Take That are to take to the road next year for a new tour, only this time things will be a little different for the boyband (or should that be man-band?) who first caught public attention back in the nineties – there will be only three of them.
Take That will be taking to stages across the UK as a trio of Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and Howard Donald after former member Jason Orange decided to call time on his involvement in the band.
“We’ve always been very proud of our live show and are very excited to be touring again next year,” say the band in a statement.
“Playing live is something we love the most about what we do and we’re looking forward to putting on the most amazing show we can.
“It will have been four years since our last tour [the record-breaking Progress stadium tour] so we’re really keen to get back out on the road to play some of our biggest songs from the last 20 years alongside our new ones.”
The band have new album III, their seventh, coming out this December with a first single These Days preceding it on November 23. The tour itself is going to include 22 shows played across seven UK cities, including Belfast, Manchester, London and Glasgow where it begins on April 28.
Take That have been that rare breed of pop act – one who achieved global fame with little critical success early in their career but subsequently reinvented themselves as a pop group to be taken seriously. Which, let’s face it, is no mean feat as, despite their latter years move into the serious pop mainstream, they initially heralded their arrival with an eye-catching pecs-out, leather-clad incarnation.
Another former member who will not be involved in the tour, though, is Robbie Williams.
Robbie was a member of the band back in their initial rise to fame but quit in 1995, much to the shock of Take That fans.
Post-Take That, he went on to carve out quite a nice solo career for himself, with hits such as Angels and Rock DJ before struggling for musical ‘form’ in the mid-noughties and ultimately re-joining the band in 2010.
He released his latest solo album, Take The Crown, last year, scoring his seventh solo number one single for the song Candy, which incidentally was co-written with his former bandmate Gary Barlow.
