"FUNPLEX" BY THE B-52S; ASTRALWERKS

Bang, bang, bang on the door, baby. It's The B-52s knocking, and they want you to know they're still around huggin', kissin', dancin' and lovin'. More importantly, they're still creating quirky party music with funky lyrics that make little to no sense and beats that usually only convey one emotion: joy.

"Funplex" is The B-52s' first album with all new material since 1992's "Good Stuff." There's nothing complex or all that modern about this collection of 11 songs from the new wave foursome — Fred Schneider, Kate Pierson, Cindy Wilson and Keith Strickland.

Let's face it. The B-52s will never make another "Love Shack." The title track of "Funplex," an eccentric ditty about a magical shopping mall comes closest to such nostalgia. This time, the freewheeling spirit is more electrified, but the band's signature funky sound never gets lost.

Strickland sizzles in all the right spots while the band's three vocalists continue to have a madcap Fleetwood Mac-like chemistry, bouncing off each other with jarring melodies that should come off as shrill but never do.

However, The B-52s do take time to briefly recognize the world has changed since their '90s heyday with the somewhat somber "Too Much to Think About." That song comes two tracks after the band envisions a future of robots, bootybots and erotobots in the ultra spacy "Love in the Year 3000." No, The B-52s are not living in the moment with "Funplex," but that's what's so fun about it.

— Derrik J. Lang

"SATURDAY NIGHTS & SUNDAY MORNINGS" BY COUNTING CROWS; GEFFEN

Wild nights and early mornings. You hurt, you heal. You fall down, you pick yourself up again.

While these ideas are cliche, they're ample inspiration for Counting Crows on their first disc of new material in nearly five years, "Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings."

A heartfelt effort drenched with themes of regret and redemption, the disc celebrates the band's alternating identities — energetic folk-rockers (Saturday Nights) or emotive balladeers (Sunday Mornings).

Singer Adam Duritz continues to play the bohemian troubadour poet, offering emotional confessions on relationships and identity struggles.

Their "Saturday Nights" hit hard (not TOO hard) and fast and offers some of their most straightforward rock ever: wrestling with America's melting pot on "1492" ("I'm a Russian Jew American, impersonating Africans"), and life's overwhelming moments on the radio-friendly "Hanging Tree."

The hard charge and outward expression melts into the soul-searching introspection of their "Sunday Mornings" — confessing your flaws ("You Can't Count on Me"), longing for a sense of place ("Washington Square" and the lush "When I Dream About Michelangelo") and the heart-wrenching piano ballad "On a Tuesday in Amsterdam Long Ago."

— John Kosik