Bunnymen take Apples For Isaac on seven winter dates

General sale opens at 10am today as the new album sits at No. 8 midweek, on course for the band’s first UK Top 10 studio set in 29 years.

Echo & the Bunnymen have set a seven-date UK winter tour in support of Apples For Isaac, their first collection of new material in twelve years. The run opens on 9 November at Tramshed in Cardiff and continues to Eastbourne Winter Garden on 10 November, Southampton Engine Rooms on 12 November, Wolverhampton Wulfrun Hall on 13 November, Middlesbrough Empire on 17 November, Holmfirth Picturedrome on 19 November and Coventry HMV Empire on 20 November.

Tickets go on general sale at 10am BST today, Thursday 24 September, via GigsandTours and Ticketmaster, after a pre-sale the previous day. The band confirmed the dates on their official website and Instagram.

A first Top 10 in nearly three decades

Apples For Isaac arrived via BMG on or around 18 September and sits at No. 8 in the UK midweek album chart. That placing puts the Liverpool group on course for their first UK Top 10 studio album in 29 years. The late Clem Burke of Blondie played drums on ten of the record’s eleven tracks — a contribution that helps define the set since the album reached shops last week.

The November itinerary is a tight winter circuit through mid-sized rooms rather than large arenas. Tramshed, the Winter Garden, the Engine Rooms, Wulfrun Hall, the Empire in Middlesbrough, the Picturedrome and Coventry’s HMV Empire are halls that reward detail in a set built on new songs as well as the older catalogue. For a band whose reputation was sealed by atmosphere and craft as much as by volume, that scale fits the material.

From Crocodiles to Apples For Isaac

Echo & the Bunnymen formed in Liverpool in 1978. The original line-up brought together vocalist Ian McCulloch, guitarist Will Sergeant and bassist Les Pattinson; by 1980 Pete de Freitas had joined on drums. The early albums still frame how the band are heard: Crocodiles in 1980, Heaven Up Here in 1981, Porcupine in 1983 and Ocean Rain in 1984. Those records fixed McCulloch’s voice and Sergeant’s guitar in the British alternative landscape of the decade. Later live releases and anniversary editions — among them the 25-year treatment of Evergreen in 2022 — kept the catalogue in circulation while wholly new studio work stayed scarce.

Apples For Isaac breaks that silence. Twelve years without a full set of original songs is a long gap by any measure; the midweek chart placing suggests the wait has not dimmed interest. The winter dates are the first proper chance for audiences outside London and Glasgow to hear the new material on stage, alongside the songs that built the band’s name.

What is already booked

Shows at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre on 22 and 23 September have already taken place. Separate Glasgow Barrowland gigs on 20 and 22 December were scheduled earlier and stand apart from this November run. No further UK dates beyond Coventry have been announced with the winter package. Whether a wider itinerary follows remains unannounced and will turn on how these halls and the album perform through the autumn.

For now the immediate step is clear. Seven nights are on sale from this morning, the new record is climbing, and a band formed in 1978 are back on the road with songs written for the present rather than the archive alone.