Post-punk icons The Chameleons spent a significant part of the summer on tour in North America, while any gaps in the schedule saw them in the studio as they continued to record their long-awaited brand new album, Arctic Moon, which will see the light of day in 2025.
Currently on tour in mainland Europe, they return to the US in the autumn before playing seven UK and Irish shows in December (the remaining European itinerary is below).
The band has now announced that a five-song EP, Tomorrow Remember Yesterday, will be released on 11 October via Metropolis Records (digitally) and Aufnahme+Wiedergarbe (vinyl), with a limited number of the latter to be made available from Metropolis on mail order. "These were among the very earliest songs we got together prior to our first John Peel session in 1981, but were discarded at the time due to them feeling unfinished", states vocalist/bassist Mark Burgess.
Posited between the Where Are You? EP issued in May and the upcoming new album, this refreshed and re-recorded archival tracks' set creates a nostalgic bridge between the two releases. It was conceived at the band's annual gathering in Manchester at Xmas 2023, where they performed two shows at The Ritz. "I had the idea of revisiting some of these very early songs but recording them in a way that reflects who the band is now, rather than who we were in 1981", continues Burgess. "We are so happy with the results."
The EP opener is "The Fan And The Bellows", a song that highlights the band's penchant for creating epic soundscapes with searing guitar textures. "Most of the songs have been released over time in their original form on various retrospectives and suchlike, but were never really intended to be", he explains. "'The Fan And The Bellows' was the original choice of CBS/Epic to be our debut single, but we weren't happy with that and rejected it in favour of 'In Shreds', our newest song at the time."
Another song, "Nostalgia", the chorus of which provides the origin of the EP title - recorded during the same sessions as "The Fan And The Bellows" with producer Steve Lillywhite - was also resurrected. Both songs originally appeared in a retrospective collection via Statik Records.
In 2025, Arctic Moon, The Chameleons' first new album since Why Call It Anything in 2001, will come out (learn more about it by following HEREs). "It's quite different from anything we have done before, and I know it will probably polarise the legacy audience, but we're excited about how it's developing", says Burgess. "I think the songwriting is much more mature in a lot of ways, which I suppose is to be expected given our age, but I really believe we're taking the band forward." Link
Tomorrow Remember Yesterday tracklist:
1. The Fan and the Bellows
2. Nostalgia
3. Nathan's Phase
4. Every Day I'm Crucified
5. Things I Wish I'd Said
The Chameleons European Tour Dates:
13.09.24 OBERHAUSEN (DE) Turbinenhalle Oberhausen
14.09.24 HAMBURG (DE) Gruenspan
15.09.24 BERLIN (DE) Columbia Theater
17.09.24 FRANKFURT (DE) The Bed
18.09.24 MUNICH (DE) Backstage Kulturzentrum
19.09.24 LYON (FR) L'Epicerie Moderne
20.09.24 PARIS (FR) Cabaret Sauvage
21.09.24 TOURCOING (FR) Le Grand Mix
06.12.24 BRISTOL Marble Factory
07.12.24 LONDON O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire
09.12.24 DUBLIN (IE) Opium
10.12.24 BELFAST Limelight 2
12.12.24 GLASGOW The Garage
13.12.24 NEWCASTLE Riverside
14.12.24 MANCHESTER Albert Hall