You know you’re a rock star when companies that handmake their own instruments decide to give a band a signature instrument. In the case of Dropkick Murphys, the Deering Banjo Company has decided to honor the band with a signature 19-fret banjo, made of maple, with a hard-rock maple neck and a maple rim.The Boston flag and band name are engraved in the neck of the banjo, with wood dot and clover inlays.

Deering Banjo Company have been making banjos for over thirty years, and are proud enough of their product to accompany each banjo with a six-year warranty. Check out pictures of the Dropkick Murphys Tenor Goodtime banjos and case on the Deering Banjo Company website.

British folk-punk singer, Frank Turner issued a studio update a couple of weeks ago, and he just did an interview with a little more information on his new album. Check it out here.

The album has a tentative title that Turner said he isn’t allowed to share yet, and is scheduled to come out this summer. The new album is being produced by Tristan Ivemy and will include an accompanying string section, plus appearances from Franz Nicolay (formerly of Hold Steady), folk singers Emily Barker and Chris T-T, and Andy Yorke from Unbelievable Truth (who is also Thom Yorke’s brother).

Turner will be touring Europe with Social Distortion and then hitting the US for some dates. He’s scheduled to play the Bamboozle Festival in New Jersey on April 30.

According to a Twitter update from bassist Josh Martin, it appears that pop-punkers The Wonder Years are done tracking their upcoming album.

The band recently posted a studio update, but still haven’t announced a release date or title for the new record. Of course, as soon as we hear anything about that we’ll let you know. The Wonder Years last release was their 2010 No Sleep album, The Upsides.

As we mentioned awhile ago, H2O‘s Toby Morse heads up an organization called One Life One Chance that is aimed at keeping kids away from drugs and alcohol. He’s had some help from Blink 182 drummer Travis Barker, who has donated instruments to various schools for the organization.

Now they’re putting on a benefit show at the Roxy in Hollywood. H2O, Set Your Goals and Touche Amore will perform, and Barker will appear along with Alkaline Trio‘s Matt Skiba and New Found Glory‘s Chad Gilbert.

The show is this Sunday, February 6. Check out the flier here.

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Rise Records posted a new video to their Facebook page. It’s a teaser trailer for the upcoming Man Overboard 7-inch, The Absolute Worst.

Check it out here.

The Absolute Worst comes out February 22. Their latest release was last year’s Real Talk, which came out on Run For Cover Records.

Welsh band The Blackout posted a new track to their MySpace page. “Higher & Higher” is off their upcoming album, Hope, which is a follow-up to 2009′s The Best In Town.

Check out the song here. The full track list for Hope was released last week.

Hope will be released April 4th on Cooking Vinyl.

The Reaganomics (which features members of the now defunct band Ryan’s Hope) have posted another new song to their MySpace. “Ed Hardy,” featuring Kody Templeman of Teenage Bottlerocket, is off their upcoming sophomore album Lower the Bar.

Check out the song here.

Lower the Bar will be released on February 15th through Red Scare Industries.

New York hardcore is getting old. Of course, it’s still awesome. And one of NYHC’s finest is about to hit a pretty important milestone – 25 years. Sick of it All will be celebrating their silver anniversary with a big show in NYC.

The show will also feature Buffalo’s Snapcase, Brooklyn’s Merauder and New Jersey’s Razorblade Handgrenade. It will be March 26 at Webster Hall. Tickets are on sale February 11.

SOIA’s latest album, Based On A True Story, came out in 2010  on Century Media.

Canadian screamo act Silverstein mentioned in an interview that they will be releasing an EP for Record Store Day:

I don’t know if I’m supposed to tell you this but I’m going to anyways.  There’s Record Store Day in April, and we’re doing a special 7” record for Record Store Day.  Which will be really cool!  We really wanted to do it, but we never were able to do it until now.  It’s not something that were going to make any money doing and it’s going to cost us money, but we just really want to do it.

Silverstein’s Transitions EP was released December 7th. A full-length album will be forthcoming on Hopeless Records. Record Store Day will be April 16.

New York pop-punkers Bayside released a new song off their album, Killing Time.

The track, “Mona Lisa,” is available for streaming here.

Killing Time comes out February 22, 2011 on Wind Up Records. Aside from a live album, the band’s last release, Shudder, came out in 2008 on Victory Records.