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Boomtown Rats announce first album for 36 years

By | Published on Thursday 12 December 2019

The Boomtown Rats

Next year is the Chinese year of the rat, which the Boomtown Rats have taken as an indication that they should release their first studio album since 1984 (also a year of the rat, as were BR album free 1996 and 2008). The band will also tour, while frontman Bob Geldof will publish a book of lyrics.

Asked if the world really needs another Boomtown Rats record, Geldof says: “I couldn’t give a shite. We do, and that’s enough. I love this record. It just feels absolutely right”.

“That’s what bands do”, he continues. “They make records. Songwriters write songs. There’s so much to respond to in this new and different febrile atmosphere that we live in. People forget we took our name from Woody Guthrie, the great musical activist”.

“I think The Boomtown Rats have always shown that rock n roll is a form of musical activism”, he adds. “The music has intent and purpose even if that is just the sound, about boy/girl, nothing particularly at all, everything in general, or pointed polemical… whatever”.

So, the album, titled ‘Citizens Of Boomtown’, is out on 13 Mar (as is that book). The first single, ‘Trash Glam Bay’, will be out on 10 Jan. Tour dates are also scheduled to begin in March. Here they all are:

26 Mar: Brighton, The Dome
27 Mar: Cheltenham, Town Hall
15 Apr: Birmingham, Town Hall
17 Apr: Liverpool, Grand Central Hall
18 Apr: Cardiff, The Great Hall
24 Apr: Cambridge, Corn Exchange
25 Apr: York, Barbican
29 Apr: Manchester, The Ritz
1 May: London, The Palladium
2 May: Gateshead, The Sage

Based on the current pattern, by the way, the next Boomtown Rats album is due out in 2056.

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