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A huge thanks to the Friend of DC9 who emailed this morning to pass along a note he’d noticed while scoping the Pixies’ MySpace page today: This morning, the Pixies announced via a blog post on the social media site that they will be touring again come the fall, hitting 11 U.S. cities and stopping–yes!–in North Texas for a gig at Grand Prairie’s Verizon Theatre on September 19.
And it’s a pretty amazing deal, actually: The band will be performing its seminal Doolittle release and all of its B-sides in entirety; all shows will be recorded and made available for CD purchase at merch stands immediately after the performances; the shows will open with screenings of Un Chien Andalou, the film that inspired Black Francis to pen “Debaser”; and England’s Fuck Buttons will also be on the bill, helping amp crowds up for the Pixies’ headlining spot.
Tickets go on sale on Monday, June 14, via Ticketmaster.
After the jump, check the announcement in its entirety.
Pixies to Howl the
Ferocious
Language of Doolittle in 11 U.S. CitiesBand’s
First-Ever Official WebSite Launches
LOSANGELES, CA – Thursday, June 3, 2010 — After nearly 40 sold out shows
on three continents since Fall, 2009, The Pixies are bringing The
Doolittle Tour back to the U.S.A. The 11-city trek kicks off on
September 7 at the Tower Theatre in Philadelphia and will extend
the 20th anniversary celebration of the release of the band’s classic
1989 album, Doolittle.
All of the shows will be recorded and the CDs will be made available
immediately after every show at the band’s merch table; all live CDs can
also be ordered at www.doolittlelive.com. Fuck Buttons, the two-pieceelectronic pop group from Bristol, England, will open all shows.
A
special pre-sale begins on Monday, June 7 at 9AM ET/6AM PT at http://www.pixiesmusic.com/…
But this is more than a pre-sale – this special offer also marks the
soft-launch of the first-ever official Pixies website. After disbanding
in 1993 and essentially taking the “web years” off, the Pixies have
quietly begun using the Internet to communicate directly with fans.
This week, the band is playing the two sold-out shows in London for
which the band is the sole promoter and ticketing company, offering
tickets only to those on the band’s email list, and soliciting set list
ideas via email. The fan-centric approach continues on Monday as
pre-sale tickets provide access to the best seats at each show, and each
purchase comes with a complete live recording of the show, delivered
via email the day after the show. Once again, these pre-sale tickets
will be made available first to members of the band’s email list, in
advance of even this press announcement. The cost of these presale
tickets and live recordings is less than the all-in price for tickets at
public outlets.
For most dates, the public
on-sale begins Monday, June 14; Nashville goes on sale Saturday, June
19. On sale times, ticket prices and where to buy tickets will vary
city to city so please see itinerary below.
On this tour, the Pixies – Black
Francis, Kim Deal, Joey Santiago
and David Lovering – will perform all of
the songs from Doolittle and its related B-sides,
“Weird at My School,” “Dancing the Manta Ray,” and “Bailey’s Walk” among
them. Doolittle, the band’s third album and
the first to chart on Billboard’s album charts, includes
classics such as
“Debaser,” “Wave of Mutilation,” “Here Comes Your Man,” “Hey,” and
“Gouge Away.”
An imaginative
cinematic
production has been created for The Doolittle Tour. Designed by
long-time Pixies lighting designer Myles Mangino and designer Paul
Normandale, the set features four huge, undulating, eyeball-like spheres
flown just below the lighting rig and are part of the concert’s light
show. Filmmakers Judy Jacobs, Tom Winkler, Brent Felix and Melinda
Tupling were brought on board to create 11 films especially for the
production. The films are projected onto a massive backdrop video
screen to accompany 12 of the 21 songs that comprise the show.
As an example, visualsaccompanying the song “Debaser” are from a compilation titled “Forbidden
Images.” The hauntingly beautiful black and white footage from the
1920s depicts the beginning of the women’s rights movement, showing
women’s exuberant playfulness, femininity and sensuality. The footage, a
little too progressive for its time period, was originally banned from
theaters.
For “Here Comes Your
Man,” a four-way split
screen displays close up images of the band members dancing along to the
song; “I Bleed” sees blood dripping down the screen in time to the
music; “Hey” features hand-drawn animation of the song’s lyrics by
Hollywood animator Tom Winkler; clouds, black holes, and Mankind’s
arrogance destroying the Earth are the focus for “Monkey Gone to
Heaven,” while “La La Love You” is a humorous animated piece starring
hearts with legs.
The Doolittle Tour
launched on September 30,
2009 in Dublin, Ireland, and played sold-out shows everywhere –
Scotland, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, and to 20,000 fans over
four nights in London. It then came to America last November, playing
multiple-night sell-outs from Los Angeles to Chicago to New York, and
then in March, 2010 sold-out shows were performed in five Australian
cities. The tour received five-star reviews in the [London] Times, the Guardian and the Independent, and, according to one U.S.
alt/weekly, “The
Pixies continue to WOW.”
The Boston-formed
Pixies have been acclaimed
as the most influential pioneering band of the late ’80s alt/rock
movement. Their five studio releases and six years together effectively
blazed the path for groups like Nirvana, Radiohead, and Pearl Jam to
rise to superstardom. They disbanded in 1993 and launched their reunion
tour in April 2004 when virtually every, single date sold out within
minutes and fans traveled hundreds of miles to attend a show. In
post-Pixies years, Black Francis has enjoyed a successful solo career as
Frank Black, Kim Deal went on to form the Platinum-selling band the
Breeders, Joey Santiago started the band The Martinis and has carved a
career as a music composer for film and TV, and David Lovering performs
as a magician and continues to drum.
The concert opens with the showing of
the 1929
silent surrealist short film, “Un Chien Andalou,” which was produced in
France by Spanish director Luis Bunuel and artist Salvador Dali, and
provided the impetus for Black Francis in writing “Debaser.”
Confirmed dates for
the Pixies’
2010 U.S. Doolittle Tour are as follows:
SEPTEMBER 7 Tower Theatre, Philadelphia, PA*10 Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN*13 Fox Theatre, Atlanta, GA*17 Uptown Theatre, Kansas City, MO18 Brady Theatre, Tulsa, OK**19 Verizon Theatre, Dallas, TX*20 Verizon Wireless Theatre, Houston, TX22 Austin Music Hall, Austin, TX***24 Mesa Amphitheatre, Mesa, AZ (tix sold
through the venue)25 TheJoint, Las Vegas, NV*26 RIMAC
Arena, San Diego, CA*
* Tickets sold through
Ticketmaster** Tickets sold through Protix***
Tickets sold through Frontgate
