll history and how everything fits together. To be a part of that history and to inspire what's coming after us is a great, great honor."

Metallica, Run-D.M.C., the Stooges, War, Bobby Womack, Jeff Beck, Chic, Wanda Jackson, and Little Anthony and the Imperials are the nine Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2009 nominees, it was announced Monday. Of these nine, ultimately five will be chosen for induction. The 24th Annual Induction Ceremony will take place on April 4th in Cleveland (in a first, tickets for the ceremony will be available to the public).

Eligibility for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame dictates that the artist's recording career began at least 25 years prior to the year of nomination. Thus, this year's nominees must've all released their first recording by or before 1983. Last year's winning class included Madonna, John Mellencamp and Leonard Cohen.

Bobby Womack's running partner Sam Cooke famously sang 'A Change Is Gonna Come' during the height of the African-American struggle for civil rights. And though the late soul legend never got to see how many changes have taken place since he laid down his 1964 anthem, Womack himself can testify to just how different things are in both the world of music and the world at large since he began singing in his family gospel quartet in the 1950s. With a new greatest-hits collection in stores and a trove of classic soul albums just reissued digitally, this was a good time for the 64-year-old soul singer, songwriter and -- it should be noted -- in-demand session guitarist to reflect on his 50-plus years as a prime music maker.

You've been creating music in one form or another for more than a half century. What keeps you in the game?

What's great about the music [is] it keeps you young. It's a spiritual blessing that every time I walk onstage I say, "Man, I feel so much younger. I wish I could stay up here forever." But you come off, you live the real life, you realize that you're getting older. You move at a slower pace, but the spirit makes you move at the pace that they want you to move at, and you enjoy it because you're feeding off the people, the people are feeding off of you, and everybody came for the reason -- to have a good time. I can remember very well going onstage and saying, "Oh, man, I got the flu, I'm probably gonna die of the wheeze," and as soon as they call my name, I became another Bobby Womack. I jumped onstage, man, and just was going crazy. Boy, that feeling will never leave. I say records and that stuff come and go, but the spirit lives on and it reminds you why you first chose the business. Because before I even had a record, I was able to go onstage and perform.

Do you consider yourself more of a performer than a recording artist?

I think it's a little bit of both, because all you do when you record, you're really going in telling a story if you write the song. And you're trying to get that message out with as less distraction as possible. And when you go onstage, you found out how many people heard the message because they're out there and they're responding. So you both have something in common. They giving it and I'm giving it. And we both getting off on it.