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The performance on 20 June will be a comeback from their eight year hiatus after splitting at the peak of their career in 2016. The gig will have a capacity of only 300, organised by Hugo and Felix White. With Dork Magazine, Felix had this to say: “This show means a lot to us as MS is a cause close to our hearts. When we knew the band were getting back together, we really wanted to do something again to support the MS Society.”

Hugo added, “Our mum had MS so we know the devastating effect it can have on young people and families. We’ve always done what we can to raise awareness and funds for the MS Society, and we’re delighted to be able to put on this show.”

The band have worked closely with the MS Society for years with the White brothers becoming MS Society Ambassadors in 2016. They announced their return in October 2024 with the news of their upcoming headline performance at All Points East on 24 August.  

 

 

 

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The Maccabees broke up at their “creative peak” after 14 years of working together and achieving their highest charting 2015 album ‘Marks To Prove It’, which spent 10 weeks at Number one on the UK Official Albums Charts. Upon announcing the reunion, the band spoke with Radio X about how it came to be, stating “it’s been kinda delicately being approached for the last year or so”.

@themaccabeesband Who’s gonna say it first? #themaccabees @Radio X ♬ original sound – The Maccabees

At their first rehearsal after reuniting, they performed their widely loved singles ‘Love You Better’, ‘Lego’ and ‘X-Ray’ for NME, sharing that “It’s felt to me like no time has passed,”. 

 The band have many standout tracks, including the acoustic, floaty romance single ‘Toothpaste Kisses’, which has amassed over 100 million listens on Spotify.

The intimate London gig will have tickets available to buy on a ballot. Entry to the ballot opened yesterday (20 May) with £5 entry and will close on 2 June. They will also be embarking on a UK and Ireland tour in August with support from Sorry. Tickets are available on their website.

I’m playing some museums and special places across the US this February. Mostly new songs.

2/18: New York
2/20: Chicago
2/22: San Francisco
2/24: Los Angeles pic.twitter.com/rmWWNiVRop

— Lucy Dacus (@lucydacus) December 16, 2024

    The shows were announced in January and the singer, famously known for the emotionally staggering track ‘Night shift’, has recently spoken on the significance of the London venue for this show. The Museum opened in June 2004 at the original site of the Foundling Hospital, founded in 1739. The hospital was the UK’s first children’s charity and public art gallery. The Museum commemorates this as ‘the only cultural institution in the UK to celebrate people who have been in care, and all those who care for them’, with curation of art, music, writing and objects. 

 

 

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Dacus has spoken about her connection with the cause as the artist herself was adopted. She explains the importance of contemporary support for young people in care, revealing in an interview with The Guardian that she invited trainees to the performance to show them, “hey, I’m doing cool shit – you can do cool shit.”. The inspiring artist has also discussed the significance of Museums and churches when touring her new music with the album cover presenting a Renaissance-style painting of the singer by artist Will St John. In Wallpaper‘s interview with Dacus, she explores the significance of singing queer personal stories in historical spaces where this has ‘probably never happened’, noting that when performing in churches, the thought occurred to her that ‘there were years in the past in this church where I would have been killed’. This amplifies the significance of such a performance, striking a chord with the queer community.

She also notices the importance of historical landmarks and inclusion of other artists such as Will St John as well as several actors and artists from Cara Delevigne to Christina Moreland in the music video for ‘Best Guess’ off her latest album ‘Forever is a feeling’.

Her inclusion of inspirational artists is important in a contemporary context, as she discusses her thoughts on AI, an issue widely discussed in the music industry as of late. Dacus expresses that she finds the issue a frustrating shortcut to art that negates the ‘internal process. That’s the entire reason for me’. Her choice of locations in these intimate shows speaks to a love of the human-ness and history of art as well as its organic creation.

Dacus will return to the UK on 26  June in London, following with a show in Edinburgh on 30 June and Manchester on 2 July where she will perform her latest album ‘Forever is a feeling’, her fourth studio album released on 28 March. The 13 track album is a sentimental acoustic pop release embracing love and life.

The show was packed with special guests and a very excited crowd as Eilish herself had to stop the show four times and ask the crowd to calm down.

Amongst the guests was London-based rapper, singer and producer Labrinth who came out to perform their collaborative track, ‘Never Felt So Alone’ from Labrinth’s album Ends & Begins, released earlier this year.

Eilish wasn’t done with special guest appearances however as super group Boygenius took to the stage after wowing audiences at Gunnersbury Park just over a week ago (August 20) to perform ‘When the Party’s Over’, a single from Eilish’s first album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?

Another angle of boygenius performing When The Party’s Over with Billie Eilish at her show tonight!! pic.twitter.com/v3vO7CLSd3

— phoebe on tour (@bridgersontour) August 29, 2023

Her set comprised of huge fan-favourite singles such as ‘Bad Guy’ and ‘Happier Than Ever’ but she also performed rarities for the crowd such as ‘My Boy’ and ‘Wish You Were Gay’.

It wasn’t such a straight forward show however, as three songs into her set she stopped mid-performance during ‘Therefore I Am’ two times in order to encourage the crowd to check on the crowd amid crowd crushing, urging security to give out water to the crowd. “Can we get some water for these folks? Like where is security? Am I security now?” she frustratingly exclaimed to the audience.

The show was marred with crowd and security concerns from Eilish as she repeatedly addressed her frustration to the crowd by saying: “I haven’t played a small venue in literally six years. I’ve forgotten how to do this… I’m having an anxiety attack right now,” later following this up by adding “This felt like a good idea… Once. You guys look like you’re gonna die, take a step back.”

Her frustrations with security did not stop there as later on in the set she was still not happy as she addressed the crowd once more: “No one is answering me,”. She later had a break in the set to allow security to give out water and to provide a break for the excitable crowd, saying to the crowd: “Who needs an inhaler? I feel like I’m babysitting. Do you feel ok for me to keep going?”.

The intimate show was a surprise one that was only announced 3 days prior, in between her headlining sets at Reading and Leeds festival. Unsurprisingly, tickets for the show sold out instantly and fans were clearly fanatic about seeing a megastar such Billie Eilish at such a small venue.

“It’s been a couple of hard years – how’re holding up? Alright?” calls out frontman Brandon Flowers after a trio of fan favourites ’When You Were Young’, ‘Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine’ and ‘Smile Like You Mean It’, “Thank you very much. There’s been a lot of separation, there’s been a lot of uncertainty. But there’s one thing I’m certain of… we are together tonight, so let’s do something about it.”. A slight surprise in the set came from the early appearance of their seminal single ‘Mr Brightside’ which surprisingly came in the first half of the first set. Flowers also went on to comment on the recent warmup shows in Vegas, “We did some warm-up shows in Vegas. It was good but tonight feels a little bit better. Thanks for coming.” Before ultimately concluding that Sheffield is, in fact, “our spiritual home”.

“Oh, man – it’s such a strange thing that it’s been three years,” he said. “This feels so familiar but when you look at the days… it’s been a thousand days. It’s wild.” muses Flower’s midway through the set, “I hope you can tell that we’re genuine though when we talk about our love for this place. Man… I mean, you changed our lives! And we do love coming here – this is our spiritual home. You took these sentimental Americans in, and we won’t forget it.”

If you weren’t fortunate enough to bag tickets to this particularly intimate set, then you can try and snap up what few tickets may remain to their stadium tour here. Beginning at the end of the month, the tour will see support from Blossoms, Manic Street Preachers, Supergrass, and Sam Fender – depending on which night of course. You can see the full list of dates below.

24/5 – Doncaster – Keepmoat Stadium
26/5 – Bristol – Ashton Gate
28/5 – Coventry – Ricoh Arena
30/5 – Southampton – St Mary’s
1/5 – Middlesbrough – Riverside Stadium
3/5 – London – Emirates Stadium
4/5 – London – Emirates Stadium
7/5 – Falkirk – The Falkirk Stadium
9/5 – Norwich – Carrow Road
11/5 – Manchester – Emirates Old Trafford
14/5 – Dublin – Malahide Castle
15/5 – Dublin – Malahide Castle