Live Preview: Cigarettes After Sex Announce World Arena Tour Dates

#AD Get your Priority Tickets via the Priority app from O2 ahead of the general sale...

Cigarettes After Sex have announced details of their new album, titled X’s, and a huge world tour, which features shows at some of the globe’s biggest arenas including New York’s Madison Square Garden and London’s O2 Arena on the 12th of November 2024.

Are you an O2 or Virgin Media broadband customer? Get your Priority Tickets via the Priority app from O2 HERE this Wednesday 6th March from 10.00am ahead of the general sale.

Filled with raw, imagistic vignettes set to entrancing, slow-burn pop songs, bandleader Greg Gonzalez captures every emotion a romantic arc inspires. But where previous albums have drawn from an amalgam of relationships, for the most part, X’s centralises on just one relationship that spanned four years. “The record feels brutal,” admits Gonzalez. “I could sit and talk about this loss to someone, but that wouldn’t scratch the surface. I have to really write about it, sing about it, have the music, and then I can start to analyse and learn from it. Or just relive it—in a good way. I don’t have that Eternal Sunshine-thing of wanting to forget.”

While continuing to observe classic pop song structures, Gonzalez has moved away from the prior sonic touchstones of the ‘50s and ‘60s, finding himself now drawn to a ‘70s/’80s slow dance. While (in typical Cigarettes style) these changes may be subtle, the overall resulting energy is akin to disco ball-refracted tears on the dance floor.

Today also marks the release of the record’s first single, “Tejano Blue”, a nod to the music of bandleader Greg Gonzalez’s Texas childhood, resulting in the most instantly memorable version (and liveliest tempo) yet of the band’s signature sensual, timeless, love songs.

Gonzalez explains: “I grew up in El Paso & Tejano music is huge there. You could go to a lot of the bars in the city and hear artists like Selena, Los Ángeles Azules & La Mafia playing over the speakers. It was in the atmosphere around me back then, but I always rejected it and gravitated towards anything else I was attracted to really.

“Years later when I was living in New York City I finally started listening to Selena’s ‘Como La Flor’ at the same time that I was also listening to a lot of Cocteau Twins. I had the idea then to try to combine both of their sounds somehow, which felt a bit strange, but also felt like it was coming from a genuine place of rediscovering & finally connecting with the music that I heard around me in my youth.”

Are you an O2 or Virgin Media broadband customer? Get your Priority Tickets via the Priority app from O2 HERE this Wednesday 6th March from 10.00am ahead of the general sale.

Tune in now…


Cigarettes After Sex EU/UK Dates:

25th October – OAKA Indoor Arena, Athens

28th October – Ziggo Dome, Amsterdam

29th October – Forest National, Brussels

1st November – Forum, Milan

3rd November – Wiener Stadthalle, Vienna

5th November – COR Torwar, Warsaw

7th November – Uber Arena, Berlin

9th November – St Jakobshalle, Basel

10th November – Lanxess Arena, Cologne

12th November – The O2 Arena, London

16th November – Accor Hotel Arena, Paris

17th November – Tony Garnier Hall, Lyon

20th November – WiZink Arena, Madrid

21st November – Altice Arena, Lisbon


#AD

-
Join the Clash mailing list for up to the minute music, fashion and film news.