Big Summer Tour for Hootie & The Blowfish
Hootie & The Blowfish are back!!!! This summer the band will join forces with Barenaked Ladies for the sprawling 44-date North American “Group Therapy” tour, and have announced a new band record deal with Universal Music Group Nashville. The band’s upcoming sixth album will be the followup to 2005’s Looking For Lucky, and coincides with the 25th anniversary of their debut album, Cracked Rear View. The trek kicks off on May 30th in Virginia Beach, Virginia at Veterans United Amphitheater and winds down on September 13th with a homecoming gig at Columbia, South Carolina’s Colonial Life Arena.
Hootie & The Blowfish’s debut album Cracked Rear View, which was released on July 5th, 1994, was certified by the RIAA as 21-times Platinum and is the fifth-most certified studio album of all time. The band is a two-time Grammy winner who have gone on to sell over 25 million albums and score a whopping 17 Billboard-charting songs to date.
Frontman Darius Rucker who in the decade-plus year break since their last formal tour has reacked up nine chart-topping solo singles on country radio. A while back, Rucker recalled to us that after hearing the single “Hold My Hand” in 1994, David Letterman immediately called his talent booker to schedule the then-unknown Hootie & The Blowfish on his show: “He was the catalyst of our career. He was the guy who made us a household name. Now seeing how all that works with the booking agents and all that stuff, it’s amazing that our fortunes happened that he just happened to hear us on the drive home. ‘Cause I’m sure David Letterman never says to his booking agent, ‘I want this band or that band.’ Never. I’m sure it’s just not what he’s worried about. He’s worrying about being funny that night. And for him to have heard it and called and say, ‘I want them Friday,’ is just unbelievable.”
Bassist Dean Felber explained to us that one of the reasons the group took time off was so it could get perspective on its music: “Several reasons we kind of slowed down for a while, y’know, kids and family. But another one was to kind of get perspective on ourselves again and figure out what makes us special as a songwriter.”