Adam Ant at Tupelo Music Hall

– Adam Ant, one of the defining musicians of new wave, brings his ANTMUSIC tour to North America in 2024, extending a legacy that stretches back to the heady days of post-punk. Emerging during the chaotic clamor of British punk, Adam Ant drew initial inspiration from the Sex Pistols but pursued his own distinctive path with his band Adam & The Ants. Dirk Wears White Sox, the group’s 1979 debut, channeled the sexy swagger of glam through the provocations of punk, creating a dark, sexy and vital sound that would later influence the likes of Nine Inch Nails, who would later cover Adam & The Ants’ B-side “Beat My Guest.”

Teaming with Malcolm McLaren, the manager who helped make the Sex Pistols notorious, Adam Ant developed the sound and sights that made him an international star. Sporting pirate outfits and warrior makeup, Adam & The Ants now sang clever, snappy pop backed by thunderous rhythms, a combination showcased on “Antmusic,” a number two UK single that kicked off Antmania in Great Britain. 

Adam & the Ants stayed on the top of the British charts with “Stand and Deliver” and “Prince Charming” before Adam Ant went solo in 1982 with Friend or Foe, an album that gave him his American breakthrough with the jaunty “Goody Two Shoes.” 

For the next few years, Adam Ant was a fixture in pop culture. Kings of the Wild Frontier won Adam & The Ants the first ever BRIT award in 1982, MTV named Adam Ant the Sexiest Man Alive and, at one point, Adam Ant had eight simultaneous singles in the UK Top 40, a feat that not even the Beatles could match. 

Adam Ant continued to place high in the charts through “Room at the Top” in 1990, when he chose to take a hiatus from music to pursue acting. Over the next decade, he balanced these two interests, scoring another hit in 1995 with the shimmering love song “Wonderful.” 

Adam began reclaiming his musical legacy in the 2000s, publishing his autobiography Stand and Deliver in 2006 and earning a Q Music Icon Award in 2008. After releasing Adam Ant Is The Blueblack Hussar In Marrying the Gunner’s Daughter, his first album of new material in 18 years, in 2013, he returned to the road, shining the spotlight at different eras in his career by performing Dirk Wears White Sox, Kings of the Wild Frontier and Friend or Foe in their entirety. The ANTMUSIC tour follows in this tradition, pulling from all aspects of his deep catalog.

The English Beat – The English Beat is a band with an energetic mix of musical styles and a sound like no other. The band’s unique sound has allowed it to endure for nearly three decades and appeal to fans, young and old, all over the world.

When The English Beat (known simply as The Beat in their native England) rushed on to the music scene in 1979, it was a time of massive social and political unrest and economic and musical upheaval. This set the stage for a period of unbridled musical creativity, and thanks in large part to the Punk movement and it’s DIY approach to making music, artists like The Beat were able to speak out and speak their mind on the news of the day, as in “Stand Down Margaret”, things that mattered to them and the youth culture, as in “Get A Job”, and universal matters of the heart and soul, as in their classic hits “I Confess” and “Save It For Later”.

The Beat first came to prominence as founding members of the British Two Tone Ska movement, with their classic first album “Just Can’t Stop It” fitting squarely in that genre. Along with their contemporaries The Specials, The Selecter, and Madness, the band became an overnight sensation and one of the most popular and influential bands of that movement.