The three original studio albums from the legendary 2-Tone ska act The Specials — 1979′s The Specials, 1980′s More Specials and 1984′s In the Studio — will be reissued this March in expanded 2CD sets featuring non-album singles, live material, instrumentals and Peel sessions.
Paul Weller will follow up 2012′s Sonik Kicks with a brand-new album this year, a record titled Saturn’s Pattern that is due to arrive sometime in 2015, according to the former Jam leader. While Weller has not revealed a release date for his 11th solo album, he did recently disclose the tracklist.
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark will reissue its fifth album, 1984′s pop comeback Junk Culture, in February as a two-disc Deluxe Edition that will find the original album fully remastered and supplemented by a disc of the era’s B-sides, extended remixes and five previously unreleased songs and demos.
The spate of hugely expanded box-set reissues continues next year with Simple Minds’ breakthrough sixth album Sparkle in the Rain — featuring the singles “Waterfront” and “Up on the Catwalk” — set for re-release a a five-disc set featuring B-sides, remixes, BBC sessions, a previously unreleased concert.
B-52s co-founder Kate Pierson will make her solo debut next year with the release of Guitars and Microphones, a 10-track album described as “marrying party rock, psychedelia and socio-political punk” and featuring songs co-written by Sia and a guest appearance by guitarist Nick Valensi of The Strokes.
The Pixies will mark the 25th anniversary of their classic sophomore album Doolittle with an expanded 3CD, 50-track reissue this December that will feature, as bonus material, the record’s B-sides, two of the band’s Peel sessions in their entireties, and a full disc’s worth of demos.
R.E.M. this November will unleash a mammoth video package documenting 30 years of live performances, award show highlights and TV appearances on MTV’s networks, a six-DVD set called “REMTV” that will collect 14 hours of material, including a new feature-length documentary called “R.E.M. by MTV.”
After releasing a steady stream of 7-inch singles over the past couple years, The Dead Milkmen return next month with their first new album in three years, a 17-track collection called Pretty Music For Pretty People that, perhaps not surprisingly, contains many of the songs included on those limited-edition 45s.
Late last month, Siouxsie and the Banshees confirmed the long-overdue reissue of the final four albums in the band’s catalog, and while tracklists were not announced at the time, they’ve now been revealed as the re-releases have appeared on Amazon UK for pre-order ahead of the Oct. 13 street date.
An impressive set of The Wedding Present reissues will arrive this fall, a campaign that sees the first decade of David Gedge and Co.’s catalog expanded into 3CD/1DVD sets brimming with extras that include non-album singles, B-sides, BBC sessions, live concerts, music videos and much more.
Scruffy the Cat — part of the late-’80s cowpunk scene that helped spawn the alt-country movement — get their due in the coming months with both the full digital release of the band’s catalog and, on CD, the arrival of a new collection of previously unreleased live and studio material.
Johnny Marr returns this October with what’s being billed as his sophomore solo album, the 11-song Playland, a collection of new music built “around a common theme of ‘songs that move at the speed of life’” that arrives just 18 months after the release of his first official solo record, The Messenger.
We’re still two months away from the arrival of Erasure’s 16th studio album, The Violet Flame, but the duo has just offered up the first taste of the record in the form of first single “Elevation,” which you can stream here. Vince Clarke and Andy Bell also revealed the full tracklist for the album,
Omnivore Recordings will launch a new Game Theory reissue campaign this September with the first release of the band’s debut Blaze of Glory in its original form since the album’s original issue in 1982, supplementing the 12-track record with 15 bonus tracks,
Like Mission of Burma, Scottish indie-pop faves The Vaselines are on their way to becoming more prolific post-reunion than in their original incarnation, this week announcing their second post-reunion album, and only their third overall, called V for Vaselines.
Robyn Hitchcock this August will release a brand-new, Joe Boyd-produced album titled The Man Upstairs that will be “part well-known favorites, part personal discoveries, and part originals,” according to Yep Roc Records. The first offering off the record is an acoustic take on the Psychedelic Furs’ classic “The Ghost in You.”
The Mission is following up last year’s reunion album The Brightest Light with a brand-new EP that will feature four new songs that each are sung by a different member of the band — plus, for those who purchase the digital version, a bonus fifth track in the form of a cover of Bob Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower.”
A new 50-song compilation of early R.E.M. material called Complete Rarities: I.R.S. 1982-1987 is due out digitally next month, but appears to be largely, if not completely, comprised of tracks previously assembled on 1987′s out-of-print Dead Letter Office, a more recent I.R.S. years best-of and singles.
Paul Weller this June will follow up 1998′s Modern Classics compilation with a new companion best-of — cleverly titled More Modern Classics — that will pick up where the previous set left off, collecting 20 favorites by the former Jam leader recorded over the past 15 years, including a brand-new single.
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