Details
For anyone who has been following our band over the past 18 years it will come as no surprise that we as a band have had ongoing struggles with our mental health. We have never cancelled a tour. Ever. We have played almost dead, we have played crippled, we have played when I (Joel, who is writing this) have been close to killing myself, and not once have we ever pumped the brakes when we definitely should have. We have had a system of time off between tours that has worked for us for the most part, but in the depths of Covid we agreed to break this structure as all we wanted to do at the times was tour.
We committed to back to back USA and European tours and we are in a situation now where we can’t consciously embark safely on both tours and need to briefly pump the brakes. Some members of the band need to seek help for their mental health, issues that were only compounded during the worst of Covid. We are at a point where if we were to force them to continue our European tour as it stands, directly after the US tour, we would risk having to face a situation far worse than a cancelled tour, and that’s not a risk we are willing – nor should anyone be willing – to take. This is not a decision we have taken lightly, in fact this is the fastest selling headline tour we have announced, but what matters to us foremost is making sure that our brothers have the space and time to tackle the parts of their lives that need to be addressed.
Sadly, within the music industry – and indeed the larger entertainment and hospitality industries within which we coexist – the schedules that artists are expected to keep maintaining to remain relevant are brutal. This has created a culture and an atmosphere that almost rewards abuse, which leads to extremely poor mental health issues that mostly roll on disregarded. The music industry is a behemoth that moves on without the artists it spits out, and so if we were to ignore this situation and abandon the love we have for our friends, EXPECTING them to embark on a timeline of touring that would very likely destroy them and us, life would go on, just not for us. Not for our band. Not for all the people who love them, and not for you, our extremely loyal and beloved fans.
Thankfully this is FAR from a break up statement. It’s just us, asking for your understanding as we move our European tour and give our friends and brothers the time to heal some wounds that have been left unattended. Without a doubt we will be back in Europe and the UK, it will just be a little later than planned. The US tour will go ahead as scheduled, and all future plans are still in place. We do apologize – deeply and sincerely – for this move, but as I have stated above, sometimes you need to pump the brakes, and that time for us is now. 2023 and 2024 will be busy years for us, with a new album and then the tenth year anniversary of Let The Ocean Take Me, so we want to make sure we are moving into the next two years the strongest we can possibly be as a band, and that means that we need to be prescient and acknowledge that acting pre-emptively instead of reacting to possible tragedy is the right thing to do.
Europe we love you, and hope you understand. We will be back very soon with an album that we wrote with you in mind. It’s heavier, faster and more aggressive than anything we have ever made. We can’t wait to play it for you.
Love, Joel and The Amity Affliction.
Vom 24.10.2022 auf den 30.01.23 verschoben! Bereits gekaufte Tickets behalten ihre Gültigkeit.
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Roadrunner Records’ group, The Amity Affliction, have announced details of their widely anticipated new album. THIS COULD BE HEARTBREAK, the platinum-certified Australian band’s new LP will arrive on August 12th (see attached album art / tracklisting). The band – Joel Birch [Vocals], Ahren Stringer [Bass, Vocals], Ryan Burt [Drums] and Dan Brown [Guitar] – detailed the new material in a press conference earlier today hosted by former Triple J radio host / Frenzal Rhomb guitarist, Lindsay McDougall which can be viewed on the band’s Facebook (LINK).
THIS COULD BE HEARTBREAK is available now for pre-order in a variety of limited edition physical bundles via www.theamityaffliction.net, with all DSP pre-orders going live Thursday, May 19th at 12:00AM local time. All digital pre-orders will receive an instant download of the album’s gripping first single, “I Bring The Weather With Me” which debuted today along with the track’s official music video. “I Bring The Weather With Me” is streaming now at www.theamityaffliction.net and on the band’s official YouTube channel, www.youtube.com/amityofficial.
Furthermore, The Amity Affliction have announced a run of Australian headline shows taking them back to venues they haven’t played in over 4 years. After a massive arena tour in December 2015, these new dates will see The Amity Affliction getting up close and personal with their Australian fans in smaller and more intimate venues. Tickets for the upcoming dates will only be available for purchase with pre-orders of THIS COULD BE HEARTBREAK at www.24hundred.net through Sunday, May 22nd with a limited amount of tickets released to the general public the following week. This summer, The Amity Affliction will head to the UK where they will embark on a series of festival dates and headline shows with highly anticipated sets slated for the United Kingdom’s Slam Dunk Festival and Download Festival. Following the UK run The Amity Affliction will then touch down in the US for a string of stateside festival dates kicking off September 10th at Denver, Colorado’s High Elevation festival. For complete details and ticket information, please see www.theamityaffliction.net/tour.
Deeply personal and emotionally wrenching, THIS COULD BE HEARTBREAK is The Amity Affliction’s most transformative and revealing record yet. Recorded by producer and longtime collaborator Will Putney at Melbourne’s Holes and Corners with additional drum tracking done at Sing Sing Studios, the album finds The Amity Affliction evolving their signature powerful and cathartic song craft. Both ambitious and grand, album standouts “This Could Be Heartbreak” and “All Fucked Up” are equal parts heavy and hopeful, fueled by frontman Joel Birch’s desperation which achieves extraordinary transcendence through radical honesty and absolute power.
THIS COULD BE HEARTBREAK follows The Amity Affliction’s ARIA platinum-certified #1 album, LET THE OCEAN TAKE ME, which proved an to be an international breakthrough for the group. LET THE OCEAN TAKE ME marked The Amity Affliction’s second consecutive time topping the ARIA Album Chart following 2012’s gold-certified CHASING GHOSTS. More recently, the band released SEEMS LIKE FOREVER, the #1 ARIA gold-certified documentary chronicling The Amity Affliction’s history up through their epic “Let The Ocean Take Me World Tour,” which saw the band performing in front of capacity crowds around the globe, including sold-out shows at New York City’s Irving Plaza and London’s KOKO. Furthermore, the band’s most recent single, “Shine On” came in at #25 on Triple J’s “Hottest 100” of 2016. For more than a decade, The Amity Affliction has confronted the very darkest edges of man’s existence through their music and with SEVERED TIES, 2008’s full-length debut, and 2010’s ARIA gold-certified follow-up, YOUNGBLOODS, The Amity Affliction instantly established themselves as leading force in the heavy music world.
