Inspiral Carpets have announced a 16-date UK tour set for the end of 2025. Kicking off on 20 November at Newcastle’s Boiler Shop, the tour will conclude on December 13 with a homecoming show at the Albert Hall in Manchester. This will be the band’s third tour in as many years after their 2022 reunion.
The tour announcement came yesterday, 24 March, with details of ticket information. Pre-sale for select venues will begin tomorrow, Wednesday 26 March, and tickets will go on general sale on Friday, 28 March. Fans will have to act quickly to secure tickets, with Newcastle’s Boiler Shop holding just 100 people. The largest venue on their tour will be Leeds’ O2 Academy, with a capacity of 2300 people. Tickets can be accessed through Ticketmaster here.
The band will travel up and down the country, visiting venues in Scotland, the North, the Midlands and all the way down to the south coast. Their visit to Margate will be the first time the group play the town, and their stop off in Dundee will mark their return to the city after over three decades since their last appearance.
Dundee get in there pic.twitter.com/rrss462qto
— Sado Witz (@WitzSado) March 24, 2025
There is nothing to suggest that this tour will be supporting any upcoming new music. Their last studio release was their self-titled album in 2014. They haven’t released any new material since founding member and drummer Craig Gill passed away in 2016. Despite the lack of recent activity, they have performed more than 80 shows since their return to touring in 2023.
Gill’s passing left a hole in the group, but also in the local music scene in Manchester. He co-founded the award-winning Manchester Music Tours, and co-authored the ‘Manchester Musical History Tour’ book, both of which brought the hundreds of music-related landmarks scattered around Manchester to new audiences.
Often listed as one of the influential 90s Madchester bands, alongside the likes of the Happy Mondays and Stone Roses, the band never felt like they quite fit that label, saying “we were completely different: a psychedelic throwback, with an electric organ as our main instrument”. The group had moderate mainstream success, with 11 Top 40 singles, and three Top 10 albums, including their debut, ‘Life’, which was only held from the top spot by a Carpenters compilation.
The dates leave the band’s summer free from touring, or it could also be seen as an Oasis-shaped hole. The band’s summer tour has already revealed Richard Ashcroft and Cast as supporting acts for their reunion shows, but the connection between Noel Gallagher and Inspiral Carpets cannot be overlooked. Before his days in the Britpop band, Gallagher auditioned for the Carpets as a singer before joining them as a roadie for two years.
Whether the Inspiral Carpets are considered a vintage act or not, the venues promise intimate shows surrounded by fans. If the reviews from their recent shows are to be believed, the shows will be “a joyful ride back to the early 90s”.
