Richard Ashcroft debuts newband

Thu 10th Jun, 2010 in International News

Former Verve frontman Richard Ashcroft took his new band The United Nations of Sound to France on June 8th to play one of their first gigs together.

The Le Trabendo venue in Paris was at capacity with a crowd of 500 as the group appeared onstage with their own song Third Eye (Columbus Circle) playing in the background. The group performed ten out of the twelve tracks from their upcoming self-titled debut album, scheduled for release on July 19th.

After the concert, Ashcroft took to the stage for an encore where he played acoustic solo versions of Verve hits Sonnet and The Drugs Don’t Work. The full band played Verve’s Lucky Man together, but Bitter Sweet Symphony was conspicuously absent.

The United Nations of Sound will play at Australia’s Splendour in The Grass festival, and Ashcroft has announced three sideshows this July.

This will be Ashcroft’s first trip to Australia, and the singer promised fans in an interview with The Daily Telegraph that he will be playing Verve songs along with his new tracks: “You’ve paid good money, you’ve got a pretty unfulfilling job and you shouldn’t have to wonder if the songwriters going to play one of his better tunes.”