Alabaster DePlume - New album and UK & European Tour, April and May 2025.
Wednesday, April 09, 2025
Alabaster DePlume, the London-based saxophonist, singer, songwriter, activist, orator & poet-philosopher will be touring in the UK & Europe in support of his new album A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole
We have received the following press release;
Alabaster DePlume Tours the UK and Europe from April 29 in Support of Critically Acclaimed Album"A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole”.
Artist: Alabaster DePlume
Album: A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole
Label: International Anthem
Hot off a successful run of shows in the US, Alabaster DePlume — the acclaimed London-based saxophonist, singer, songwriter, activist, orator, and poet-philosopher — continues his A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole tour with headline dates across the UK and Europe from April 29, including Norwich, Glasgow (sold out), London, Brighton and festival such as Roskilde (Netherlands) and Worldwide (France). The album, out now on International Anthem, has been praised by The Guardian as “stunning… entirely gorgeous, cyclical tunes that rise and fall in intensity,” hailed by MOJO for “assiduously pushing the boundaries,” and described by UNCUT as “serenely beautiful.” Listen to and purchase A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole on all streaming platforms here.
https://international-anthem.lnk.to/ABladeBecauseABladeIsWhole
DePlume will be joined by percussionist Julian Sartorius, drummer Seb Rochford (Polar Bear / Sons of Kemet), bassist Ruth Goller (Skylla / Melt Yourself Down), and longtime collaborator Mikey Kenney on strings — see full dates below, more information here;
https://www.alabaster-deplume.com/tour
Tour Dates 2025
April 29 - Norwich, UK @ Norwich Arts Centre
April 30 - Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
May 1 - Newcastle, UK @ Gosforth Civic Hall
May 2 - Glasgow, UK @ Mono
May 3 - Manchester, UK @ Gorilla
May 6 - Bristol, UK @ Trinity Centre
May 7 - Exeter, UK @ Phoenix
May 8 - Southampton, UK @ Papillon
May 9 - London, UK @ Hackney Church
May 10 - Brighton, UK @ Concorde 2
May 15 - Istanbul, TK @ Salon IKSV
May 16 - Warsaw, PL @ Niebo
May 17 - Berlin, DE @ XJAZZ!
May 21 - Paris, FR @ Le Petit Bain
May 22 - Lille, FR @ L’Aéronef
May 23 - Brussels, BE @ La Botanique
May 24 - Amsterdam, NL @ Zonnehuis
May 25 - Nijmegen, NL @ Doornroosje
May 26 - Rotterdam, NL @ Bird
June 1 - Torino, Italy @ Bunker (Jazz Is Dead)
June 7 - Cluj-Napoca, RO @ Jazz In The Park
July 2/5 - Roskilde, DK @ Roskilde Festival
July 4 - Sete, FR @ Worldwide
July 17 - Molde NO, @ Moldejazz
Recently, DePlume was profiled in The New Yorker during a jujitsu session. Read the full feature here.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/03/31/alabaster-deplume-grapples-with-it
His 10 headline shows across the US last month featured an array of special guests, varying on a night-to-night basis. Those who joined DePlume on stage included multi-instrumentalist Shahzad Ismaily (“one of music’s most coveted collaborators,” according to The New York Times), drummer Tcheser Holmes of Irreversible Entanglements, percussionist / multi-instrumentalist Dan Bitney of Tortoise, violinist/vocalist Macie Stewart, drummer Helen De La Rosa, vocalist Monique Golding of Black Monument Ensemble, flutist Rob Frye, cellist Olula Negre and guitarist Blake Mills.
As with all of DePlume’s work, A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole is driven by intention. In this case, a desire to interrogate the concept of healing. As DePlume shared with music writer Liz Pelly, who wrote an essay to accompany the album as digital liner notes: “When I meet people who love my work I ask them, ‘what do people need?’ Many of them were answering ‘healing’, so I worked on that, first of all by healing myself. I found that it was an activity I could choose, and that it had a lot to do with my ownership of myself, dignity and independence. Instead of waiting for healing to ‘happen to me’ I could heal myself and own myself. That is what this album is.”
Throughout the eleven songs on A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole, DePlume’s reflections on healing, dignity, and struggle are communicated through a stirring assemblage of disparate musics: ghostly and ancient folk melodies, groove-anchored maelstroms of swirling folk-jazz, elegant string arrangements (courtesy of Macie Stewart), disembodied voices, noir atmosphere, and allegoric, troubadouric song. Throughout, Alabaster’s intimate, confessional croon and vibrato-laced tenor saxophone convey, with a startling humanistic touch, everything from dejected fragility to resolute strength.
The album’s focus track, the punchy and contemplative “Thank You My Pain” carries a quiet but powerful rhythm, with a rhythmic refrain drawing on the wisdom of Vietnamese monk and peace activist Thích Nhât Hanh’s teachings about embracing pain when healing. About the track, he says: “Where often we automatically react against and escape from the discomfort we are in, it can be empowering to instead meet and feel those feelings. My feelings are me. I shall meet them, and thank them for coming. I learn to experience them, and doing so, I heal. It is easy to say, but trickier to do. This piece could be seen as an expression of the teachings of Thích Nhât Hanh who says, “hello my little pain, I know you are there, I am home to take care of you”.”
Tracklist
Oh My Actual Days
Thank You My Pain
Invincibility
Form a V
A Paper Man
Who Are You Telling, Gus
Prayer For My Sovereign Dignity
Kuzushi
Salty Road Dogs Victory Anthem
Too True
That Was My Garden
A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole is out now, purchase it here.
https://international-anthem.lnk.to/ABladeBecauseABladeIsWhole
QUOTES:
“Outstanding melodies, played with tremulous vibrato…entirely gorgeous, cyclical tunes that rise and fall in intensity”
The Guardian
“These songs act as a guided meditation on healing, and DePlume can express more with his saxophone than a guru with a well-thumbed thesaurus”
Pitchfork
“The Mancunian saxophonist and Jujitsuka dusts himself down and fires up the big strings for an album of fighting songs with healing sounds.”
The Quietus
“Conjuring chamber-based folk/ jazz collages with a bespoke philosophical twist .. assiduously pushing the boundaries.”
MOJO
“Traversing folk-jazz and elegantly-rendered orchestral suites, atmosphere and allegory, DePlume looks inward and confronts his own struggles.”
Clash
“His singing is murmured, pressurised, prayerful. His self-taught sax is his most distinctive voice, though, at times a shivering, Arabic thing like a quaking ghost, or sinuously sensual and serenely beautiful.”
UNCUT
“A simple yet beautifully executed reminder to reflect, find healing and resist vanity.”
The Skinny
“Weaves a tapestry of sounds — spiritual jazz, folk, classical, and beyond — into a potent missive of grace.”
FLOOD
“sombre yet curiously comforting”
Songlines
https://www.alabaster-deplume.com/