Paul Heaton & Jacqui Abbott will release their third album ‘Crooked Calypso’ on Virgin EMI on 21st July. ‘Crooked Calypso’ boasts all the hallmarks of Heaton’s peerless songwriting: songs buoyant with melody, and redolent with biting wit, but also real emotion. First single ‘I Gotta Praise’, a euphoric secular Gospel anthem, raises the roof and opens the record in style. ‘The Lord Is A White Con’, meanwhile, considers religion as an exploitative tool of empire builders, while ‘She Got The Garden’ is the wittiest divorce song since ‘D-I-V-O-R-C-E’. And then there is ‘Blackwater Banks’, a gorgeous Irish waltz that the Dubliners would be proud to call their own. Some if not all of these will get an airing when Paul & Jacqui hit the road and they will also delve deep into Paul’s phenomenal 30 year back catalogue as a songwriter and will also perform classic songs by The Beautiful South and the Housemartins.
Paul Heaton, one of the UK’s most successful songwriters with some 10 million album sales under his belt, first came to public attention in the early 80s as front man of Hull-based indie poppers The Housemartins (the same group that spawned Norman ‘Fatboy Slim’ Cook), best known for their third single ‘Happy Hour’ and their No 1 acapella Isley Bros cover ‘Caravan Of Love’. The Housemartins released two albums ‘London 0 Hull 4’ (’86) and ‘The People Who Grinned Themselves To Death’ (’87). In ’88 Heaton formed The Beautiful South, who released 10 hugely successful albums – ‘Welcome To The Beautiful South’ (’89), Choke (’90), ‘0898 Beautiful South’ (’92), ‘Miaow’ (’94), ‘Blue Is The Colour’ (’96), ‘Quench’ (’98), ‘Painting It Red’ (2000), ‘Gaze’ (’03), ‘Golddiggas, Headnodders & Pholk Songs’ (’04) and ‘Superbi’ (’06). In 2001 Heaton took a break from The Beautiful South and released his first solo album ‘Fat Chance’. The Beautiful South called it a day in 2007 citing ‘musical similarities’. Jacqui Abbott was lead vocalist in The Beautiful South from ’94 to 2000 and she sang many of their signature hits including ‘Rotterdam’, ‘Perfect 10’, ‘Don’t Marry Her’ and ‘Dream A Little Dream’. Paul Heaton went on to release two further solo albums: ‘The Cross-Eyed Rambler’ (’08) and ‘Acid Country’ (’10). In 2011 Heaton wrote a musical called ‘The 8th’ based on the Seven Deadly Sins and asked Jacqui to sing one of the parts. They have since released two acclaimed albums as a duo: ‘What Have We Become’ (’14) and ‘Wisdom, Laughter and Lines’ (’15). Paul Heaton & Jacqui Abbott’s new album ‘Crooked Calypso’ will be released on 21st July ’17.
Tickets go on general sale at 9.30am on Friday 7th July. Tickets for the Irish shows will be available here: https://www.
The full list of dates is:
OCTOBER 2017
20 CORK Opera House
21 BELFAST Limelight
22 DERRY Millennium Form
24 DUBLIN Olympia Theatre
26 GALWAY Radisson Hotel
27 LIMERICK Big Top
28 WEXFORD Spiegeltent
NOVEMBER
23 SUNDERLAND Empire Theatre
24 GLASGOW Clyde Auditorium
25 WOLVERHAMPTON Civic Hall
27 NEWPORT Centre
28 BRISTOL Colston Hall
30 MANCHESTER Albert Hall
DECEMBER
2 LIVERPOOL Echo Arena
4 LEICESTER De Montfort Hall
5 WATFORD Coliseum
7 LONDON Hammersmith Apollo
8 BRIDLINGTON Spa
9 SHEFFIELD Motorpoint Arena