The reconfigured Big Country — with The Alarm’s Mike Peters filling in for the late Stuart Adamson and the new addition of original Simple Minds bassist Derek Forbes — will release a new album titled ‘The Journey’ this spring and embark on a world tour that will hit the U.K., Europe and North America.

Bassist Tony Butler — who joined Big Country prior to the recording of its 1982 debut single ‘Harvest Home’ — announced this past weekend that he’s leaving the recently reunited band, writing in a message to fans that ‘after 32 years of incredible highs and a very tragic low, I feel that now is the time to look to new horizons.’

This week’s roundup of headlines includes items on Killing Joke’s Jaz Coleman, New Order, Ian McCulloch, R.E.M., Aztec Camera, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Jazz Butcher, Crime and the City Solution, Men Without Hats, Ministry, Public Image Ltd., Close Lobsters, Mojo Nixon and more.

For our latest installment of Vintage Video, we turn, yet again, to the fabulous archive of the German TV show ‘Rockpalast,’ this time for a full, 100-minute concert by Big Country that was filmed March 15, 1986, during the band’s tour ahead of the release of its third album, ‘The Seer.’

He’s been busy of late fronting the resurgent Big Country at performances across the pond, but The Alarm frontman Mike Peters will make it to these shores for a special, one-off solo-acoustic show at Maxwell’s in Hoboken, N.J., on July 4 that’s being billed as a “Spirit of ’76 Independence Day Concert.”

This week’s new releases include a new B-sides compilation from the Pet Shops Boys (‘Format’), a new live album by Wire (‘The Black Session’), a vinyl reissue of Cocteau Twins’ ‘Stars and Topsoil,’ a new John Foxx and the Maths’ album, a 2CD reissue of Big Country’s ‘The Crossing’ and an archival live album from The Plimsouls.’