Record producer and engineer Stephen Street — who worked on three albums by The Smiths before producing and co-writing Morrissey’s solo debut ‘Viva Hate’ — will be the guest on this week’s episode of the ‘Sound Opinions’ radio program, billed as ‘the world’s only rock ‘n’ roll talk show.’

Synthpop duo Pet Shop Boys this weekend announced they’ve teamed up with choreographer Javier de Frutos to develop a full-length ballet based on the Hans Christian Andersen story ‘The Most Incredible Thing’ that’s set to premiere at London’s Sadler’s Wells dance house next March.

The Pixies continue to map out a busy 2010, with newly announced plans to follow up the band’s second round of U.S. ‘Doolittle’ concerts with a string of Latin American shows this October in Mexico, Brazil, Argentina and Chile.

The Houston, Texas-based Catastrophic Theatre is working with Pixies frontman Black Francis to adapt his 2007 solo album ‘Bluefinger’ — a concept record about the life and death of Dutch rocker and painter Herman Brood — into a rock opera set to debut this fall.

This week’s new releases include a new solo album from the Pixies’ Black Francis called ‘NonStopErotik,’ plus expanded reissues from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Galaxie 500 and Duran Duran, as well as a vintage live album from The Wedding Present.

A group of Israeli human rights activists have asked the Pixies to cancel their June 9 concert in Tel Aviv to protest ‘the military occupation the Palestinian people have been living under,’ urging the reunited band to ‘refuse to perform in Israel until there is freedom here.’

The Pixies have licensed “Isla de Encanta,” off the band’s 1987 debut EP ‘Come On Pilgrim,’ to Visa for a (admittedly quite clever) World Cup-themed TV commercial called “Football Evolution.”

Black Francis has released his long-in-the-works project The Golem, a 4CD/1DVD set and 50-page book chronicling the score to the silent 1920 German expressionist film “Der Golem” that the Pixies frontman wrote for the San Francisco International Film Festival in 2008.

[tweetmeme]Pixies frontman Black Francis will delve into the recording of1989’s Doolittle during a “classic album dissection” on this week’s “Sound Opinions” radio show, aka “the world’s only rock ‘n’ roll talk show.” The episode featuring the rocker also known as Frank Black — hosted by Chicago music critics Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis — [...]

[tweetmeme]Six years into the Pixies’ reunion, the band still hasn’t delivered a new album — yet frontman Black Francis has been madly prolific, and this spring will deliver a new solo album dubbed NonStopErotik even as he begins work on a second Grand Duchy record with his wife, Violet Clark.
The 11-track NonStopErotik, reportedly due out [...]

[tweetmeme]Last night in Los Angeles,  Black Francis hosted a benefit concert called Winston Calling that featured appearances by most of the Pixies — Kim Deal was absent, so Kim Shattuck of The Muffs and Flea filled in on bass — as well as Love and Rockets’ David J, Michael Penn, Tenacious D, OK Go, She [...]

[tweetmeme]Looking for Christmas gift ideas for the Pixies fan and footwear enthusiast in your life? Get ‘em Vans’ black-and-white “Death to the Pixies” shoes, which slap the band’s iconic ’80s T-shirt design — featuring a naked Black Francis hunched over, giving a thumbs-down — onto a pair of skate shoes.
While these fetching sneakers aren’t exactly [...]