OMD have announced UK and European dates in October and November. Their 'History of Modern' tour will feature the band's classic line up of Andy McCluskey, Paul Humphreys, Martin Cooper and Malcolm Holmes and will support their forthcoming new album of the same name. See GIGS for all the dates.

THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS have announced UK dates for October during which they will perform their 1981 album 'Talk, Talk, Talk' in its entirety alongside an encore set of classics from across their career. See GIGS for all the dates.

VINCE CLARKE is auctioning his silver award for YAZOO's 1983 hit 'Nobody's Diary' on EBAY to benefit the Rett Syndrome Research Trust charity. The disc has been autographed by Vince Clarke and the auction is open to bids from anywhere in the world!

SPANDAU BALLET will release expanded and remastered editions of their 'True' and 'Parade' albums on June 21st. 'True' will be released in a three disc edition featuring a CD of the original album, remastered; a CD of bonus material including previously unreleased remixes and live tracks; and a DVD of the band playing live at London's Sadlers Wells theatre in 1983. 'Parade' will appear in a 2-CD edition, featuring the remastered album and a number of bonus tracks on one disc and a BBC In Concert show recorded at Wembley Arena in 1984 on the other. See NEWS for the full tracklisting of both albums.

HEAVEN 17 have extended their 'Penthouse and Pavement' dates into November and December with the announcement of another run of UK shows that will see the band perform their classic 1981 album in its entirety. See GIGS for all the dates.

KYLIE MINOGUE has announced the tracklisting for her forthcoming album, 'Aphrodite', which will be released on July 5th, preceded by a new single 'All The Lovers' on June 28th. See NEWS for the album tracklisting.

A-HA will play a special show at London's Royal Albert Hall on October 8th where they will play their debut album 'Hunting High and Low' in its entirety.

HOWARD JONES has announced an eleven-date acoustic tour of the UK in September, see GIGS for all the dates. Jones will also play a live set at London's La Beat Route Club on May 25th as part of the launch party for Bestival's 'Back To The Phuture' night. Also appearing at the show will be HEAVEN 17's MARTYN WARE who, along with RUSTY EGAN, will be playing a DJ set.

BOY GEORGE is expected to announce the release date of his new album shortly, however the album will be called 'Extraordinary Alien' and is expected to feature sixteen tracks, see NEWS for more details.

THE LOTUS EATERS' classic 'No Sense Of Sin' album has just been reissued in an expanded twenty-track edition featuring a number of bonus tracks. The band are currently putting the finishing touches to a new album and are planning some live dates which will be announced shortly. See NEWS for the full album tracklisting.

ALI CAMPBELL'S UB40 have been added to the line-up of the forthcoming Guilfest Festival, joining a bill that already includes THE HUMAN LEAGUE, KID CREOLE AND THE COCONUTS, LEVEL 42 and STATUS QUO among many others.

REM have announced details of a 2-CD reissue of their 'Fables Of The Reconstruction' album on July 13th. The 25th anniversary reissue will feature the original album in a remastered edition plus a fourteen-rack CD of previously unreleased demo tracks. See NEWS for the full album tracklisting.

KING's 1985 album 'Steps In Time' will be reissued on May 24th with seven bonus tracks including remixes and b-sides. See NEWS for the full album tracklisting.

CYNDI LAUPER and BELINDA CARLISLE are both said to have written autobiographies that will be published this year. Although there is very little information currently available about the Cyndi Lauper book which is expected later in the year after the June 22nd release of her new album 'Memphis Blues', Belinda Carlisle's will be entitled 'Lips Unsealed: A Memoir' and will be published in June.

WANG CHUNG will release a new EP, entitled 'Abducted By The 80s', on August 2nd however the release will be available from the band's website and at their forthcoming tour dates from June 7th, The release will come in a CD package featuring one disc of re-recorded versions of the band's hits -including 'Dance Hall Days' and 'Everybody Have Fun Tonight' - and one disc of new material. The band will be on tour in the US in June and July, see GIGS for all the dates.

SONIA has marked the 20th anniversary of her 'Everybody Knows' album with a reissued and remastered edition which is available via iTunes. PWL meanwhile have been releasing rare Sonia material from their archive including six megamix tracks, and nine or ten-track digital editions of 'You'll Never Stop me Loving You', 'Can't Forget You', 'Listen To Your Heart', 'Counting Every Minute' and 'End Of The World'.

JOHNNY MARR has been awarded the Inspiration award at this year's ceremony for the prestigious Ivor Novello Awards in London.

With thanks to www.remembertheeighties.com for the news this week!!!

Hey there! Some Hot Chip news you might have missed out on...

The festival season has begun and the band are out there gigging heavily all over the planet. Following shows at SOS in Spain, the Liberation festival in Gronigen and Electronic Beats in Prague, Hot Chip will spend most weekends this summer playing to fields of sun kissed/mud stained (delete as applicable) dancing kids. All of the band's dates and links to the festival websites are listed in the live section on the site??- more shows are being added all of the time...

Back in the band's hometown, Hot Chip are the inspiration behind a window display in one of London's most iconic shops - Selfridges. Along with genius artist Pete Fowler??they have created a beautiful installation inspired by recent single "I Feel Better". It's part of an exhibition called Sounds Of The Mind... Get down there or check it out here.

Hot Chip's Al Doyle on the window... "When we were asked about taking a window at Selfridges and creating a 'Hot Chip' installation we immediately thought of Pete Fowler... He jumped at it... It's been a real pleasure putting this thing together. ??We've really let him just get on with it and pursue his vision"

...and artist Pete Fowler... "I was chuffed to be asked by the band to create a design for a window display interpreting their recent single I Feel Better. I took the lyrics mostly as the inspiration for this design, the words touch on both happiness and darkness, love and fear and I decided to transplant these feelings into this design. Two creatures alone in a sometimes frightening, cruel but wonderful world,??both in it together... I can't wait to see it!"

It's up now - check it out over the next few weeks while wandering down Oxford Street.
You can view some pictures over at the band's Myspace site.

VINCE CLARKE AWARD FOR YAZOO'S 'NOBODY'S DIARY' UP FOR AUCTION
Vince Clarke is auctioning the BPI silver disc he received in 1983 for Yazoo's hit 'Nobody's Diary' to benefit the Rett Syndrome Research Trust charity. The award, to mark 250,000 UK sales of the single, has been signed by Vince and is available for bids - via eBay - until May 26th. I can confirm that this auction is available to international bidders so go and have a look, it's all for a very good cause!

ANDY BELL LIMITED EDITION 'NON-STOP' T-SHIRTS + FREE AUTOGRAPHED POSTCARDS
To mark the release of Andy's 'Non-Stop' album on June 7th, I've been working with Andy on a set of three special 'Non-Stop' t-shirts which will be available for pre-order only for a very limited period over at the Official Erasure Shop at Lexer Music. In addition, Andy will sign 100 special 'Non-Stop' postcards which will be included in the first 100 orders worth over £30 which contain an Andy Bell 'Non-Stop' t-shirt plus any other Andy Bell/Erasure music or merchandise available at Lexer Music.

VINCE CLARKE - NEW AUDIO PLAYER + FREE ASH REMIX DOWNLOAD
I have added a new audio player to Vince's website which will allow you to hear his recent remixes for Polly Scattergood, The Saturdays, Franz Ferdinand, The Presets, Ash, A Place To Bury Strangers, Erasure and Space Cowboy. We hope you enjoy having a listen, and if you like the remix of 'True Love 1980' that Vince has done for Ash - one of twenty-six singles Ash are releasing over a single year, more details in the news section on Vince's site - then it is also available as a free download over at Ash's website!

ANDY BELL IN THE MEDIA
Gaydar's Phil Marriott interviewed Andy for his show last week and has very kindly sent over the audio for anyone who missed the original show. It's a great interview, clocking in at around twenty minutes, which covers pretty much everything and is well worth a listen! It's streaming for you in the news section at Andy's website.
Elsewhere in the media, 'Subject/Object', one of the tracks from Andy's 'Non-Stop' album, appeared in USA Today's prestigious feature 'The Playlist' this week alongside picks from Barbra Streisand, Doves and Dido among others, more on Andy's website!

VINCE CLARKE PRODUCES 'LOVESICK' FOR TONYA HURLEY AND POLLY SCATTERGOOD
Vince Clarke has produced and mixed a new song entitled 'Lovesick' which is sung by Polly Scattergood using lyrics written by Ghostgirl author Tonya Hurley. The lyrics were written for Ghostgirl character Scarlet to sing in the forthcoming book 'Ghostgirl - Lovesick', which is due for publication in July. Polly Scattergood then created the music for the track and provided vocals before handing the track over to Vince Clarke for mixing and production. There is also a competition running on the Ghostgirl channel at YouTube which invites anyone to video-record their own version of 'Lovesick' in any style. Winners will have their video broadcast at Comic-Con as well as receiving all sorts of Ghostgirl merchandise signed by Tonya Hurley with a one-of-a-kind Ghostgirl guitar going to the overall winner!

ANDY BELL 'CALL ON ME' SINGLE DOWNLOAD AT iTUNES + 'NON-STOP' ALBUM AT AMAZON
'Call On Me' is now available to pre-order at iTunes UK, the single - as you should know by now! - will be released on May 31st (June 1st in the US and I will bring you the US iTunes link as soon as I have it). Andy's 'Non-Stop' album is also now available for pre-order from Amazon UK and Amazon US and will be released on June 7th (June 8th in the US). Mute Bank are still taking pre-orders for 'Non-Stop' and their exclusive Vince Clarke remix of the title track, 'Non-Stop', as a free download! See the Mute Bank website for all the details.

Special thanks goes out to Richard of www.erasureinfo.com