Billy Bragg Announces Career-Spanning New Zealand Shows

UK songwriting icon and activist Billy Bragg has announced he's returning to Aotearoa this November, to play three special shows at Auckland’s Hollywood Avondale. Bragg will cover a range of material over the trifecta of evenings; on the first night there’ll be a selection of career-spanning favourites drawing on more than thirty five years of material, the second will feature songs from his first three albums Life’s a Riot with Spy Vs Spy, Brewing Up with Billy Bragg and Talking with the Taxman about Poetry, and on the third he’ll play tunes from later records Workers Playtime, Don’t Try This at Home and William Bloke. True fans of the award-winning artist will of course be heading to all three events, here are the details...

Billy Bragg - One Step Forward. Two Steps Back.

Wednesday 21st November, Thursday 22nd November and Friday 23rd November - Hollywood Avondale, Auckland

Tickets available HERE via UTR

Here’s Billy Bragg's classic nineties tune ‘Sexuality’...

Remind yourself of what happened ‘Between The Wars’...

Check out ‘There Is Power In A Union’...

Press release:

Handsome Tours is proud to announce the return of Billy Bragg to New Zealand for a trilogy of Auckland-only solo shows at the intimate Hollywood Avondale this November.

Entitled “One Step Forward. Two Steps Back.”, these three unique performances will trace Bragg’s career from its humble beginnings to the present day.

The first performance on Wednesday 21st November will comprise of Billy Bragg’s current set, including 35 years of his most beloved works.

The second performance on Thursday 22nd November will see Bragg perform songs from his first three albums: his punk-charged debut ‘Life’s a Riot with Spy Vs Spy’ (1983), its similarly utilitarian follow-up ‘Brewing Up with Billy Bragg (1984)’ and “the difficult third album” ‘Talking with the Taxman about Poetry’ (1986).

The third performance on Friday 23rd November will see Bragg perform songs from his second three albums: the positively jangled ‘Workers Playtime’ (1988), pop classic ‘Don't Try This at Home’ (1991) and the back-to-basics ‘William Bloke’ (1996)

Billy Bragg has been a fearless recording artist, tireless live performer and peerless political campaigner for over 35 years. Politicised by a Tory government operating without love or justice, this previously adrift young man from Barking, whose failure at the eleven-plus had reduced his career opportunities to two, bought himself out of the British Army in 1981 (‘the best £175 I ever spent’), determined to make a living out of song.

Governments rise and fall, fashions come and go, pop stars are built up and knocked down by a fickle media, and Billy Bragg adapts to survive: the one-time Luddite and failed handyman has embraced New Media and engages with fans directly via Facebook and Twitter, uploading songs when a headline strikes. His enemies remain essentially the same: craven politicians, inhumane corporations, plus assorted racists, fascists, bullies, reactionaries and people with floppy fringes.

Don’t miss the orator, entertainer, rabble-rouser, negotiator, pamphleteer, the fabled ‘big-nosed bard from Barking’, Billy Bragg, across three extraordinary evenings in Auckland.