For the second time in less than four months, Van Halen is denying reports that it will be fronting the new upcoming second season of Rock Star, the CBS reality series that found INXS a new lead singer during last summer's first season of the show.

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New reports that the band would star in Rock Star's second season emerged earlier this week, with AOL's TMZ.com website reporting that sources had told it that Van Halen would star in this summer's Rock Star: INXS sequel. Reached by TMZ.com, Van Halen publicist Larry Solters declined to deny the report. "I'm not denying it. I'm not going to answer any questions about it," Solters told TMZ.com in a story published Sunday.

However that didn't last long, and similar to what happened last fall when MTV.com also had a difficult time attempting to understand the band's publicist's doublespeak (an event that ended in MTV formally retracting its report that Van Halen would appear in the then still unordered second season and issuing a mea culpa correction), both Solters and CBS are now both denying that Van Halen will star in Rock Star's sequel.

After TMZ.com published its initial weekend story, Solters contacted TMZ on Monday and "vehemently" denied that the band would appear in Rock Star's sequel and explained that his previous comments had been "in no way" intended to confirm that Van Halen would star in Rock Star: The Series (CBS' current working title for the show, given its current absence of an announced band.)

CBS also voiced in on the matter on Tuesday. "All it is is a rumor, we deny it," a CBS Entertainment spokesperson told Billboard.com. "We don't even have [an act] firmly established yet, though, hopefully we will shortly."

In the meantime, the lack of a firm second season star -- or, if last month's comments from Rock Star's producers are still accurate, a firm decision as to whether Rock Star 2 will even feature a previously established rock band as its star -- that hasn't stopped the show from beginning its casting search.

Although applicants aren't being told many details about exactly what they're trying out for, Rock Star has already begun accepting mail-in applications, with its North American casting call tour scheduled to begin March 1 in Austin, TX. Reached by Reality TV World last week, the show's network spokesperson confirmed that interested singers are presently being asked to apply for the show without knowing whether they'll be attempting to join some still undetermined existing band or instead joining a Making The Band-like series that will result in the formation of an entirely new rock group.

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