Just hours before Irish rock band Snow Patrol played an intimate tour opener at New York City's 600-capacity Bowery Ballroom, frontman Gary Lightbody spoke with SPIN.com about "Crack the Shutters," the new single from his group's latest album, A Hundred Million Suns<

For nearly three years, since the release of his band's 2006 album, Eyes Open, Snow Patrol's wise-cracking frontman Gary Lightbody would drop into producer Garret "Jacknife" Lee's studio in Westmeath, Ireland, to tinker with ideas -- ideas that were eventually fleshed out on the band's just-release follow-up, A Hundred Millions Suns.

As we here at SPIN.com sit back and look at the past week, we can't help but wonder: Is the U.K. planning a musical takeover? Oasis and Snow Patrol both kicked off massive North American tours; Lily Allen premiered a brand new single and video; Coldplay was slapped with a new lawsuit; and Robbie Williams revealed his, uh, weird drug habits. It appears the invasion has already begun.

Snow Patrol may have began as an indie rock band, but over the course of 10 years and five albums, frontman Gary Lightbody and Co. have created their own lovesick brand of commercially viable mid-tempo pop rock -- the kind their fans have come to adore. And last night on the opening date of the group's U.S.

The Kinks are the latest to join the recent reunion trend. The '60s legends, who last performed together in 1996, have been working on new material. "We've started a little bit of this and that," singer Ray Davies told BBC News, adding, "but it is too early to judge the quality.

Here's a rundown of the albums available online and in record stores today: