Modern English preps new album “1234,” announces 18-date U.S. tour

Modern English | Photo by Sheva Kafai

Post-punk veterans Modern English plan to release their ninth album, titled 1234, this fall and have just announced an 18-date U.S. tour that’s focused largely on the Midwest and South, which will see the band on the road from late August through late September.

No tracklist or release date has been announced for the record, though the band revealed its title on their website, and frontman Robbie Grey and bassist Mick Conroy discussed it when they co-hosted Sirius XM’s “Dark Wave” last month with Slicing Up Eyeballs founder Matt Sebastian.

The album is the follow-up to 2016’s Take Me to the Trees, the first to feature original members Grey, Conroy, Gary McDowell and Stephen Walker since the 1980s.

“We recorded it in upstate New York in October with a producer called Mario McNulty,” Conroy said on the June 11 episode of “Dark Wave.” “The idea was to record the LP live, which is not something that people do so often these days, but we did. It was full of energy. Each take was quite powerful. It’s good. It’s definitely edgier than Take Me to the Trees, but, at the same time, there are one or two tracks that are quite atmospheric.”

Grey added: “When we were recording, what we did is we opened the doors of the different rooms that people were working in so there was bleed of everything onto the tracks. So it’s got a real live feeling to it, a real live energy, which is what we were looking for.”

Conroy said a song or two might hit streaming in September, with a vinyl release of the full album this fall.

As for the tour, Modern English opens the trek Aug. 26 at the Evolution Festival in St. Louis, Missouri, and will play for a month, wrapping Sept. 30 with another appearance on a multi-act bill, at the Neptune Festival in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Watch the band’s website for ticket information.

Here are those tour dates:

Modern English tour dates 2023

Aug. 26: St. Louis, MO — Evolution Festival
Aug. 27: Chicago, IL — Chicagoland Taco Fair
Aug. 28: Evanston, IL — Space
Aug. 31: Indianapolis, IN — HiFi
Sept. 1: Cincinnati, OH — The Ludlow
Sept. 2: Columbus, OH — A&R Bar
Sept. 7: Baltimore, MD — Ottobar
Sept. 9: New York, NY — Baker Falls
Sept. 15: Hamden, CT — Space Ballroom
Sept. 16: Greenfield, MA — Hawks & Reed
Sept. 17: Boston, MA — Sonia
Sept. 20: Richmond, VA — Canal Club
Sept. 22: Greenville, SC — The Radio Room
Sept. 23: Atlanta, GA — The Earl
Sept. 24: Nashville, TN — 3rd and Lindsey
Sept. 27: Athens, GA — 40 Watt
Sept. 29: Smithfield, NC — Paul A. Johnson
Sept. 30: Virginia Beach, VA — Neptune Festival

PREVIOUSLY ON SLICING UP EYEBALLS

• Playlist: Sirius XM’s “Dark Wave” — co-hosted by Modern English (6/11/23)
• Modern English’s Robbie Grey, Mick Conroy to co-host Sunday’s “Dark Wave” on Sirius XM
• Modern English shares new quarantine performance of ‘I Melt With You’
• Retro Futura Tour — with ABC, Belinda Carlisle, Modern English — rolls out initial 2018 dates
• Modern English cancels North American tour after guitarist undergoes emergency surgery
• Modern English touring U.S. in support of reunion album ‘Take Me To the Trees’

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