Handsome Tours is thrilled to announce that Billy Bragg will be returning for a very special tour entitled “One Step Forward. Two Steps Back.” In each city Bragg will perform three unique shows on consecutive nights.

NIGHT 1
Career Spanning Billy Bragg Set

NIGHT 2
Songs From First Three Albums
‘Life’s a Riot with Spy Vs Spy’ (1983)
‘Brewing Up with Billy Bragg (1984)’
‘Talking with the Taxman about Poetry’ (1986)

NIGHT 3
Songs From Second Three Albums
‘Workers Playtime’ (1988)
‘Don’t Try This at Home’ (1991)
‘William Bloke’ (1996)

The first night’s performance will feature Bragg’s current set, which ranges across his 35 year career. The second will see Bragg perform songs from his first three albums: his punk rock debut Life’s a Riot with Spy Vs Spy (1983), its similarly raw follow-up Brewing Up with Billy Bragg (1984) and Talking with the Taxman about Poetry (1986). The third performance will see Bragg perform songs from his second three albums: the positively jangled Workers Playtime (1988), the pop classic Don’t Try This at Home (1991) and the back-to-basics William Bloke (1996).

Says Billy: “After more than three decades of travelling around the world in a van, or spending all day flying vast distances to play a gig, I’m looking forward to having some time to explore cities that I usually only get to see between the soundcheck and the show. And this three night stand format is a way of keeping things interesting, both for me and the audience. I tried it out in Auckland recently and had a lot of fun revisiting my back pages.”

Billy Bragg has been a fearless recording artist, tireless live performer and peerless political campaigner for over 35 years. Politicised by a Tory government operating without love or justice, this previously adrift young man from Barking, whose failure at national exams had reduced his career opportunities to two, eventually bought himself out of the British Army in 1981 (‘the best £175 I ever spent’), determined to make a living out of song.

Don’t miss the orator, entertainer, rabble-rouser, negotiator, pamphleteer, the fabled ‘Bard of Barking’, Billy Bragg, across three extraordinary evenings.