Music

This summer, The Raconteurs released its first new album in 11 years.

This story is part of American Anthem, a yearlong series on songs that rouse, unite, celebrate and call to action. Find more at NPR.org/Anthem.

Updated at 4:18 p.m. Monday

Ric Ocasek, the lead singer of the rock band The Cars, died Sunday in New York; he was found unconscious Sunday afternoon at his townhouse in Manhattan. A New York Police Department spokesman confirmed Ocasek's death to NPR. There is some confusion about Ocasek's age: The NYPD said that he was 75; public records list his age as 70 years old.

Bruce Hornsby has an appetite for the unusual that may surprise those who know him best for his 1986 smash hit "The Way It Is." His latest album, Absolute Zero, features a "bitonal pop song" where Hornsby plays in different keys with each hand.

Fifty-five years after first forming in London, The Who is back with an album of brand-new songs. WHO, due out later this fall, will be the band's 12th studio record. It includes the first single, "Ball & Chain," a gritty swamp-rock critique of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and the powers that have kept it open.

"Down in Guantanamo," Roger Daltrey sings, "we still got that ball and chain. That pretty piece of Cuba designed to cause men pain."

The singer and songwriter Eddie Money, whose singles like "Take Me Home Tonight," "Baby Hold On" and "Two Tickets to Paradise" were an archetype for 1970s and 1980s rock radio, died Friday morning in Los Angeles at age 70.

Less than a month ago, Money announced that he had stage IV esophageal cancer, which had metastasized to his liver, lymph nodes and stomach.

The Lumineers have taken their latest album, III, as an opportunity to shine a light on a topic that's close to many of the members' lives — addiction. III tells a story of addiction in three acts. As the album runs from one song to the next, it's a tale of one family facing the same problem. "It's the family secret and it's a taboo," Wes Schultz, the band's lead vocalist, says.

Drummer Jeremiah Fraites says addiction happens in cycles and should be considered that way.

Charli XCX makes wildly warped, genre-bending songs that are artful and adventurous but can still top the charts. On the English singer's latest album, Charli, she collaborates with Troye Sivan, Lizzo, Haim and more for a sound that moves pop firmly into the future.

Michelle Zauner has an incredibly rich creative life.

There's a new, unreleased song from R.E.M. out today, with all proceeds going to Mercy Corps, an organization helping those in the Bahamas impacted by Hurricane Dorian.