Photo Credit: Owen Ela
Rock band Bright Eyes announced dates for a North American tour series today. The 13 new dates follow up two festival appearances from the band planned for August and September. Set to kick off in early October 2026, the tour dates will see the band supported by Lullaby for the Working Class, which will feature Bright Eyes bandmates Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott performing in both bands across the nights.
Mogis and Walcott’s performance with Shane Aspergren, Megan Siebe and Ted Stevens of Cursive as well as Macey Taylor and Tiffany Kowalski will mark the long-awaited reunion of Lullaby for the Working Class, bringing together not only longtime collaborators but “members of the extended Bright Eyes family” back onstage for the first time in many years. Tickets for the tour will be on sale starting Friday, June 26th at 10am local time.
Mogis had much to say about the reunion:
“Lullaby for the Working Class was the band I was in before Bright Eyes (1994–1999). Ted Stevens (Cursive, Mayday) and I started the band as an experiment to try and make more folk-based music with all-acoustic instruments. Up until that point, we had only really played in loud punk and rock bands, so it was an entirely new approach and a new world for us. I learned so much from my time with Ted and Lullaby, both as a musician and an engineer/producer, that I would go on to employ heavily when I started working with this weird little kid named Conor, who Ted was friends with. We also took Conor on some of the earliest Bright Eyes tours, opening for Lullaby with us acting as his backing band.”
“When we started recording and needed some trumpet on our first records, the Consolation EP and Blanket Warm, I heard about this high school kid, Nate Walcott, and got his number from a mutual friend. He ended up playing on all our records and going on some tours with us. I have great memories of us all piled into our old Chevy Transvan, driving around the country and playing anywhere that would have us. We also went on a really long tour of Europe in the fall of 1997, and that was the first time any of us had been there. Back then, everything was strange, new, and exciting.”
“Lullaby ran its course, and I went on to play in Bright Eyes full-time (along with Nate, eventually), while Ted joined Cursive and continued making his own records in Mayday and other projects. We reunited once in 2010 when Conor organized the Concert for Equality in Omaha to fight against a racist, anti-immigration law that had passed in Nebraska. That is the only time we played this century!”
“So I am extremely excited to tell you guys that we are going on tour again. The tables have turned, so we will be opening for Bright Eyes, but we will still all be playing together for both sets, just like the old days. I am really looking forward to it, and I hope some of you can make it out and join us at one of the shows.”
Bright Eyes Live:
08/08 – Maha Festival – Omaha, NE
09/18 – Riot Fest 2026 – Chicago, IL
10/03 – First Avenue – Minneapolis, MN
10/05 – Majestic Theatre – Detroit, MI
10/06 – Bogart’s – Cincinnati, OH
10/07 – Union Transfer – Philadelphia, PA
10/09 – 9:30 Club – Washington, DC
10/10 – The Orange Peel – Asheville, NC
10/11 – Variety Playhouse – Atlanta, GA
10/12 – Brooklyn Bowl – Nashville, TN
10/13 – Tipitina’s – New Orleans, LA
10/15 – Stubb’s Waller Creek Amphitheatre – Austin, TX
10/16 – Studio at The Factory – Dallas, TX
10/17 – The Truman – Kansas City, MO
10/18 – The Sovereign – St. Louis, MO
Leave a Comment