The members of New Order have been talking up new music since reuniting a few years ago, and the prospect of a new album became that much more real this past September when the band signed to the legendary Mute label and it was announced the group soon would return to the studio to work on new music.

Depeche Mode today announced that Columbia Records will release its upcoming 13th studio album in March, signalling an end to the synthpop act’s relationship with EMI Music, which picked up the group when it purchased Mute Records in 2002. Neither an exact release date nor the album’s title have been revealed.

With their reunion tour set to open tonight in Denver, Australian Simon Bonney’s resurrected art-rock group Crime and the City Solution — which, during the ’80s, included members of The Birthday Party, Swell Maps and Einstürzende Neubauten — today debuted its first new music in 22 years.

As we previously reported, Mute Records this fall will celebrate Slovenian avant-garde industrial group Laibach’s “unique take on the art of the cover version” with a new 15-track compilation called ‘An Introduction To.. Laibach / Reproduction Prohibited,’ which will include a newly recorded version of The Normal’s “Warm Leatherette.”

Mute Records this week released a 10-minute video Q&A with former Depeche Mode bandmates Vince Clarke and Martin L. Gore in which the duo discuss their reunion under the banner of the VCMG techno project, the making of their album ‘Ssss’ and unresolved issues between the two.

Mute Records this fall continues its new compilation series An Introduction To… with a disc celebrating Slovenian avant-garde industrial group Laibach’s “unique take on the art of the cover version,” compiling 15 tracks, including newly recorded version of The Normal’s “Warm Leatherette” and Bob Dylan’s “Ballad of a Thin Man.”