Merseyside post-punk icons Echo & The Bunnymen have rescheduled their upcoming UK Tour due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The 19-gig tour – originally intended to belatedly mark the fortieth anniversary of the band’s 1980 debut album Crocodiles – has been pushed back from this summer to 2022, kicking off with a show at Sheffield’s City Hall next February. Existing ticket purchases remain valid for the new dates.
Due to the ongoing Coronavirus outbreak, the Bunnymen May and June 2021 shows have been postponed. The rearranged dates will instead take place in Feb & March 2022. Please keep hold of your tickets as they will be valid for the rescheduled dates. pic.twitter.com/lAghzKHHXF
— Echo & the Bunnymen (@Bunnymen) March 3, 2021
Speaking about the tour last year, frontman Ian McCulloch said “I can’t wait to be out there with the band on all those stages in all those cities and towns, doing what I love most, playing our magical songs to our brilliant fans and, hopefully, making all our lives a little bit happier along the way.” While the earthy-toned vocalist will have to wait a little longer to get back on stage, fans will eagerly await the opportunity to celebrate the album that kickstarted the Liverpudlian group’s 1980s’ purple patch, and a career spanning four decades.
Crocodiles served as an early introduction to the sparse, moody sound that would typify the band’s unique contribution to the new-wave indie scene. The BBC‘s Chris Jones said that the album “single-handedly defined what it meant to be young and impossibly cool on Merseyside…mixing punk’s stripped-down aesthetic with a love of both the Velvets and a whole host of psychedelic icons from the Doors to Love.”
The record paved the way for 1981’s acclaimed Heaven Up Here and two British Gold-certified albums in Porcupine (1983) and the seminal Ocean Rain (1984). Porcupine spawned the band’s first UK top 10 single in The Cutter, while Ocean Rain produced what is arguably their most enduringly popular track in The Killing Moon; an intensely atmospheric gothic ballad which McCulloch has since described as “the greatest song ever written.” The group capped off a golden period with their eponymous 1987 LP Echo & the Bunnymen, which reached number #4 in the Official UK Albums Chart.
Since then Echo & The Bunnymen have experienced their fair share of tumult; with several line-up changes and personal tragedies – notably the deaths in motorcycle accidents of drummer Pete De Freitas and keyboardist Jake Brockman in 1989 and 2009 respectively. McCulloch and guitarist Will Sergeant are the only members of the original outfit still in post. Since the turn of the century, the band have released six studio albums; while McCulloch has dropped two solo albums of his own and linked-up with other artists; notably collaborating with the Manic Street Preachers on their stunning 2010 track Some Kind of Nothingness.
The Bunnymen’s last studio album was 2018’s The Stars, The Oceans & The Moon; a collection of reimagined versions of classic tracks which reached number #11 in the UK Albums Charts. In a press release, McCulloch – who described the record as a career overview with “strings and things attached” – said “I’m not doing this for anyone else, I’m doing it as it’s important to me to make the songs better. I have to do it.”
The full list of dates for Echo & The Bunnymen’s 2022 UK Tour is as follows:
01/02/22 – City Hall – Sheffield
02/02 – O2 Academy – Leeds
04/02 – O2 Academy – Bournemouth
05/02 – St Davids Hall – Cardiff
07/02 – Roundhouse – London
11/02 – UEA – Norwich
12/02 – Sage – Gateshead
14/02 – Philharmonic Hall – Liverpool
16/02 – Albert Hall – Manchester
17/02 – Rock City – Nottingham
19/02 – Corn Exchange – Cambridge
20/02 – O2 Academy – Bristol
22/02 – O2 Shepherds Bush Empire – London
23/02 – Royal and Derngate – Northampton
25/02 – Albert Hall – Manchester
26/02 – O2 Academy – Birmingham
28/02 – Barrowland – Glasgow
01/03 – Barrowland – Glasgow
06/03 – De La Warr Pavilion – Bexhill-on-Sea
