Well, we got one of the precious and few emails from the official Scritti Politti mailing list two days ago, and this one’s a doozy. Apparently the modest and retiring Green Gartside is planning a UK tour next year to commemorate the band’s seminal “Cupid + Psyche ’85” album by playing it in its entirety. This might be the only Scritti Politti show ever where the notoriously reticent band ever play the sparkling US hit “Perfect Way,” so be sure to buy those tickets early if you are going to be in the UK next fall and have an interest. Just when and where are those dates then? We have multimedia…
And plaintext…
SCRITTI POLITTI | CUPID + PSYCHE ’85 35TH ANNIV. UK TOUR | 2021
21st Sep 2021 | Norwich | The Waterfront
22nd Sep 2021 | Birmingham | Town Hall
24th Sep 2021 | Cardiff | The Gate
25th Sep 2021 | Manchester | RNCM Concert Hall
27th Sep 2021 | Glasgow | St Lukes
28th Sep 2021 | Leeds | City Varieties
29th Sep 2021 | Gateshead | Sage
1st Oct 2021 | Brighton | Concorde 2
2nd Oct 2021 | London | O2 Shepherds Bush Empire
The tickets go on sale at 10:00 a.m. GMT tomorrow, December 4th, so get a move on little dogies if this one is calling out to you. No word on the cost of tickets but as anyone who had even a passing familiarity with the band and album would assert, it’s worth whatever the asking price is. As an American with a thin purse, I am not planning on being there, but don’t let my problems stop you from going. I’d more than welcome any readers who attend dropping comments about how splendid it all was. But first, be sure and get those tickets starting in about 16 hours. Below.
I can assuage my angst with the knowledge that I just bought the 12″ single of “Take Me In Your Arms + Love Me” this morning to edge ever closer to that inevitable Scritti Politti BSOG I have been planning on making for 20+ years now. Be there. Aloha.
-30-
Post-Punk Monk 
Tickets for the Norwich show are £22 and the venue isn’t a big one so it’ll be a cosy gig (Heaven 17 played there in 2017 and packed the place so the following year they moved to a venue 3 times the size and still packed that)
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Ranvil – That was a blindingly fast comment, my friend. It’s good to know that one would not need a second mortgage to experience Scritti Politti playing their much loved album next year. Those Young Communist meetings Green attended paid off after all!
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Holy cow! Wow, I’d love to catch one of these shows. This album remains one of my absolute favorites to this day. What a shame that there are no US dates.
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Steve Shafer – I’ve long loved that album but in all honesty I think “White Bread Black Beer” finally took the brass ring for my Scritti favorite when it came out in…2006! Yikes. Time for another one, maybe? He did do some dates Stateside at some point, I think. But “Perfect Way” has been perennially missing in any Scritti set lists. A check of setlist.fm reveals that it’s been played three times! And only in the last three years.
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Damn, I’m probably going to be in the UK just 2 or 3 weeks earlier for the Divine Comedy shows! Maybe I should just move there for a month!
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David Ponak – Nice to see you stop by. I was just thinking of how interesting RonKon II was recently and thought of you. Yep, it would be the thing to do! No argument here. That is assuming that travel to the UK will resume by then.
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Side note, saw them twice in LA in 2006. Once at the Roxy and once opening up for Brian Wilson at Royce Hall
https://www.brooklynvegan.com/scritti-politti/
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David Ponak – I remember Ron Kane attending these shows and being over the moon at the time. What I did not know was that they opened for Brian Wilson at one of their L.A. dates. What a coup! I’ll wager Ron sat out the Wilson show!
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A band I never expected to see live, but they played in Bristol I think back in 2012, small venue, great setlist, Green as modest and self-deprecating as you’d expect, I kept having to pinch myself as it seemed weirdly unlikely!
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SimonH – Green’s stage fright is semi-legendary but at least he has an interest in working past it. Unlike Andy Partridge.
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Got up at 2 am here on the west coast to try for tickets in Glasgow. Waited in virtual line until my turn came up at 2:03. Sold out. Back to bed now to toss and turn in disgust.
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Brian – Arrrrgh! That cuts to the bone! Anyone in America who would wake at 2 AM PST to buy concert tickets for a show in Glasgow only to have them sold out in three minutes deserves our deepest sympathies.
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PPM, The trip is on. I got tickets through Ticketmaster’s TicketWeb company. The tickets were face value plus about 8 pounds (for two tickets) in service fees and such. Seems silly to get in a bunch over about $12 when it’s such a big trip. Now let’s get this pandemic wrapped up so there are no worries about the show.
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Brian – Right on! That’s what we like to hear. Good luck with your concert adventure [in Glasgow?]. I think its going to be right down to the wire but it miiiiiight be possible that we’re covid-free by September.
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BSOG?
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Christooper Merritt – BSOG = Boxed Set of God. It’s what I make for fun, though sadly with much less frequency these days. [hint: the Search function here is your friend – also the Tags]
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They played Perfect Way in Berlin in 2018 at a gig at an art museum. There were maybe 100 people there. Virtually none were under 50 and, surrealistically, most looked like middle-American suburbanites, many of them overweight, who could have just come from the shopping mall or mowing the lawn, which I say not as judgment but just as an interesting demographic observation because apparently there’s not a single serious Scritti fan in Berlin who’s under 50 and/or anything you or I would picture as an 80s-synth-music-head (whereas at the “X Propaganda” gig with Claudia and Suzanne in 2019 the audience was also over 50 but arty like you’d expect, or at least not lawn-mowing-ish, and largely wore black.) It got barely any publicity but it wasn’t “secret” or anything. It was right there on the museum’s calendar along with lectures and art movies.
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Richard – Fascinating, Captain. What intriguing sociological insights you have provided here. The trickle of occasional Scritti gigs is very encouraging, considering Green’s performance issues. I’m just glad he is addressing them head on. Unlike that annoying Andy Partridge. We don’t demand old fashioned “rock star” world tours. In fact, I’d be aghast if Green did that sort of thing. It seems like what he is doing in terms of performance is appropriate and correct. Now as far as the audience makeup, I can’t help out there at all.
What you say reminds me of the time I saw Roxy Music touring in America in 2001. My wife and I were dressed nicely, even though they were playing the “outdoor shed” circuit. But 98% of the audience was in shorts and sandals with t-shirts! It was utterly appalling couture for a Roxy gig! “Where had standards gone,” I asked myself.
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Ah just saw the link to the set lists buried in a previous comment. BTW the list for the Berlin 2018 gig is very incomplete. It was a normal-length gig or perhaps slightly on the shorter side of normal. Maybe you know this already but since around 2000 or 2010 they’ve played quite a few little gigs, I think in LA and/or NYC and/or UK, I think with a smattering of hip-hop people. Maybe averaging 2 or 3 or 5 gigs per year or something… don’t quote me… I just remember looking it up and gigs were so small-scale it was hard to find the info.
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Wow, that’s not something I ever expected to hear was happening! But it’s making me think I should at least sign up for the Scritti Politti list…
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Jeremy Shatan – By all means sign up. At 1-2 emails per 5 years, it certainly isn’t spam! If you get a Scritti mail it will be something fairly big.
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Let me know if he tours in U.S./New York City.
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Paul Hallasey – Welcome to the comments! Well, as long as Scritti Central pump out the tour emails [which, I think, they do on a regular basis] I will post it here.
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