Brighton duo Royal Blood eye up Hastings and Portsmouth dates this summer

Having last played a full UK show at the Leeds Festival in August 2019, Brighton duo Royal Blood are making up for lost time as they announce details of four special intimate summer headline shows.
Royal Blood - Mike Kerr on the left, Ben ThatcherRoyal Blood - Mike Kerr on the left, Ben Thatcher
Royal Blood - Mike Kerr on the left, Ben Thatcher

Among the shows is Hastings White Rock on Saturday. August 28 – plus, as previously announced, they will also be playing Portsmouth’s Victorious Festival on August 29.

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Starting in Bristol in a little over a fortnight, the Royal Blood shows are the duo’s first in almost two years, and also their first since the release of their critically acclaimed number-one album Typhoons earlier this year.

The new shows extend Royal Blood’s upcoming touring plans, having already announced that they will headline the Tramlines and Victorious Festivals. They also come after Royal Blood completed a show at Brighton Pier part of Radio 1’s Big Weekend of Live Music 2021 which featured a selection of Typhoons tracks alongside firm fan favourites such as Out Of The Black.

2022 will see Royal Blood return to the road in style. They will embark upon their biggest European tour to date in March before they return home to the UK for a run of huge arena dates, including the largest show of their career at The O2 in London. The Amazons will support at all shows throughout March and April.

The success of Typhoons heralds an exciting new era for Royal Blood, who are firmly established as one of rock’s biggest and most vital bands. The Brighton duo have completed a phenomenal hat-trick in which all three of their studio albums have immediately topped the UK album charts, a streak that began with their self-titled debut (2014) and then How Did We Get So Dark? (2017). To date, they have achieved two million global sales.

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Now they are on a roll again – on the back of a lockdown which proved remarkable creative for former Worthing boy Mike Kerr

Mike (vocals, bass) – who formed the band with Ben Thatcher (drums) nearly 15 years ago – found himself in a good place musically when the pandemic hit.

“From a creative standpoint, it has been amazing,” Mike said.

“It has been one of the best years of my life. I think just having been forced into that isolated state makes for the most perfect conditions for creativity. I think the reason I started to play music was essentially to entertain myself from the boredom of growing up in a town like Worthing.

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“I was very bored. I didn’t like playing football or going outdoors. I was an indoors kid. It meant that playing the piano, writing songs, learning Queen songs was like my skateboarding.

“When we had the lockdown, it took away all my hobbies, every other part of my life and just left me with music. And I think it created an appetite for a particular type of music that was not gloomy or bleak like the world. We wanted to create the antidote to all that was happening, something that was feel-good.”

Most of the album was written during lockdown: “We were able to get together on and off. When we were able, we got together. But we were able to share idea and speak on Facetime.”

Both live in Brighton: “I have been here for about six years,” Mike says. “I left Worthing and went on tour for a long time but once we had a month off, I was able to set up a place here.”

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The point is that there is nowhere better to be than Brighton for a musician: “I wouldn’t want to be in London. I want to be able to see the sea. Once you have grown up by the sea, you know what you are missing.”