Aidan Moffat and Malcolm Middleton are to reunite as Arab Strap for their 20th Anniversary playing three live shows in October, their first in five years (following their 2011 secret acoustic set at Glasgow’s Nice‘n’Sleazy). They will be performing in London, Manchester and Glasgow (dates below).
To mark the announcement they have released a remix of their 1996 debut single The First Big Weekend (re-titled The First Big Weekend of 2016). The remix by Glasgow based producer Julian Corrie aka Miaoux Miaoux is available to stream and download now:
The duo were one of the few bands that Chemikal Underground signed on the strength of a demo tape, a move they never regretted – “Arab Strap blazed a trail for the kind of honest, colloquial songwriting that has become so common nowadays.”
Asked about how the reunion came about Malcolm Middleton said: “I think the day we went to the pub and split up, we made a joke about Arab Strap getting back together in 10 years’ time to celebrate. So that’s basically what this is: a chance to enjoy the music we made once more.” Aidan Moffat added that “We wanted to celebrate it while we’re still relatively young and don’t look too embarrassing on the stage.”
In the interim years they’ve been pretty busy with Middleton releasing a number of LPs, his latest being Summer Of ’13, the funding for which was raised via a Pledge campaign and was produced by Miaoux Miaoux. Featuring guest appearances by Lone Pigeon, Martin John Henry, Scott Simpson and Miaoux Miaoux.
Likewise Moffat has released a pair of albums with Bill Wells which saw them win the inaugural Scottish Album of the Year Award (SAY) for Everything’s Getting Older. More recently he has featured in Paul Fegan’s first feature documentary ‘Where You’re Meant to Be“, a travelogue which followed Moffat around Scotland on a 2014 tour performing modern re-interpretations of old folk songs. The documentary took an interesting turn when he met the late balladeer of travelling folk royalty Sheila Stewart. The film is showing in 40 cinemas across the country from tomorrow and is available to download from July 1st. You can read more about the film and see a trailer here.
Arab Strap Tour Dates
Oct 13 – Lonon, Brixton Electric
Oct 14 – Manchester, O2 Ritz
Oct 15 – Glasgow, Barrowland Ballroom
Tickets are on sale this Friday (June 17) at 9am.