8 January 2016
Having lost the 2 German shows at the beginning of the last tour due to viral infection and the 3 Dutch shows due to John Beck’s accident I had to find a way to fulfill the gigs and at the same time make sense of the logistics and expense of an awkward routing and venue availabilities. After discussion with Yatta and my agents I decided to add some shows to fill the gaps and give me a short run in the UK and into Europe. What we have come up with is 17 dates that fit in with the availability of the band members and the bus , as it comes from Northern Ireland, as well as get to some places we didn’t play on the previous tour.
Tony Turrell will be on keyboards as John Beck, although now with his plaster removed from his broken arm, is still not gong to be fit for the dates which begin on the 9th April.
These will be the last shows on the ‘Farewell to Childhood’ tour and the last shows until at least next April when I intend to tour with the ‘Weltschmerz’ album which will be written and recorded between May 2016 and March 2017 and linked up with the 30th Anniversary final performances of the ‘Clutching at Straws’ album.
The dates I have confirmed so far are as follows
9th April Newcastle O2 Academy
10th April Nottingham Rock City
11th April Aylesbury Waterside
13th April Koln Essigfabrik
14th April Rendsburg Nordmarkthalle ( rescheduled German show)
15th April German date tbc
17th April German date tbc
19th April Amsterdam Melkweg Max ( rescheduled show , sold out)
20th April Tilburg 013 ( rescheduled show , moved to bigger hall and tickets available)
22nd April Groningen Oosterpoort ( rescheduled show now moved to bigger hall and tickets available)
23rd April Haltern am See ( rescheduled show now moved to bigger venue , tickets available)
24th April German show tbc
26th April Karlsruhe Tollhaus
27th April Luxembourg Centre Cultural Dudelange
29th April London Islington Assembly Rooms
30th April Salisbury Town Hall
1st May Bilston Robin ( sold out)
Before and after these dates band members are not available and some places we wanted to play such as Cardiff and Edinburgh among others had no suitable venues available or in other countries such as in Italy and Spain we did not get suitable offers and could not make the routing work within the time frame. Sorry.
Most tickets are already available from venues and ticketing outlets and I will put more details up when I get them. I know some people were disappointed to miss out on the last shows as they sold out very quickly and as these are the definitive last performances of the complete ‘Misplaced Childhood’ album I would advise anyone not to wait until the last moment to get tickets for these final gigs.