photo credit: Lauren Maccabee / click for hi-res version
photo credit: Lauren Maccabee / click for hi-res version
album artwork / click for hi-res version
BREAKOUT BRITISH BAND SPORTS TEAM’S “Indomitable spirit
and a refusal to take things too seriously.” SPORTS TEAM—GULP! SPORTS TEAM LIVE
NEW ALBUM GULP! OUT NOW VIA
ISLAND UK/BRIGHT ANTENNA
SELECT HEADLINE DATES IN
NEW YORK CITY
AND LOS ANGELES
—The Times UK
“Sharply observational
lyrics skewering the mores
of suburbia.”
—The Guardian
“Twitchy and rambunctious”—Stereogum
Gulp!, the highly anticipated new album from breakthrough British band Sports Team, is out now via Island UK/Bright Antenna. Listen to/share the record HERE.
The new music has already begun to receive commercial and critical praise in the U.K. with Rolling Stone giving Gulp! a four-star review, proclaiming “Sports Team have set their sights on becoming the biggest band on the planet, and this ambition is on full show across this album of intoxicating, large-scale melodies... Sports Team’s remarkable rise won’t stop here,” while DIY adds, “Sports Team are a band to be believed, in the flesh in the sweatiest venues or most golden fields, sun beaming down… a heft of new ammo for pint-flinging, mosh pitting chaos on the dancefloor.” Dork furthers, “…a full-length that shows the depth the six-piece have always possessed… Sports Team are still dancing like everyone is watching.”
In celebration of the new record, the band is set for a run of U.S. shows in select cities next month. The dates include a sold-out performance at New York’s Mercury Lounge as well as further shows at Los Angeles’ The Echo, San Francisco’s Bottom Of The Hill and Santa Ana’s Observatory. The band’s original North American tour has been postponed until 2023, see below for the current routing.
Sports Team is Alex Rice (lead vocals), Rob Knaggs (rhythm guitar, vocals), Henry Young (lead guitar), Oli Dewdney (bass), Al Greenwood (drums) and Ben Mack (keyboard, percussion). Formed in 2016, the band released two Eps—Winter Nets and Keep Walking!—prior to their 2020 Mercury Prize-nominated debut album Deep Down Happy which reached #2 on the U.K.’s Official Charts, achieving the biggest vinyl sales for a debut British artist that year. Rolling Stone raves, “The crisp, jagged tunes on their debut LP, Deep Down Happy, recall Franz Ferdinand or the early Arctic Monkeys; their weird-angled guitars can evoke Pavement or Silkworm; their clever critiques of British life recall Pulp and the Kinks; and singer Alex Rice’s ranting style has shades of Art Brut’s Eddie Argos and Mark E. Smith of the Fall. It’s all conjured with a buoyant sense of good-natured humor, so they sound like they’re having fun even when they’re pissed off. The album bounces by with the logic of a free-for-all pub debate.”
Sports Team’s vivid vignettes of modern Britain and inspections of the follies, foibles and frustrations of youth have earned them an impassioned fanbase, a real community who come together at the band’s electrifying and infectious live shows.
For more information, please contact Cami Opere,
Louis D’Adamio
or Carla Sacks at Sacks & Co., 212.741.1000.
1. The Game
2. Dig!
3. The Drop
4. Cool It Kid
5. Unstuck
6. R Entertainment
7. Kool Aid
8. Getting Better
9. Fingers (Taken Off)
10. Light Industry
October 3 /// New York, NY /// Mercury Lounge
October 6 /// Santa Ana, CA /// Observatory
October 7 /// Los Angeles, CA /// The Echo
October 8 /// San Francisco, CA /// Bottom Of The Hill
October 11 /// Leeds, UK /// O2 Academy
October 12 /// Glasgow, UK /// Barrowlands Ballroom
October 13 /// Birmingham, UK /// O2 Academy
October 14 /// Manchester, UK /// Manchester Academy
October 16 /// Nottingham, UK /// Rock City
October 17 /// Southampton, UK /// O2 Guildhall
October 19 /// Bristol, UK /// O2 Academy
October 20 /// Norwich, UK /// UEA
October 21 /// London, UK /// The Roundhouse
October 24 /// Belfast, Ireland /// Limelight 2
October 25 /// Dublin, Ireland /// The Academy
November 4 /// Zurich, Switzerland /// Exil
November 6 /// Vienna, Austria /// Chelsea
November 9 /// Berlin, Germany /// Privatclub
November 13 /// Stockholm, Sweden /// Debaser Hornstulls Strand
November 14 /// Oslo, Norway /// Parkteatret Scene
November 16 /// Hamburg, Germany /// Molotow
November 17 /// Köln, Germany /// Helios 37
November 21 /// Parisa, France /// La Boule Noire
BOLD—sold out
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