Britain’s oldest boy band emerge from lockdown and hit the road as The Fisherman’s Friends – combined age 401 (and three-quarters) will be heading out on their Unlocked & Unleashed tour this year, with further rescheduled dates in March 2022.
Due to demand the band have announced three new shows at Bath Forum on 4th March, Llandudno Venue Cymru Theatre on 5th March and Sunderland Fire Station on 9th March 2022. Tickets for Bath and Llandudno go on sale at 10:00am on Friday 3rd September, tickets for Sunderland go on sale 10:00am Friday 17th September and will be available from www.gigsandtours.com
Thanks to the small film with a big heart that shares their name, the story of the original Cornish ‘buoy band’ is known around the world – bound by shared experience, for 40 years they have met on the Platt on the harbour in their native Port Isaac to sing the songs of the sea.
“And now we can’t wait to show the rest of the country what they’ve been missing – singing live is in our blood, almost as much as the sea,” says extravagantly moustachioed MC and bass man Jon Cleave.
Starring Daniel Mays, James Purefoy, Tuppence Middleton and Noel Clarke with cameo appearances from the group whose voices also appear on the soundtrack, Fisherman’s Friends took $10 million at the box office and saw the boys perform at the 2019 Cannes film festival as well as sell out another UK tour.
The boys kept fans entertained during lockdown posting weekly songs and poems on their YouTube series ‘Mares Tales & Mackerel Scales’. They also played sell out summer shows at Cornwall’s iconic Minack Theatre and various festivals aswell as performing at screenings of the film at the Wavelength Drive-In Cinema in Watergate Bay.
This year filming started on Fisherman’s Friends 2 as the boys return to the studio to record a new album, the follow up to the hit soundtrack album Keep Hauling that is well on its way to Gold sales.
Cornwall’s best-known musical export, a decade ago The Fisherman’s Friends were persuaded to sign the million-pound record deal that saw their album Port Isaac’s Fisherman’s Friends go Gold as they became the first ever traditional folk act to land a UK top ten album. Since then they’ve sang at HM The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations, played Glastonbury festival and been honoured with the Good Tradition Award at the prestigious BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards. They’ve also been the subject of an ITV documentary, released the hit albums One and All (2013), Proper Job (2015) and Sole Mates (2018) and continued to play to tens of thousands of fans at home and abroad.
The Fisherman’s Friends are: lobster fisherman Jeremy Brown; writer/ shopkeeper Jon Cleave; smallholder and engineer John ‘Lefty’ Lethbridge; builder John McDonnell (a Yorkshireman who visited Port Isaac more than 30 years ago and never left); Padstow fisherman Jason Nicholas; film maker Toby Lobb and the new boy, former ambulance driver Pete Hicks.
UK DATES
2021
09 Sep Birmingham Symphony Hall
10 Sep York Barbican
11 Sep Edinburgh Queens Hall
12 Sep Sheffield City Hall
24 Sep Aylesbury Waterside Theatre
25 Sep Oxford New Theatre
26 Sep Torquay Princess Theatre
07 Oct London Palladium
08 Oct Cambridge Corn Exchange
09 Oct Ipswich Regent
10 Oct Portsmouth Guildhall
04 Nov Cheltenham Town Hall
05 Nov Southend Cliffs Pavilion
06 Nov Leicester De Montfort Hall
07 Nov Bournemouth Pavilion Theatre
02 Dec Cardiff St David’s Hall
03 Dec Northampton Derngate
04 Dec Plymouth Pavilions
2022
03 Feb Hull City Hall *rescheduled*
04 Feb Manchester Bridgewater Hall *rescheduled*
05 Feb Brighton Dome *rescheduled*
03 Mar Nottingham Royal Concert Hall *rescheduled*
04 Mar Bath Forum *new date*
05 Mar Llandudno Venue Cymru Theatre *new date*
09 Mar Sunderland Fire Station *new date*
10 Apr Glasgow Fruitmarket *rescheduled*
Tickets for the new dates in Bath and Llandudno go on sale at 10:00am on Friday 3rd September, tickets for Sunderland go on sale 10:00am Friday 17thSeptember. Tickets for the rest of the tour are on sale now. All are available from www.gigsandtours.com
