The Cars are releasing an expanded “Deluxe Edition” of their 1984 album, Heartbeat City, for its 40th anniversary, which took place last year. The four-CD and one-LP set arrives on Oct. 31 with discs ...

Via their first four albums, The Cars established themselves as one of the most commercially successful bands to come out of the New Wave era. But they wanted to hit a new level on their fifth record.

When "Heartbeat City" appeared in the spring of 1984, The Cars seemed both utterly of their moment and somehow outside it. They were too neat for rock and too sly for pop, the sort of Gatsby band that ...