Brooklyn’s Lushes have just announced that they will be joining Kurt Vile on his European tour next month, following the departure of Waxahatchee, who had to pull out due to health issues affecting her voice.
The UK leg of the tour hits Brighton’s Concorde 2 on the 11th November, followed by London’s Electric Ballroom on the 12th and shows in Bristol, Dublin, Glasgow, Leeds and Manchester. The band will return to London to play The Shacklewell Arms on December 7th, following a further seven European tour dates in support of Raketkanon.
Lushes released their wonderfully dark second album earlier this month. Service Industry – recorded and mixed by Sonic Youth’s long time engineer Aaron Mullan at Echo Canyon – was born out of a period of intense money, work and life stress. Tracks such as the hauntingly twisted ‘You Only Have‘, drag the reality of life from your bare bones. But it’s both menacing and delicious.
The band is made up of singer/guitarist James Ardery, who grew up listening to punk and rap, and drummer Joel Myers, raised on classical music – with the tension between the two balanced sublimely in every track.
Service Industry is a more raw, guitar and drum driven follow-on from the band’s debut, What Am I Doing, where themes of anxiety were often held back in pursuit of serene moments – brief escapes from our mundane lives. This latest offering stands as a map of a crisis, a bleak and gorgeous snapshot of our world, and a question: why continue living like we do?
Service Industry is out now via felte.
FULL EUROPEAN TOUR DATES
November
01 – Brussels, BE @ AB Box * (Autumn Falls Festival)
03 – Hamburg, DE @ Üebel & Gefährlich *
04 – Aarhus, DK @ Voxhall
05 – Oslo, NO @ Rockefeller
06 – Stockholm, SE @ Münchenbryggeriet *
07 – Copenhagen, DK @ Amager Bio *
09 – Berlin, DE @ Postbahnhof *
10 – Cologne, DE @ Gebaeude 9 *
11 – Brighton, UK @ Concorde 2 *
12 – London, UK @ Electric Ballroom*
13 – Bristol, UK @ Motion *
15 – Dublin, IE @ Vicar Street *
16 – Glasgow, IRL @ ABC 1 *
17 – Leeds, UK @ Leeds University Stylus *
18 – Manchester, UK @ The Ritz *
20 – Lucerne, SE @ Südpol *
21 – Lyon, FR @ Epicerie Moderne *
22 – Barcelona, ES @ Apolo *
23 – Madrid, ES @ Penélope *
24 – Lisbon, PT @ Armazém F *
25 – Hasselt, BE @ MOD (Autumn Falls Festival)
26 – Paris, FR @ Espace B**
28 – Oberhausen, DE @ Druckluft (Pressure Air Festival) **
29 – Berlin, DE @ Comet Club **
December
01 – Copenhagen, DK @ Musik Loppen **
02 – Hamburg, DE @ MS Stubnitz **
03 – Amsterdam, NL @ Bitterzoet **
04 – Brussels, BG @ AB-Box (Autumn Falls Festival) **
06 – Rotterdam, NL @ Rotown
07 – London, UK @ Shacklewell Arms (Eat Your Own Ears)
* w/ Kurt Vile
** w/ Raketkanon