Solid Entertainment Are Very Excited To Present for the First Time in NZ
KATE TEMPEST
An extraordinary artist. An exceptional talent. A musical and literary maestro. A wordsmith par excellence.
“She is beyond modern, she’s practically science fiction” - The Guardian
Solid Entertainment is thrilled to announce that KATE TEMPEST will be coming to play in New Zealand for the very first time in January 2016. She’s an artist we rate as highly as any in the history of our touring company - one the world’s most exciting young performers and writers operating across several mediums, each to stunning effect.
KATE TEMPEST is a Mercury Music Prize nominated recording artist and an award winning poet, playwright and novelist. She was born in 1985, grew up in South-East London and put simply is mind-bogglingly talented. Kate Tempest and her four piece band will play Wellington Bodega and Auckland Kings Arms on Thursday 14th January and Friday 15th January.
In 2014 Kate Tempest’s remarkable debut album Everybody Down came out to huge critical acclaim and was shortlisted for the Mercury Music Prize. It is an astonishing album of social commentary and visceral narrative story telling wrapped around tunes so addictive the listener can inhabit and breathe the world Tempest describes.
In the same year Kate Tempest was selected as one of this decade’s Next Generation Poets by the Poetry Book Society, and in 2013 she was the youngest person ever to win the Ted Hughes Award - for her epic narrative poem Brand New Ancients. Ask Kate Tempest what she is and she’s more than likely to say a rapper. That’s her true and first love.
Ten years later Tempest has completed sell-out runs in the UK and New York with Brand New Ancients (performed to a live score) and won a Herald Angel at the Edinburgh Fringe. Her poetry collection Hold Your Own has been published by Picador and her first novel The Bricks That Built The Houses is due to be published by Bloomsbury in early 2016. It features the characters and the world built in Everybody Down, with a chapter correlating to each track.
What sets Kate Tempest apart is her ability to describe real life, to reflect raw truths and to articulate strands of how it all fits together – family and friends, living, love, loneliness, survival, despair, hope and dignity. Her language illuminates the subject matter to dazzling effect and her characters and songs speak directly to us. She is an artist who can say more in one song than many do across a whole album, a career even.
As with all of her words Tempest passionately believes they are meant to be heard, to be spoken out loud, to be played live and shared with people. The phenomenal response Everybody Down received by directly connecting with so many people has made taking the album on the road the most natural and instinctive of things to do.
Kate Tempest and her four piece band have spent the last eighteen months playing the major festivals and touring the world and now we’re delighted to be able to welcome them to New Zealand for the first time.
Two must-see shows for music fans – she’s already achieved more than most do in a lifetime but we’ve got a feeling Kate Tempest is only just getting started! A truly extraordinary talent and one of the most interesting of a whole generation. Grab this chance to see this very special artist in what are sure to be two very special shows. Happy New Year. We said it first, just for you!
Kate Tempest
Thursday 14th January 2016, Bodega, Wellington
Friday 15th January 2016, The Kings Arms, Auckland
TICKETS ON SALE THURSDAY 15 OCTOBER AT 9AM
TICKETMASTER.CO.NZ and UNDERTHERADAR.CO.NZ & Real Groovy Records, Queen Street, Auckland.
