On 4 April 2025 the Nightingales release a new album “The Awful Truth” on Fire Records and will embark on a UK tour shortly afterwards.
Fire were responsible for the deluxe reissues of the band’s earlier records plus the “King Rocker” movie (see below) and so have had a relationship with the ‘Gales that goes back quite a few years. “The Awful Truth” though is the first all new album for Fire since the group signed to the label in 2024.
Recorded in a remote spot in the old DDR, the album contains 13 songs produced by the band’s bassist Andreas Schmid and comes packaged in a beautiful sleeve featuring a painting by Tomasso Salini. The initial LP will be available with an embossed front cover and pressed on brown vinyl.
It is the Nightingales’ first release since September 2023’s “Live In Balsall Heath”, an individually numbered limited edition double LP issued by Tiny Global Productions.
“Live In Balsall Heath”, as the name would suggest, is the live show that the ‘Gales played in Birmingham, augmented by three guest musicians – sax god Terry Edwards and Brummie superstars the Nightingals. It is an unadulterated 68 minute document of the seven piece Nightingales from one of the four gigs the line up performed.
Following that album’s release the group were pleased to undertake their first post pandemic tour of mainland Europe, featuring visits to Germany, Italy, Austria, Switzerland and Czechia. This Euro jaunt was followed in December by a long weekend of shows in Ireland.
The Nightingales were less busy than usual in 2024 but did play the Rockaway Beach and Green Man festivals in addition to their own headline ‘Off The Beaten Track’ tour in May, featuring gigs in some smaller, less visited towns.
First shown on Sky Arts in February 2021 “King Rocker” is the critically acclaimed documentary feature film about Robert Lloyd and the Nightingales written and presented by Stewart Lee, directed by Michael Cumming and produced by James Nicholls for Fire Films. The movie’s cinema debut was at the respected Sheffield documentary film festival and it has since been screened at assorted cinemas, music and film festivals, from Glastonbury to Perth, Australia. It is also available as a bookback DVD.
Since the film – and it’s soundtrack album – the band released “The Last Laugh” described by critics as, “a rollocking, sardonic, sprawling, cuddly beast of a new album from Birmingham’s finest”, “a brilliant album”, “a masterpiece”, blah, blah.
“The Last Laugh” was the final release of Nightingales material in 2022. Earlier there had been “The New Nonsense”, a 12” EP featuring radical reworkings of tracks from the band’s previous album “Four Against Fate” by top techno DJ Surgeon, the Go! Team and German wunderkind Randy Kuntz. Then, continuing the series of unreleased material and reissues, the group’s second album “Hysterics” was released as a ‘deluxe’ double album, followed by an expanded reissue of “In The Good Old Country Way”
In April 2023 the ‘Gales were stoked to be special guests of The Damned on their successful tour of most of the UK’s major cities and, following a rather quiet 2024, the group are looking forward to their own headline UK tour in May ’25.
More news of live dates at home and abroad plus possible theatrical screenings of “King Rocker” and further record releases will follow, as and when, over the coming months.