This week’s round-up of Slicing Up Eyeballs headlines includes news about Kate Bush, Peter Buck, Erasure, J Mascis, Husker Du, Howard Jones, Madness, Paul Weller, Mike Watt, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Lee Ranaldo, The Cure and Close Lobters — plus a B-52’s live DVD giveaway.

Following the break-up of R.E.M. last year, frontman Michael Stipe was quick to say he had no intentions of making a solo album — but that doesn’t appear to be the case for guitarist Peter Buck. Longtime R.E.M. sideman Scott McCaughey broke the news this week to KIRO 97.3 radio show Seattle Sounds.

This year’s South By Southwest will feature appearances by a horde of ’80s college rock vets, including The Jesus and Mary Chain, Bob Mould performing ‘Copper Blue,’ The Wedding Present, Thomas Dolby, The Cult, Dinosaur Jr and The dB’s, plus R.E.M.’s Peter Buck and Mike Mills playing Big Star’s ‘Third.’

Slicing Up Eyeballs caught up with the Dream Syndicate’s Steve Wynn last week as he was rehearsing with The Baseball Project for a tour that hits both South By Southwest — for a marathon 14 gigs — and a series of spring training ballgames.

This week’s new releases include The The’s soundtrack to the film ‘Tony’; a new best-of from Scritti Politti; Mike Watt’s punk opera ‘Hyphenated-Man’; the second album from Steve Wynn’s The Baseball Project; a new OMD single; and This Mortal Coil on vinyl.

Now less than a month away, the schedule for the South By Southwest music festival is starting to solidify, with a host of ’80s college rock vets slated to make appearances in Austin, Texas, next month — including Duran Duran, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Edwyn Collins, World Party, J Mascis and more.

Today’s assortment of online odds and ends includes a great new Smiths/Morrissey visual discography, a podcast of The Fall’s best Peel sessions, the first taste of Peter Buck’s and Steve Wynn’s second Baseball Project album, and an interview with Chrissie Hynde.

The influence of R.E.M. on indie-folk outfit The Decemberists is no secret, so it’s no surprise to see that Colin Meloy and Co. trotted out a cover of ‘Cuyahoga’ off ‘Lifes Rich Pageant’ during the band’s visit to KCRW’s ‘Morning Becomes Eclectic’ on Thursday.

Peter Buck is no stranger to jumping on stage for a good jam, so when former Hüsker Dü frontman Bob Mould swung through Athens, Ga., on July 25, 1990, in support of ‘Black Sheets of Rain,’ the R.E.M. guitarist pitched in on a crunchy cover of Neil Young’s classic-rock staple ‘Cinnamon Girl.’

Members of R.E.M.’s fan club have begun receiving their annual holiday single in the mail, and, like last year’s, the 2010 installment features the return of departed drummer Bill Berry on a cover of Darlene Love’s classic ‘Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)’ — as well as an instrumental mashup of three tracks off the band’s forthcoming album ‘Collapse Into Now.’

Anyone who saw the ‘Monster’ tour in 1995 no doubt remembers that ‘Country Feedback,’ off 1991’s not-toured ‘Out of Time,’ was the set’s highlight, capped off each night with a mesmerizing solo from Peter Buck — a guitarist not generally prone to long turns in the spotlight.

The latest side project from R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck — the country-tinged Tired Pony, fronted by Snow Patrol singer Gary Lightbody — stopped by the ‘Late Show with David Letterman’ last night to perform ‘Dead American Writers,’ off the band’s just-released debut ‘The Place We Ran From.’

R.E.M. tonight posted a minute-long video of the band’s recent recording sessions in Nashville, showing, in typically enigmatic fashion, Michael Stipe playing high-pitched noises off some kind of contraption while the rest of the band and assorted personnel record a round of handclaps — after which Peter Buck asks, ‘Should we double track it?’