April 3, 2012 – Put them in, coach. They're ready to play. Foo Fighters, My Morning Jacket, Miranda Lambert, and other big-name artists are teaming up with John Fogerty for his fall album Wrote a Song for Everyone, the former Creedence Clearwater Revival frontman has announced. Billed as a "celebration of Fogerty's iconic songbook," the album combines newly recorded songs the California roots-rocker's hugely influential back catalogue with an unspecified number of totally new tracks. One of the albums from CCR's terrific late-'60s/early '70s run was titled Willy and the Poor Boys, but the new record's list of contributors is nothing if not rich with talent.

April 3, 2012 – The Flaming Lips, the Roots, Public Enemy, Of Montreal, Girl Talk, Spoon, and Modest Mouse are among the musical heavy hitters who've spent their Fourth of July weekend in Des Moines to headline the Iowa capital's 80/35 festival. This year, the fest's fifth, will see Death Cab for Cutie and the Avett Brothers topping the bill for the July 6-7 event, organizers announced today. Midwest festival-goers won't only be getting sensitive, emotive pop-rock and harmony-drenched open-air folk-pop, however. Dinosaur Jr., Fucked Up, Freddie Gibbs, and Dan Deacon are also on the bill, along with Leftover Salmon and Greensky Bluegrass.

April 3, 2012 – L.A.'s Edward Sharpe is still in folksy character on the latest track from May 29 album Here, the follow-up to 2009 breakthrough Up From Below. "That's What's Up," which like previously surfaced Here opener "Man on Fire" sticks to the sweetly down-home, She & Him-meets-Walk the Line nostalgia of their love-lovin' best song, "Home." As on that track, bandleader Alex Ebert — formerly of spazzy new wave revivalists Ima Robot — duets here with singer Jade Castrinos, and once again they're exchanging sweet nothings, complete with whistling and jug-band bass. "You've got my love to lean on, darlin'," goes the sunny chorus. Spoiler: That's what's up.

April 3, 2012 – In which T.I. reminds us why we love him. Tip's recent streak of musical activity since getting out of prison last fall has made it all too easy to take the self-proclaimed King of the South for granted. Generic party bangers? Faceless street boasts? On "Love This Life," the first single (available now on iTunes) from upcoming album Trouble Man, the Atlanta rapper born Clifford Harris returns to the regal, effortless-sounding savoir fair that helped make him so appealing in the first place. It doesn't hurt that this song starts with an actual, focused concept: T.I. wants us back. And, in his telling as in reality, we really can't find another Tip. Of course, he's addressing a romantic interest, not necessarily fans or critics, but the point is made either way.

April 2, 2012 – Fast-forward to Coachella later this month. On the last night of each of the festival's two weekends, Dr. Dre will be headlining with Snoop Dogg. If recent weather patterns hold, sweaty fans will be cooling down after a sweltering 90-degree day. And, just maybe, decades-younger Compton rapper Kendrick Lamar will join his new Aftermath Music boss onstage for a moment-perfect rendition of slow-burning Southern California ode "The Recipe." With a Lamar-sung hook that languidly flaunts L.A.'s "women, weed, and weather," Lamar's latest joins Best Coast's "The Only Place" in the recent canon of stoner musical tributes to the Golden State.

April 2, 2012 – MGMT's first album, Oracular Spectacular, was effervescent electro-pop, party rock anthems before party rocking required an apology. Their second, Congratulations, prankingly left-turned into druggy psych-rock esoteria. Palates now cleansed, what we can hear of the first song to emerge since suggests MGMT's third album might split the distance between those two previous extremes. NME points to a fan video of the Connecticut-bred band played a new song on Friday night during the Festival Estereo Picnic in Bogotá, Colombia. "It has acoustic guitar," bedheaded frontman Andrew VanWyngarden says by way of introduction to the song, which he calls "Alien Days" (or "Alien Daze" — pesky homophones!).

April 2, 2012 – Underneath effects-pedal whiz Oliver Ackermann's industrial-grade squalls of distortion, A Place to Bury Strangers have always tucked away shimmery goth-pop songcraft. Both aspects of the New York band return in equal measure on "You Are the One," the advance MP3 from the group's upcoming album Worship, which Dead Oceans will release on June 26. Building on last year's Onwards to the Wall EP, it's the first album from Ackermann and the crew since 2009's Exploding Head. "You Are the One" has more of the ear-rending sonics on which Ackermann has built his Death by Audio business, though he always seems to keep the shrillest settings to himself. At the same time, the song is a simple plea for a lover who's gone, with Ackermann almost whispering at points atop the lockstep, krautrock-tinged pummeling.

April 2, 2012 – Jack White is well into his Willy Wonka phase, and that's great news for everybody. Right after releasing the world's first 3 RPM single (that's right, three), the former White Stripes frontman's Third Man Records has found an equally unconventional way to premiere a track from his upcoming solo album. It wasn't an April Fool's joke, but yesterday the label sent 1,000 flexi discs containing previously unreleased Blunderbuss cut "Freedom at 21" into the air attached to helium balloons, as you can see in the video below. The launch took place from the label's Nashville headquarters. According to Third Man, the balloons include postcards instructing their lucky finders on how to submit photos and information on where and when they discovered the record. All of those details will end up online.

March 30, 2012 – "...And again, and again for the first time," John Maus repeats in an uncharacteristically sentimental-sounding moment from brittle synth-pop deconstruction "No Title (Molly)," which labels Domino and Ribbon will issue on April 21 as part of Record Store Day. (Perhaps Madonna would dig this one?) The phrase is an evocative one from the academic-minded Ariel Pink pal in a few ways. Especially in the context of this release. Maus' recordings, including 2011 Ribbon debut We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves, run with turn-of-the-'80s analogue synth sounds as if they were still new, or at least, new again. "No Title (Molly)," with its stentorian vocal and icy precision, at first recalls Joy Division or Suicide, though when it opens up into the dewy romanticism of the bridge, it's as if Maus is using these old tropes to express feelings that are very much now.

March 30, 2012 – Moody British rockers 2:54 aren't necessarily morning people. The last time guitarist Colette Thurlow puked, she told us recently, it was after a night opening for fellow '90s anthem-churners the Big Pink. Led by Thurlow and sister Hannah, the band deals in darkly brooding dream-pop, more akin to similarly 4AD-indebted groups like School of Seven Bells and Trailer Trash Tracys than latest 4AD signee SpaceGhostPurrp. So if 2:54 — one of our must-see acts at SXSW — show up early, you know it's serious. After a couple of U.K.-only singles, the crew is set to release its self-titled debut album on May 28 via Fat Possum, and "You're Early" is the first video selection. "I just wanna be close to you," the sisters sing, harmonizing with each other, on a patient yet muscular song with stalker-like themes. They've been watching us.