Now that he’s unemployed, former R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe has plenty of time on his hands, which might explain his drop-in at the end of Thursday night’s ‘The Colbert Report.’ Stephen Colbert paid fitting tribute to ‘legendary rockers The R.E.M.s,’ then permanently enshrined Stipe on his ‘rock ‘n’ roll shelf of fame.’

If you caught the ‘Late Show with David Letterman’ last night, you may have seen Peter Gabriel perform his classic ‘Red Rain’ backed by the New Blood Orchestra. However, he also performed a full hour-long concert from the Letterman studio that was webcast, which you can see here.

Long known for their supermodel-filled ’80s videos, Duran Duran takes it a step further in their new nine-minute, Jonas Akerlund-directed “short film” for All You Need is Now single “Girl Panic!” by casting Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford, Eva Herzigova and Helena Christensen as the band’s members.

The Mike Peters-fronted Big Country is commemorating its U.K. comeback tour earlier this year with a collection called ‘Dreams Stay With You: Live 21st April 2011,’ a full 19-track performance spread across two CDs and two DVDs — and which you can preview via a clip of the show-closing ‘In a Big Country.’

Al Jourgensen not only has reactivated Ministry for a new album and tour next summer, but he’s decided to chronicle the recording of the ‘Relapse’ record with a series of short ‘webisodes,’ the first of which can be watched here. The album is due out in spring, with a limited number of U.S. dates next summer.

R.E.M. today released not one but two music videos for its new, and likely final, single ‘We All Go Back To Where We Belong’ — one featuring actress Kirsten Dunst, the other performance artist John Giorno. Both, shot in black and white, simply show a close-up of the face of their subject set to the new single.