Del Amitri to reunite for tour in 2018

Del Amitri have announced their return in 2018 for a UK tour, the Glaswegian band’s first run of dates since 2014. The July 2018 tour is set to include original band members with Justin Currie, Iain Harvie, Andy Alston, Kris Dollimore and Ashley Soan.

Del Amitri will headline Edinburgh Castle for the first time in 25 years. The band will also return to London’s Hammersmith Apollo, where they played a sold out concert in January 2014 on ‘The A To Z of Us Tour’, which featured their first UK dates in more than a decade.

“25 years ago we played Edinburgh Castle to the biggest headline audience we’d ever been in front of,” says Justin Currie. “I wore a kilt and my bass didn’t work for the first two minutes during which we played the opening riff of ‘The Ones That You Love Lead You Nowhere’ over and over again. We never recovered. This is our chance to make up for it. I won’t be wearing a kilt…”

“From ‘Nothing Ever Happens’ to ‘Jesus Saves’ there is a catalogue of Del Amitri songs that seem even more relevant now than when we wrote them,” adds Iain Harvie. “In this new millennium where everything changes and everything stays the same in an increasingly disorientating gyre of social and personal atomisation, the chance to lean against the bar and play our songs again to audiences around the UK just seems like something too right.”

For a current list of tour dates, please visit:

Del Amitri |
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Great band. "Some Other Sucker's Parade" got heavy spins from me back in the day.

 

'Not Where It's At'

 

The band are reuniting again in 2018 for a very short string of UK dates.

Their last UK tour was in 2014 and sold out everywhere. I have seen their singer Justin Currie on his solo tours going on for a dozen times since the Dels folded in a cloud of record company disinterest. Always excellent.

Just wondering if they are fondly remembered on here or not?



From 2014 in Manchester...

 

I really liked their debut album (which is in a different musical style) but also Waking hours , the other albums I have heard were ok but not so much to my liking as the early stuff.

 

I got into them way after the fact. I found a couple of their hit albums for a buck or two each and bought them without knowing any of the songs. I liked everything, so I picked up the rest of their catalog as quickly as I could. The sadder the song, the more I like it, although their pure pop confections are also treasures. I even have a CD by Justin's father, choral arrangements of traditional Scottish songs.

Justin Currie's new releases are automatic day of release purchases for me, and each one is great. He also writes excellent prose, his website is one of my favorites, he's one of the few artists I follow on FB.

My biggest regret is not picking up the deluxe editions with the bonus discs, which now are a bit harder to find. Reminds me I need to be on the lookout for them more frequently.

 

Wish I was going. They were very big in Australia for Waking Hours. I have the complete collection and most of Justin Currie solo. Very very underrated band.

 

Huge fan. Picked up the debut on a recommendation from my local record shop and purchased every release thereafter.

I'll have to check out Justin's solo stuff.

 

It’s not quite as catchy as DA but just as witty and next best thing IMHO. A new Del Amitri album would be welcome.

 

We have two threads on the same welcome subject. Great band. Great news. May they reunite more permanently.

 

Definitely. Would love to have a new studio album or perhaps a different live recording. "In The Mirror" was intentionally made to sound the way it did, but I'd like to have a live package, perhaps a 1CD or 2CD with DVD containing a complete performance from this 2018 tour.

 

Very strange they are not playing Glasgow.......

 

I really like their 1997 album, Some Other Sucker's Parade.
Not Where It's At is a great piece of power pop.

 

I suspect they will add a date later on, once Edinburgh Castle has sold out.

 

Justin's live shows recently with The Pallbearers have been superb.
He has done a few very welcome off the cuff requests, like this one...

 

Ooooo. Tell me more!

 

Justin's father, John Currie, was the director of the Scottish National Orchestra Chorus from the mid-60s to the mid-80s. He did arrangements of Scottish songs for a large chorus in conjunction with the Scottish National Orchestra. Very formal presentation of the music. I found the CD I have in a thrift store for $2 a year or so ago. It's on ASV, but I couldn't find anything online, at discogs or anywhere else. It's pleasant, calming music, and not at all similar to Justin's work. But interesting nonetheless.

 

What a great album. I have at least 2 pressings of the CD. Wasn't this from the era when Del Amitri toured with The Smiths?

 

Definitely. The vault-clearing 2014 2CD deluxe edition versions of the albums were loaded with quality bonus content and made most of the bootlegs and fan-traded comps entirely obsolete. Four years is sufficient time for a title to go OOP and I'd be very surprised if they don't re-press those titles to coincide with the 2018 reunion tour.

 

Excellent band, saw the most recent Justin Currie tour in London which was superb.
There are 3 fans in our house, sadly with the ticket prices so high, we wont be going to any of these shows.

“Sleep instead of teardrops” is a tremendous heart wrenching pop song and tucked away on a b side.

 

I think that was rather weak compared to their earlier albums. Beginning of the end. Certainly one of the best bands of the late 80's and early 90's. Mystery why they weren't bigger and should never have split. Perhaps we will get an album as well if the tour goes well. Justin Currie would sell a lot more records as Del Amitri than solo. He's up there with some of the best songwriters of the last 30 years.

 

John, I'm also a big fan of Dr. Feelgood/Lee Brilleaux/Wilko Johnson. Checking out the videos of your excellent Feelgood tribute band as we speak. Keep up the good work!

 

Thank you! Wilko comes along sometimes, this is my favourite moment.