Inspiral Carpets Announce 2023 Greatest Hits Tour – Their First Australian Shows in 30 Years

February 19, 2023

30 years since they last visited the country, influential Madchester outfit Inspiral Carpets have announced their return to Australia. The veteran English group will celebrate their 40th anniversary with a national tour throughout July and August 2023.

Inspiral Carpets formed in 1983 and rose to prominence later in the decade alongside contemporaneous Mancunian acts The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays. They released their critically-acclaimed debut album, Life, in 1990 and their second, The Beast Inside, in 1991. The band’s one and only Australian tour came in 1993, by which time they’d released their third album, 1992’s Revenge Of The Goldfish.

Inspiral Carpets – ‘This Is How It Feels’

Inspiral Carpets released their fourth album, Devil Hopping, in 1994 but were dropped by their label, Mute Records, in 1995 and split up shortly thereafter. The classic lineup of vocalist Tom Hingley, guitarist Graham Lambert, keyboardist Clint Boon, bass player Martyn Walsh and drummer Craig Gill got back together in 2003 for a couple of UK tours.

Original vocalist Stephen Holt replaced Hingley in 2011 and the Carpets released their fifth album, Inspiral Carpets, in 2014. The band parted ways again in 2016 following Gill’s death at the age of 44. Lambert, Boon and Holt will be joined on the upcoming Australian tour by drummer Kev Clark and bass player Jake Fletcher.