The Wedding Present will release a new album later this month called Locked Down and Stripped Back that’s exactly what the title advertises: wtripped-down versions of the band’s songs, plus a couple unreleased numbers, recorded during the COVID-19 lockdown. Hear a brand-new song right here.

New Zealand indie-pop legends The Chills will return this spring with their seventh studio album, the 10-track Scatterbrain that is preceded by the recently released track “You’re Immortal” and the brand-single “Monolith” — which you can hear right here. Plus full tracklist.

With the Bauhaus reunion sidelined by COVID-19, guitarist Daniel Ash found plenty of time in 2020 to focus on a new album by his new band — a trio called Ashes and Diamonds — with plans to release the record later this year, he announced in a podcast interview Monday. More details here.

Cathal Coughlan, the Irish singer-songwriter who co-founded Microdisney and went on to lead The Fatima Mansions, returns today with his first new music in a decade, the single “Song of Co-Aklan,” which also is the title track of his forthcoming solo album. Hear the new song here.

Martin Phillipps recently released a brand-new song by The Chills — it’s called “You’re Immortal,” and you can stream it right here — that comes ahead of an anticipated new album to be released by Fire Records at some point in 2021. A new album from The Chills would be the band’s first since 2018’s Snow Bound.

After a bit of social-media teasing, Mute Records this morning announced the release early next year of a new instrumental electronic EP from Depeche Mode’s Martin Gore, a five-song collection that’s preceded by a “ferocious slice of electro” called “Mandrill.” Hear it right here.