Canadian bluegrass quartet THE DEAD SOUTH to Bring ‘The Bastard Son Tour’ to the UK in 2019….

Currently one of the hottest tickets on both sides of the Atlantic, The Dead South will return to the UK for a 16 date tour in January and February 2019.

The Dead South, a gold-rush vibing four-piece acoustic bluegrass set from Regina in Saskatchewan, Canada, infuse the genre's traditional trappings with an air of frontier recklessness, whiskey breakfasts and grizzled tin-pan showmanship. The sound, build on a taught configuration of cello, mandolin, banjo and guitar, speeds like a train past polite definitions of bluegrass into the grittier, rowdier spaces of the traditional world.

The Dead South's original and current line-up includes the gnarled baritone of Nate Hilts, Scott Pringle on mandolin, whistling cellist Danny Kenyon and virtuosic banjo player Colton Crawford. The four-piece’s, acoustic string-driven approach puts the interplay of unique and versatile voices front and centre, with Hilts, Pringle and Kenyon all sharing lead vocal duties.

The Dead South's rise to touring juggernaut status is in part a very modern music biz fairytale; an algorithm-breaking success story in a one hundred-million-view YouTube hit.

The band’s second album ‘Illusion & Doubt’ hit the Top 5 on the US Billboard Bluegrass chart and entered the Top 30 on the US Country iTunes Chart, which in turn fuelled interest in the band’s debut album, ‘Good Company’, which, though released in 2015, recently hit the Top 50 on the Billboard chart and Top 20 on US iTunes overall chart.

The boost to both albums, Nate Hilts believes, is partially due to the band’s video for ‘In Hell I’ll Be In Good Company,’ which was released in early 2016. “We were late to the game getting videos out for Good Company in general and after we did the ‘In Hell…’ video in 2016 we concentrated on releasing Illusion & Doubt and put the video on the back burner. But, a few months after we released it, there was just this huge… BOOM.”

Boom is a good way to put it. Currently ‘In Hell I’ll Be In Good Company’ has over 85 million views on YouTube and is gaining roughly 1,000,000 views weekly.

The other factor, one simpler to see in terms of cause and effect, is The Dead South’s live show. On stage they deliver, show after sold-out show, a relentlessly great, high-energy frenzy that has resulted in nearly 50,000 tickets sold in 2018. The numbers are adding up for this Billboard charting, JUNO Award winning, Next Big Sound Trendsetting, Road Gold-certified band.

Having taken the first steps towards a new album with a trip to Muscle Shoals, The Dead South are ready for 2019 with an impressive amount of fuel for the fire.

The Dead South’s ‘The Bastard Son Tour’ dates are as follows:

30 Jan Dublin Whelans

31 Jan Belfast Foundry

02 Feb Newcastle O2 Academy

03 Feb Glasgow O2 Academy

05 Feb Liverpool O2 Academy

06 Feb Manchester O2 Ritz

07 Feb Leeds O2 Academy

08 Feb Nottingham Rock City

09 Feb Norwich Banking Hall at Open

10 Feb Bristol O2 Academy

12 Feb Cardiff Tramshed