The Last Dinner Party’s debut album, Prelude To Ecstasy is out today on Island Records. The band has recently announced a 20-date North American tour in cities including Austin, New York, Portland, San Francisco, and more (full dates below). The band’s tour will kick off in Mexico City on March 19 (see full dates below).
The new album follows the band’s first BRIT Award, winning the Rising Star Award, and picking up BBC Radio 1’s Sound of 2024 in January, and NPR predicts “they have the potential to rise to the top” in 2024 and are “excited to see them storm the US…hopeful this is going to a big record!”
The Last Dinner Party on their album: “Ecstasy is a pendulum which swings between the extremes of human emotion, from the ecstasy of passion to the sublimity of pain, and it is this concept which binds our album together. This is an archeology of ourselves; you can exhume our collective and individual experiences and influences from within its fabric. We exorcised guitars for their solos, laid bare confessions directly from diary pages, and summoned an orchestra to bring our vision to life.
“It is our greatest honour and pride to present this offering to the world, it is everything we are.”
At the turn of 2023, The Last Dinner Party was little more than a new name being shared amongst those that had caught them live. Having spent much of 2022 writing those songs, road-testing them, and then taking them into the studio, it wasn’t until April when the band released the instantly more-ish, dark guitar-pop of “Nothing Matters” that took the online world by storm, and yet behind all the excitement was a confident indie-rock song by a band doing it the old-fashioned way, out on the road.
The Last Dinner Party next released “Sinner,” another gloriously infectious, leftfield pop song that fueled the fully-formed zeitgeist and set the band up for a Summer that replicated that success of Glastonbury with packed tents ensuing at the likes of Green Man, Reading & Leeds, Latitude and End of the Road (interspersed with support slots to the likes of Florence & The Machine, Lana Del Rey and First Aid Kit). It was a breakthrough Summer for one of the most talked about new British acts in years, delivering on all that early promise emphatically.
Concentrating on their own headline shows, the band skipped confidently from venue to venue, playing to bigger rooms and on wider stages. Shows sold out and shows were upgraded. In London alone, the band have moved from sell-out dates at Moth Club to Camden Assembly, Oslo to two nights at EartH, and now move on to the 3000-capacity Roundhouse on the eve of album release which has already sold out.
They’ve seen early success at America too, with all five debut shows last year selling out several weeks in advance – and more now announced and selling out quickly. On top of touring across the pond, the band also made their U.S. television debut appearance, performing “Nothing Matters” on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
The release of their third single, “My Lady Of Mercy,” an almost gothic, haunting rock song, and now with this atmospheric and anthemic ballad, “On Your Side,” the band’s songwriting is testament to all the buzz and excitement already accumulated. As it should be. Rather than wilt under the spotlight, they’ve arguably become a tighter, stronger unit because of it. Prelude To Ecstasy is both the closing of that introductory chapter and the opening of the next.
The Last Dinner Party are: Abigail Morris – vocals / Aurora Nishevci – keys / Emily Roberts – lead guitar/flute / Georgia Davies – bass / Lizzie Mayland – guitar
North American Headline Dates:
19th March – Lunario, Mexico City
21st March – Scoot Inn, Austin
22nd March – The Studio at The Factory, Dallas
24th March – Royale, Boston
26th March – Webster Hall, New York – SOLD OUT
27th March – Brooklyn Steel, Brooklyn – SOLD OUT
29th March – Studio TD, Montreal – *new venue upgraded to MTELUS
30th March – The Concert Hall, Toronto – *new venue upgraded to Queen Elizabeth Theatre
31st March – The Majestic Theatre, Detroit
2nd April – Newport Music Hall, Columbus
4th April – First Avenue, Minneapolis
5th April – Turner Hall Ballroom, Milwaukee
9th April – McMenamins Crystal Ballroom, Portland
10th April – Hollywood Theatre, Vancouver
11th April – The Showbox, Seattle – *new venue upgraded to Showbox Sodo
13th April – Coachella Festival, Indio
14th April – Crescent Ballroom, Phoenix
16th April – Bimbo’s 365 Club, San Francisco
20th April – Coachella Festival, Indio
31st July – The Truman, Kansas City
2nd August – Hinterland Music Festival, Saint Charles, IA
6th August – Gothic Theatre, Englewood
7th August – The Complex, Salt Lake City