Motorifik, the side project of Working for a Nuclear Free City’s Phil Kay, and accompanied by French songwriter Idrisse Khélifi, is rife with pop flourishes and dance elements that nod often to the fabled scene of Kay’s hometown of Manchester. It largely eschews the more esoteric, exploratory elements that have been favored of late by his main band in favor of well-crafted, conventional pop tunes.

Another year, another new Weezer album, another…well, not disappointment, really, since we all know what to expect by now, but another dumbing down from one of America’s once-great rock bands.

Yann Tiersen closes his newest album, Dust Lane, with an upbeat guitar and voice tune called “Fuck Me.” It’s a well-earned, tongue-in-cheek movement for the violinist-turned- composer. With six studio albums and three soundtracks (including 2001 standout, Amélie), Tiersen has made a career out of delivering lush instrumentals while quietly subverting expectations.

The 15th album by punk veterans Bad Religion shows the typical mixed with some unexpected, begging the question, can a punk band reinvent themselves after 30 years?

The Concretes’ fourth album, WYWH, represents the band’s return to stateside audiences for the first time since Victoria Bergsman, the singer and songwriter who helmed the band’s early success, left the band after 2006’s In Colour.

A side project from Wilco members John Stirratt and Pat Sansone, The Autumn Defense released their first album, The Green Hour, in 2001.

After so many years of aural lab work, it’s easy to imagine Brian Eno settling into his familiar work spot and thinking, “What now?” Small Craft on a Milk Sea seems a likely record for this stage of Eno’s career: a set of instrumental studies exploring a varied group of settings and directions that display the breadth of his craft.

With its sophomore album, Chicago’s The 1900s has said goodbye to two band members and the anachronistic orchestral pop of its debut.

The Coral keep making the same record over and over again. If you’re into sea shanties with great harmonies, then you’re in luck. The Coral has turned that blueprint around for the sixth time on The Butterfly House. Instead of sounding stale, this group from the wrong side of Liverpool’s Mersey River, the Wirral, is getting better at their branded sound.