Boys & Girls, the full-length debut album from Alabama Shakes, will be released in North America on April 10, 2012 by ATO Records.
Rough Trade will release it internationally on April 9. See below for track listing.
Stream the album's first single, "Hold On" + tracks:
Alabama Shakes will make its television debut on February 7 on Conan.
The band will appear on KCRW's "Morning Becomes Eclectic" on Tuesday, January 24, and its "World Cafe" session will air on NPR on January 26.
Alabama Shakes' current North American outing will include sold-out shows in Austin (1/21), Los Angeles (1/25 at the Troubadour), San Francisco (1/26 at The Independent), Portland (1/28 at Doug Fir Lounge) and Vancouver (1/29). See below for itinerary.
"Their raucous live shows are already the stuff of legend," observed NME in a recent feature. Alabama Shakes' February 22 show at Boston Arms was the first 2012 NME Awards show to sell out, so the band added two additional dates - February 23 and 24. (Feb. 23 is sold out.)
In a review of Alabama Shakes' CMJ set, The New York Times' Jon Pareles marveled: "Imagine a CMJ buzz band not built around some cool-headed concept involving noise or irony or ambiguities or primitivism. Imagine a band not trying to make a fashion or anti-fashion statement. Imagine a band whose vocals aren't just something to put up with because that's the songwriter singing. Imagine a band named after a place that actually comes from that place. And imagine a band whose New York City debut left a CMJ Music Marathon audience literally screaming for joy. That band would be Alabama Shakes..."
Alabama Shakes was named "New Band of the Year" by Paste Magazine and appeared on NPR Music's list of favorite new artists while "Hold On" ranked as one of NPR Music's "100 Favorite Songs of 2011."
As one of the emerging artists tapped by MTV for its 2012 "Artists to Watch" list, Alabama Shakes will be featured across MTV's multiple channels and screens including MTV, MTV2 and MTV.com.
"'You Ain't Alone' is about as real as you can get," blogged Justin Gage when he premiered the track on aquariumdrunkard.com last July, bringing the unknown Athens, AL band to national attention.
Alabama Shakes recorded Boys & Girls at The Bomb Shelter in Nashville, TN. Produced and mixed by the band members, the album is a vibrant fusion of swampy dirty South rock, blues and soul delivered with punk rock fervor.
Alabama Shakes - comprising vocalist/guitarist Brittany Howard, guitarist Heath Fogg, drummer Steve Johnson and bassist Zac Cockrell - began playing together when they were in high school. Ben Tanner assists on keyboards.
NPR's Ann Powers called Howard, now 23, "a young woman living in the now, wrapping her arms around a tradition without letting it carry her away" while villagevoice.com noted: "Her rollercoaster-like delivery makes her vocal melodies themselves lyrical-they tell stories and convey eternal truths, beyond even the plaintive narratives embedded in her words."
Jack White's Third Man Records has selected Alabama Shakes to kick off its series of live 45 releases. The two-song 7" from the band's fall 2011 session at Third Man in Nashville, is due out in late January.
The track listing for Boys & Girls is as follows:
Hold On
I Found You
Hang Loose
Rise To The Sun
You Ain't Alone
Goin' To The Party
Heartbreaker
Boys & Girls
Be Mine
I Ain't The Same
On Your Way
Alabama Shakes 2012 tour dates:
(Dates and information subject to change.)
January 2012
1/19 New Orleans, LA One Eyed Jacks w/Hurray for the Riff Raff, Tumbleweeds
1/20 Houston, TX Continental Club w/Nick Gaitan & The Umbrella Man
1/21 Austin, TX Continental Club w/Mudflap SOLD OUT
1/24 Solana Beach, CA Belly Up w/Terraplane Sun
1/25 West Hollywood, CA The Troubadour w/Dry The River SOLD OUT
1/26 San Francisco, CA The Independent w/Dry The River SOLD OUT
1/28 Portland, OR Doug Fir Lounge w/Quiet Life SOLD OUT
1/29 Vancouver, BC The Media Club w/Quiet Life SOLD OUT
1/31 Seattle, WA Crocodile Club w/Quiet Life
February 2012
2/2 Salt Lake City, UT The State Room
2/4 Boulder, CO Fox Theater w/A. Tom Collins
2/22 London, UK Boston Arms SOLD OUT
2/23 London, UK Boston Arms SOLD OUT
2/24 London, UK Boston Arms
March 2012
3/10 Milwaukee, WI Pabst Theater
3/23 Tuscaloosa, AL Bama Theater w/Dexateens & Lee Bains III & The Glory Fires
3/29 Oxford, MS Proud Larry's
3/31 Birmingham, AL Work Play Theatre
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