A couple days before making headlines at South By Southwest by declaring America and its music “exhausted,” former Boomtown Rats leader Bob Geldof dropped by ‘The Late Show with David Letterman’ to promote his new album ‘How to Compose Popular Songs That Will Sell.’

Synthpop vets The Human League — leader Philip Oakey and singers Joanne Catherall and Susan Ann Sulley — deliver their first album in a decade next week, and to promote it, they’ve just released the second single off the disc, album opener “Never Let Me Go.”

With the Pet Shop Boys’ ballet ‘The Most Incredible Thing’ now in previews — it officially premieres Tuesday at London’s Sadler’s Wells dance house — the duo’s Neil Tennant sat down with the Associated Press to discuss scoring the Hans Christian Andersen adaptation.

Last week, Erasure frontman Andy Bell was just one of several guests to take the stage at a special retrospective concert in London staged by Propaganda singer Claudia Brücken in conjunction with the recent release of her new best-of ‘Combined.’

MTV announced today that it will revive its hugely influential Sunday night alternative-music video outlet ‘120 Minutes’ as a weekly online series called ‘120 Seconds’ hosted by Matt Pinfield on web portal MTV Hive and a monthly show that will be televised on sister network MTV2.

While Mick Jones has yet to publicly debut the reunited Big Audio Dynamite, he took time last night to perform at the star-studded launch party for London’s new W Hotel — and enlisted The Who’s Roger Daltrey to help sing The Clash’s classic ‘London Calling.’

Twenty-five years ago today, Depeche Mode released its fifth album, the landmark ‘Black Celebration,’ which opened a dark trilogy — including 1987’s ‘Music for the Masses’ and 1990’s ‘Violator’ — that cemented the synthpop act’s evolution from underground cult faves to global chart-toppers.

With the long-awaited ‘Upside Down: The Creation Records Story’ making its North American debut last night at South By Southwest, the documentary’s makers have issued a new trailer for the film — now set for DVD/Blu-ray release in the U.K. on May 9.

For our latest installment of Vintage Video, we bring you a complete mid-’80s concert by Aussie powerhouse Midnight Oil — the landmark ‘Oils on the Water’ concert staged Jan. 13, 1985, on Sydney’s Goat Island as part of Australian radio station Triple J’s 10th anniversary.

This week’s episode of the Chicago-based syndicated radio show ‘Sound Opinions’ features an interview with and performance by the reunited Scottish indie-pop outfit The Vaselines, which the show’s producers are teasing with video of three live-in-the-studio performances.

Fresh off last year’s 30th anniversary celebration, New Jersey retro-rockers The Smithereens reunite this spring with their ’80s-era producer Don Dixon for the band’s first album of new material in 11 years: the aptly titled ‘Smithereens 2011.’

The latest installment of indie behemoth Amoeba Music’s web series ‘What’s In My Bag?’ asks Johnny Marr the titular question during his recent visit to the chain’s Hollywood store.

As promised, ‘Rattle My Cage’ — the lead-off track from The Primitives’ new EP ‘Never Kill a Secret,’ due out digitally this week — is ‘a bit noisier’ than our first taste of the four-song release.