THE SAINTS ’73-’78 ANNOUNCE SUMMER AUSTRALIAN TOUR AND NEW ALBUM 'LIVE AT CLUB ’76'
Tickets on sale Friday 14 August, 10am local via www.feelpresents.com
"I will forgive you pretty much anything, but I will never forgive you for not loving The Saints." - Everett True
50 years on from (I’m) Stranded, their epochal debut album release, The Saints ’73-’78 announce a summer Australian tour in celebration of that poignant anniversary.
The tour follows on from a hugely successful overseas jaunt in late 2025 for The Saints ’73-‘78 which saw founding members Ed Kuepper and Ivor Hay playing as The Saints to American, Swedish and German audiences for the first time and in UK for the first time since 1978.
“Out of everything I’ve seen this year, I can’t think of anything more exciting and thrilling. This was one of those performances that makes this longtime fan grateful to be there and to be alive!” - Under The Radar USA
“This has been an awesomely faultless performance from start to finish — utterly gobsmacking.” - Punk in Focus
A who’s who of the alternate music scene were in attendance across those shows, paying respect to their forebears, including members of Dead Kennedys, Fugazi, The Avengers, Bullet La Volta, Mudhoney, Primitive Ring, Earthless, Metz, Pavement, The Hard Quartet, Lubricated Goat, Minor Threat, Superchunk, Kid Congo & The Pink Monkey Birds, Sonic Youth, The Undertones, The Stupids, Scientists, Loop, Swans and many more we’re sure.
To accompany the Australian shows will be a brand new live album - featuring the original Saints - recorded in September 1976 at The Saints famed Petrie Terrace rehearsal space and ad-hoc venue Club ’76. Recorded to cassette, the 15 track performance catches the band just weeks prior to the studio album recording in front of a handful of friends and features much of (I'm) Stranded, a slew of tracks that would end up on follow up album Eternally Yours and a bunch of their famed cover versions. Hear the classic L-I-E-S here.
Before all that though, The Saints ’73-’78 will tour the UK this November / December as special guests to fellow Year Zero purists, The Damned on their Final Damnation 50th anniversary tour.
“One of the things that made punk very valid was, when you consider the Saints were doing the same in Australia at the same time and the Ramones in New York, it was obvious that people wanted too do it all over the world. The Saints were totally removed from anything going on anywhere else. They couldn’t get Sounds out NME in Australia, The synchronicity was amazing.” - Rat Scabies / The Damned
Tickets for the UK shows are on-sale now via thesaints73to78.com
The Saints: Live @ Club ’76, Brisbane will be released Nov 20 via thesaints73to78.com Details to come.
Tickets for the Australian shows on sale Friday 14 August, 10am local via www.feelpresents.com
“So… this was no tribute band… no hackneyed cabaret act. This was a band on fire. From the first few bars of opening song, This Perfect Day, through to the last drops of the chaotic frenzy that is Nights In Venice, The Saints pummelled our senses with 20 songs of jaw-dropping intensity”
L-R: Mark Arm, Ed Kuepper, Peter Oxley, Mick Harvey, Ivor Hay.
Photo: Katelyn Slyer
The Saints ’73-’78 celebrate 50 years since their first-ever shows this November with a month-long tour taking in New Zealand, USA, Canada, the UK, Sweden and Germany.
Outside Australia The original Saints only ever played the UK, two shows in The Netherlands and a single French show, while Australia itself was reduced to just Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sydney and Melbourne. Australia has since been humbled by the explosion that is The Saints ’73-’78 while New Zealand, the USA, Canada, Sweden and Berlin bear witness to the joy for the very first time
“So… this was no tribute band… no hackneyed cabaret act. This was a band on fire. From the first few bars of opening song, This Perfect Day, through to the last drops of the chaotic frenzy that is Nights In Venice, The Saints pummelled our senses with 20 songs of jaw-dropping intensity” – Backseat Mafia
Having begun in 1973 as a three piece under the moniker Kid Galahad & The Eternals, it would take until late 1975 and the arrival of bassist Kym Bradshaw before the band would take on their more recognisable name and recognisable line-up: Ed Kuepper guitar, Chris Bailey vocals, Ivor Hay drums and Kym Bradshaw bass a/k/a The Saints. It was this line-up that would record the incendiary (I’m) Stranded 7” and album of the same name just a few months later and depart Australian shores for good in May ’77.
During their 12 month stay in the UK this same line-up of The Saints would produce their only charting single This Perfect Day plus the 1-2-3-4 ep before Bradshaw would leave replaced by teenager Algy Ward, the younger brother of Saints roadie Ian. Two more stunning LP’s Eternally Yours and Prehistoric Sounds would follow before the band would dissolve, breaking into factions and returning home minus the prize.
50 years later though, and with the sound of those three incredible albums continuing to resonate and find new fans, and on the back of the recently released (I’m) Stranded 4LP box set, surviving members Kuepper and Hay decide to reunite, recruiting like-minded musicians in Mick Harvey, Peter Oxley and Mark Arm – collectively of The Birthday Party / Bad Seeds, Sunnyboys and Mudhoney – with a sold out national tour playing the classics from those three albums and drawing in 12,000 people over 12 shows. The biggest shows the band have ever played.
“This wasn’t a tribute to the Saints … it was something else. It was eight guys on stage reaching for magic, devoted to the moment and delivering one of the greatest final furlongs I’ve seen in four decades of watching live music.” – Sean Sennett (Time Off)
“The towering impressions left by the nights proceedings? That Kuepper is a motherfucker of a guitar-player, his sound just as molten and unrelenting as back in the day”. – UNCUT
Rounding out The Saints ’73-’78 on their November tour is a three-piece brass section featuring tenor and baritone sax plus trumpet and includes masters of their craft; Eamon Dilworth and Julien Wilson.
