Paul Banks, "Banks" (Matador) -- Interpol front man Paul Banks first stepped aside for his own project in 2009, but he veiled that mostly pre-Interpol material behind a pseudonym, Julian Plenti. Now Banks turns on, well, at least some warm lamplight to illuminate himself. Thankfully, this is not just a batch of songs Interpol didn't get around to recording. In fact, it would be difficult to imagine even angular Interpol tackling the ambitious sweep of these compositions, many of which are mini-suites swinging between accessible indie-rock, pastoral pop and occasionally dissonant psychedelia.

Kids These Days, "Traphouse Rock" (Kids These Days)

Even hyphens couldn't bring together all the styles that Kids These Days offer under one tent. The Chicago-based collective plays funk-alt-rock-pop-jazzy-hip-hop-blues, and that doesn't even start with the subgenres.

The point is, they do it all well, and "Traphouse Rock," due Tuesday, is definitely one of the finest Chicago albums of 2012.

A look ahead at shows worth seeing (and hearing) this week ...

THE AFGHAN WHIGS
Reunited and rarin' to go, Cincinnati's roguish gentlemen acquitted themselves admirably at Lollpalooza in August and now continue mining their grunge and grooves on a new tour. Older than their years during their mid-'90s heyday, Greg Dulli and his mates are now grown into their own sound, coming off like fine Corinthian leather flecked with cigarette ashes.
Wussy opens at 9 p.m. Oct. 26-27 at Metro, 3730 N. Clark. Tickets: $36 (Oct. 27 is sold out). Call (800) 514-ETIX; metrochicago.com.

LURRIE BELL
A great talent derailed years ago by personal problems, Lurrie Bell might have made the record he was born to make. The son of harp master Carey Bell, the Chicago guitarist released "The Devil Ain't Got No Music" last spring, a Satan-taunting set (titled for one of Mavis Staples' favorite interview quips) that tries to reclaim blues from the depths, or bring gospel down to earth, or both. Expect his concert to be a religious experience.
At 6:30 p.m. in the Myron R. Szold Music & Dance Hall at the Old Town School of Folk Music, 4545 N. Lincoln. Tickets: $20. Call (773) 728-6000; oldtownschool.org.

Unlike several of their '70s-'80s pop music peers, REO Speedwagon has not gone back into the studio to re-record their hit songs. In something of a rarity among arena rock-era superstars, singer Kevin Cronin maintained legal control of his own songs.

"I was really fortunate," Cronin said in a recent chat. "I became partners with my publishing company over 20 years ago, and my agreement is pretty unique in music publishing. I have veto power over where my songs are used."

That means Cronin has said yes to -- or, at least, not said no -- to the ubiquity of his 1984 chestnut, one of the biggest power ballads of the rock era: "Can't Fight This Feeling."

R. Kelly's bid for respectability is winding down. Since he was exonerated of child pornography charges in Chicago in 2008, the R&B; superstar -- he of the "Freaky Sensation," "Freaky in the Club," "Like a Real Freak" -- has cooled things down with the more traditional, retro-soul albums "Love Letter" and "Write Me Back," and bared not quite all in a memoir, Soulacoaster: The Diary of Me. He was even somewhat restrained in concert last year (pictured) and on his recent duet with Kanye West.

But the freaky, he says, is coming back.

The singer, famous in part for his sexually explicit songs, is working on a new album called "Black Panties" ("My intention: I wanted to do an album for the strip club," Kelly said recently). He's launched a new tour with a stated intention to turn heads (his goal on this tour: "Just basically shocking people," he said).

More importantly, "Trapped in the Closet" is back.

Well, now my heart is empty. Morrissey has postponed several concerts this week and weekend -- including the scheduled Oct. 27 show at the Chicago Theatre.

The British singer's mother has fallen ill, and he's heading back to England to be with her.

"For me, Justin [Bieber] is ... I've met him, I've worked with him, I did a TV commercial with him. He's a really great little guy. But that's his problem -- he's a little guy."

An oracle speaketh about the future of the Beeb.

"His fans are growing up, they're 18-, 19-year-olds now. And that means the little girls ... they're young women. And he still looks like that little boy!"

Tell us more, oh wise one.

"I just don't think, from my gut -- maybe my gut's wrong, 'cause it's not 100 percent -- but I don't think he's going to stand the test of time."

Lupe Fiasco was brainstorming tweets that might set the world on its ear.

His representative from Atlantic Records tensed up, looked at me, rolled his eyes. "This guy -- everything he tweets starts a discussion," he said. "The good and the bad."

This was weeks after Fiasco found himself embroiled in a brief but now notorious Twitter exchange with fellow Chicago rapper Chief Keef (Fiasco said in an interview that Keef scared him, Keef tweeted his intention to "smack" Fiasco) and just days after Fiasco traded 140-character barbs with comic D.L. Hughley (who reacted negatively to a Fiasco statement discouraging voting).

In 2012, when rappers throw down, it's off the record -- literally.

October and baseball season's winding down -- but already we have the first Wrigley Field concert announcement for next season: Country star Jason Aldean will headline a concert at the Chicago Cubs ballpark July 20, 2013, with Kelly Clarkson, Jake Owen and Thomas Rhett.

The news came Thursday afternoon at a press conference at Wrigley by promoter Live Nation, with Aldean on hand, shivering in the cold and occasional rain in right field.

"A summer show's sounding pretty good right now," Aldean said.

You hear about John Lydon, but you think Johnny Rotten.

Who could blame you? In their few short years together in the late 1970s, Rotten's squawking snarl made an indelible cultural impression as leader of British punk band the Sex Pistols. The quartet crashed music's barricades and made a deep enough impact on modern music to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.

But at the end of an ill-fated U.S. tour in 1978, the band disbanded. John Lydon was left stranded here in America, angry (personally and professionally) and hungry (literally and artistically).

His next project, Public Image Ltd., would have more staying power, lasting 15 years and proving influential in a less blatant but deeper and perhaps more meaningful way. The Pistols, sure, fired up a bunch of punk wannabes -- many of whom Lydon still despises for their lack of originality (read on) -- but PiL's innovative weave of dub beats, pop production and the angry energy of Lydon's vocals threaded into bands from U2 to Nine Inch Nails.

Lydon, 56, in our recent conversation with the California resident during a visit to London, admitted his heart wasn't ever fully committed to the Pistols -- a band manufactured by Malcolm McLaren, a hipster clothier, with intentions largely as cynical and commercial as any contemporary boy band -- at least beyond their initial run. There was no pining for the band's return, even though they re-formed for tours five times.