Multiple Grammy award-nominee and Mercury Prize winner Blake announces his return to the U.S. with headlining North American dates. The tour will kick off in Atlanta on February 18, making stops in major cities across the U.S. and Canada including Boston, Chicago, Toronto, and two nights in New York City, before wrapping in Los Angeles on March 16 (see full list of dates below). Tickets are on sale now.
James Blake has quickly established himself as one of the world’s most talented and influential musicians with the release of his three critically-acclaimed albums, 2010’s James Blake, 2013’s Mercury Prize-winning Overgrown, and 2016’s The Colour in Anything.
Blake teamed up with Kendrick Lamar and Future to record Jay Rock’s song off the Black Panther soundtrack, “Kings Dead,” produced by Mike WiLL Made-It. In fact, 2018 has been a massive year for the producer, singer, and songwriter, who co-wrote “Element” on Kendrick Lamar’s platinum-selling DAMN., collaborated on the era-defining Black Panther soundtrack, and lent his powerful vocals to the first single from Travis Scott’s Astroworld, “Stop Trying To Be God.”
Blake made his MTV Video Music Awards’ debut alongside Travis Scott performing the track, hosted a BBC Radio 1 residency, and continued to push himself forward sonically with his own new tracks “If The Car Beside You Moves Ahead” and “Don’t Miss It.”
He’s gone on to win an Ivor Novello award for Best Contemporary Song for “Retrograde,” receive his first Grammy award nomination for Best New Artist, and has played to sold-out crowds on legendary stages from the Sydney Opera House and Radio City Music Hall to Glastonbury Festival. Blake has become one of the most sought out names in the music industry, contributing songs and production to Beyoncé’s Lemonade, Frank Ocean’s Blonde, and Jay-Z’s 4:44.
Blake has proven himself to be one of the most groundbreaking and experimental artists of his generation, and only time will tell what he has in store for 2019. In one of his recent songs, lyrics include “The world has shut me out, if I give everything I’ll lose everything. I could avoid going outside, I could avoid wasting my life.” When many who first listened to the cut started describing it as sad boy music, Blake went on Twitter to express his distaste for the term “sad boy” and to stop stigmatizing men who “express themselves emotionally.”
He said, “We are already in an epidemic of male depression and suicide,” Blake argued. “We don’t need any further proof that we have hurt men with our questioning of their need to be vulnerable and open. It is only a good thing to talk about what is on your mind.”
Upcoming Tour Dates 2019:
02/16 Ill Points Festival, Miami
02/18 Tabernacle, Atlanta
02/20 House of Blues, Boston
02/21 The Anthem, Washington D.C.
02/22 The Filmore, Philadelphia
02/24 Terminal 5, New York
02/25 Terminal 5, New Yorok
02/27 Sony Center for the Performing Arts, Toronto
02/28 L’Olympia, Montreal
03/02 Royal Oak Music Theatre, Detroit
03/03 Riviera Theater, Chicago
03/04 Palace Theater, St. Paul
03/08 Roseland Theater, Portland
03/09 Harbour Convention Center, Vancouver
03/10 Moore Theater, Seattle
03/12 Fox Theater, Oakland
03/15 Fox Theater, Pomona
03/16 Hollywood Paladium, Los Angeles
Photo Credit: Raymond Flotat
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