Lawrence Arabia Extends Solo Tour

Hot on the heels of solo performances in Wellington and Dunedin, Canterbury's finest songsmith Lawrence Arabia (James Milne) has announced he'll now be playing an extensive run of intimate shows throughout the North Island for his 'An Evening Alone with Lawrence Arabia' tour. As with previous dates, the Silver Scroll-award winning artist has laid the thinking behind his plans bare in an entertainingly-penned statement which you can read below...

Honorary Bedouin Records and Under The Radar Present

'An Evening Alone with Lawrence Arabia'

Tuesday 7th November, Titirangi RSA, Titirangi, Auckland
Thursday 9th November, The Incubator, Tauranga
Friday 10th November, The Dome Cinema, Gisborne
Saturday 11th November, The Common Room, Hastings
Tuesday 14th November, Golden Dawn, Ponsonby, Auckland
Wednesday 15th November, Golden Dawn, Ponsonby, Auckland
Tuesday 21st November, The Vic Theatre, Devonport, Auckland
Wednesday 22nd November, Nivara Lounge, Hamilton
Thursday 23rd November, The Rogue Stage, Rotorua

Tickets are available HERE via UTR.

Watch Lawrence Arabia's video for 'Another Century' from recent album Absolute Truth, and read his public statement about the upcoming tour...

"NOTHING makes me procrastinate more than having to write a press release about myself. So why I do I now find myself doing this very thing?!

Well, it's BECAUSE I'm playing some solo shows this November in the North Island and I need to “publicise” them so there will be an “audience” in attendance. Without an “audience” – i.e. you? – there will be no performance, because a performance without an audience is merely a rehearsal.

And rehearsals, as fun as they are, do not pay money. And MONEY is what I need, specifically your money, in the form of ticket sales. It's ugly and gauche to talk about money like this, I suppose, but I want to be upfront with you. These shows are not merely a pure artistic statement – they are a transaction.

BUT, of all the transactions you have recently carried out (and what is life if not a series of transactions, from the sexual encounter that resulted in your conception to the contract with the crematorium that incinerates your mortal remains) this should, at least in theory, be one of the most satisfying.

Why so satisfying? Well, my sceptical friend, because SCIENCE. Psychologists from San Francisco State University have proven that experiences provide more lasting happiness than material possessions. In addition, the shared experience of music provides a primal thrill evoking the earliest days of human communication and allows a communal experience of joy so rare in this decadent age of digital insularity.

So come along – North Islanders – and join me, Lawrence Arabia, New Zealand's pre-eminent chronicler of 21st Century bourgeois dilemmas, for a “communal experience of joy so rare in this decadent age of digital insularity.”