Squeeze, the enduring British pop act whose songs have tenderly and wittily chronicled life and love stretching across four decades, are to play an extensive U.K. tour in the autumn – their first, as a band, for three years. As well as a vast catalogue including hits such as Cools For Cats, Up The Junction and Tempted, it will include songs from forthcoming album From The Cradle To The Grave, which marks their first collection of new tracks since 1998.
Squeeze have long been a captivating live act with an array of chart hits – which also includes the likes of Take Me I’m Yours, Slap And Tickle and Pulling Mussels (From The Shell) – but for this tour there is a further treat with new tracks which will appear on From The Cradle To The Grave. Some of the songs, including the title track, were taking shape as the band performed their Pop-Up Shop tour in 2012 and later this year they will be the basis for their first album of all-new material since Domino in 1998. Squeeze’s last studio release, Spot The Difference in 2010, saw them reworking many of their best known hits dating back to the early days of their career, in order to give them more creative control over their catalogue.
Glenn Tilbrook said, “We split in 1998 after the release of Domino. Chris and I were not getting on so well, we needed a break and to follow our own paths for a bit. We slowly but surely came back together as people, and then reformed Squeeze in 2007. Originally, this was only planned as a short reunion, but things went so well, here we are eight years later. Four years ago we agreed that if we were to carry on, we really needed to work on new material.”
Many of the new songs will feature in a forthcoming television comedy series Cradle To Grave, providing the backdrop for the episodes which are based on the life of their old friend Danny Baker, the writer and broadcaster. The eight-part run, set in the 1970s, is an adaptation of Danny’s autobiography Going To Sea In a Sieve and he has co-written the programmes with award-winning scriptwriter and producer/director Jeff Pope.
Glenn recalled, “When I read the book, I got in contact with Danny and said that I thought we could do something together with his book. Danny was already talking with Jeff Pope about a T.V. series and the mood and sentiment of Cradle were completely in sync. Danny and Jeff both loved it and everything else followed on from there.”
Support on the tour will come from poet and punk godfather Dr. John Cooper Clarke, the bard of Salford. John shot to fame in the 1970s for his quickfire delivery of dry, biting and hilarious satirical verse, touring with the likes of The Clash and Sex Pistols. The tousled, raven-haired creator of (I Married A) Monster From Outer Space, Evidently Chickentown and Beasley Street has gone on to collaborate with Arctic Monkeys and been a panellist on B.B.C.1’s Have I Got News For You. He recently recorded a new version of 1960s hit MacArthur Park with Hugh Cornwell and Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson.
The tour, which starts on Friday 25th September in Plymouth and which visits venues such as the Birmingham Symphony Hall on Saturday 3rd October, Manchester Bridgewater Hall on Monday 12th October and Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall on Friday 23rd October, comes to Liverpool on Monday 5th October.
Tickets are on general sale now from the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool.