The new video for ‘I Spit Roses’ by director Justin Coloma finds Peter Murphy — who’s done time as and-screen vampire — made up like some sort of pirate as he makes his way through the nautically themed story.

Last March while in Austin, Texas, for the South By Southwest music festival, former Orange Juice frontman Edwyn Collins popped into Big Orange Recording to knock out a five-song live session for Daytrotter — which was posted Monday and is available as a free download.

After weeks of postponements due to Simon Le Bon’s vocal problems, Duran Duran has begun rescheduling many of its scrubbed concerts, including its entire U.K. arena tour and four key European shows — plus the band says it will mount a four-to-six-week U.S. tour beginning in late September.

Indie buzz band Surfer Blood covers the Pixies classic “Gigantic” in this week’s installment of The AV Club’s Undercover series, in which bands drop in on the site’s Chicago offices and pick a song off a predetermined list to cover live in a very small room.

Erasure today announced the completion of ‘Tomorrow’s World,’ the group’s first new record in four years, which will arrive this fall on Mute Records and be accompanied by a 25-date North American tour.

Thirty years ago today, 2 Tone ska kings The Specials released their landmark single ‘Ghost Town,’ a haunting soundtrack to England’s early-’80s economic despair and civil unrest. Check out several video version of the unforgettable U.K. No. 1 hit.

For a band with just one album and a handful of EPs and singles, Bauhaus spinoff Tones on Tail already has been the subject of more than its share of compilations, and now comes another: ‘Weird Pop,’ a double-vinyl best-of that features at least one previously unreleased cut and several other rarities.

This week’s new releases include an audiophile vinyl reissue of ‘Copper Blue,’ the debut from Bob Mould’s post-Husker Du power trio; The Japanese Popstars’ ‘Controlling Your Allegiance,’ featuring the single ‘Take Forever’ with The Cure’s Robert Smith; and a 2CD reissue of Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s ‘Liverpool.’

A treasure trove of early ’80s concert footage shot at New Order’s legendary club FAC51 The Hacienda soon will make its way online thanks to a deal by Ikon — Factory Records’ video spinoff — to provide its remaining archive of performances to Peter Hook’s site fac51thehacienda.com.

Eight months after the release of ‘Olympia,’ occasional Roxy Music frontman Bryan Ferry is embarking on a mammoth tour this summer and fall that will take him to Israel and all across the U.K. and Europe — plus his first U.S. dates since 2003.

Twenty-five years ago today, The Smiths released their third — and, arguably, best — album, ‘The Queen is Dead,’ a note-perfect marriage of Johnny Marr’s peerless pop songcraft and Morrissey’s pointed political commentary, lovesick laments and wicked humor.

No stranger to odd musical detours — whether it be ‘Metal Machine Music’ or his most recent project, ‘Hudson River Wind Meditations’ — the legendary Lou Reed has a particularly unlikely musical partner for his next album: thrash-metal titans Metallica.

San Francisco noise-rock act Railcars this summer will release a cover of the classic first side of Kate Bush’s 1985 album ‘Hounds of Love’ on limited-edition cassette and one-sided vinyl formats — and you can hear three of the genre-bending tracks here.