Hoobastank is returning to the UK for a one-off twentieth anniversary show of The Reason.

The US rock band are returning to the UK for one show to celebrate the twentieth-anniversary of their seminal second album ‘The Reason’.

The album was released in 2003, and the band will be performing the album in its entirety at the show.

You can now listen to the 20th anniversary-version of ‘The Reason’ album on all streaming platforms! This exclusive version of the album also includes a previously unreleased cover of @rodstewart‘s iconic track “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy?”. pic.twitter.com/E1dmx5d0NQ

— Hoobastank (@Hoobastank) January 12, 2024

The concert will take place at the o2 in Islington on the 17th of June. Tickets will go on general sale from 10 a.m. on the 1st of March, and you can buy yours here.

But don’t worry, if you miss out, the band will also be playing at Download Festival at Derby’s Donnington Park.

The announcement of the anniversary show came after the band released a twentieth anniversary version of ‘The Reason’ which featured a previously unreleased version of Rod Stewart’s ‘Do Ya Think I’m Sexy’.

The song, ‘The Reason’ becameone of the many ‘retro’ tracks that found a pocket of popularity on TikTok back in 2021.

The song, which spent 38 weeks in the US singles chart, also peaked at number two back in 2004.

Hoobastank themselves joined in the trend, creating an account and posting a video under the hashtag theme of #NotAPerfectPerson with the caption: “Realizing 20 years later that you named your band Hoobastank.”

Hoobsatank is an American rock band formed in 1994 in Agoura Hills, California, by lead vocalist Doug Robb, guitarist Dan Estrin, drummer Chris Hesse, and original bassist Markku Lappalainen. They were signed to Island Records from 2001 to 2012 and have released six albums and one extended play to date. Their most recent album, Push Pull, was released in May 2018. They have sold 10 million albums worldwide. The band is best known for their hit single “The Reason“.

So if you fancy a early ’00s throwback, then set your alarms for 10 a.m. on the first of March and be sure to get in the queue early because tickets will no doubt sell out rather quickly.

Whatever you reason for going to the show, I’m sure it will be a good one.

If there is one thing that can almost be taken as a silver lining for lockdown, it’s the fact that lots of people that were fortunate enough to be unaffected had a lot of time indoors. That meant that the whole creative arts industry pretty much had a free holiday, and many great things came out of it. Charli XCX’s what I’m feeling now stands out as one of the ‘Lockdown Greats’ in my opinion. Also, last month, Bauhaus released the new song ‘Drink The New Wine’ which was recorded last year with the four members sharing audio files. The track employs the Surrealists’ ‘Exquisite Corpse’ device whereby each artist adds to the piece without seeing what the others have done. You can hear the track below.

Bauhaus have used this ‘exquisite corpse’ technique in the past to great effect. The title refers to the very first ‘Cadavre exquis’ drawing rendered by André Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Jacques Prévert and Yves Tanguy which included words which when strung together made up the sentence, ‘Le cadavre exquis boiara le vin nouveau’ (‘The exquisite corpse will drink the new wine.’)
For the recording, the four musicians each had one minute and eight tracks at their disposal plus a shared sixty seconds plus four tracks for a composite at the end. All done without hearing what the others had laid down. The only common link being a pre-recorded beat courtesy of Kevin. The final playback came as a synchronistic revelation. This process makes it very easy to create completely nonsensical music. It happened quite regularly in the past with poetry, the Parisian Surrealist Movement really introduced some interesting specimens from poets like André Breton. But hearing this technique in a popular music format seems to be taking on new ground.

The Brixton date comes in the middle of an extensive US tour the band are soon due to begin. So, if you’re desperate for a little Bauhaus and don’t manage to bag a ticket, then you can either plan yourself a nice trip to the states or head to mainland Europe for one of their festival sets. They are appearing at the now-famous Primavera Sound 2022 alongside many of the biggest names in music today; The Strokes, Gorillaz, Jorja Smith, Disclosure, and many many others.

Photo credit: Gary Bandfield