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.”