70s rock icons with Bob Geldof links announce 2025 UK tour including major London destination-Joel Harley-Entertainment – Metro

Bob Geldof and the Boomtown Rats are set to tour again (Picture: Getty)

70s rock icon Bob Geldof has announced a massive tour for 2025 with his band, The Boomtown Rats.

First formed in Dublin in 1975, the group’s line-up also included keyboard player Johnnie Fingers, bassist Pete Briquette, guitarist Gerry Cott, drummer Simon Crowe, and guitarist Garry Roberts – who died in 2022, aged 75.

The Irish rock and new-wave band rose to fame with the release of their hit song I Don’t Like Mondays in 1979, and went on to release other hits including Like Clockwork, Rat Trap and Banana Republic.

Since then, outspoken frontman Bob, 73, went on to become the co-founder of the all-star fundraising initiative Band Aid, raising money and awareness for the famine crisis in Ethiopia in the 1980s.

Fifty years since their debut, The Boomtown Rats have announced that they will be touring again next year. Billed as their anniversary tour, Happy Birthday Boomtown: Celebrating 50 Rat Years 1975 – 2025 will play in 12 venues across the UK.

And no, none of the dates released are on a Monday!

The Boomtown Rats made their debut in 1975 (Picture: Redferns)

The band’s tour will play in Nottingham, Birmingham, Aberdeen, Glasgow, Sheffield, Cambridge, London, Southampton, Manchester, Gateshead, York and Liverpool between October 10 and November 15.

The band’s show includes a very special performance in London at the Apollo on October 30 – coinciding with the band’s anniversary of their first-ever performance, 50 years to the day.

Tickets for the shows will go on sale at 10am on December 6.

The band are celebrating 50 years in the music industry (Picture: Redferns)

The band’s website describes Happy Birthday Boomtown as ‘not just an ordinary tour’ but as a ‘celebration of their musical legacy.’

A release to the website continues: ‘Relive the magic of the Rats, with an exclusive Boomtown Rats documentary screening highlighting never before seen footage, taking you on an evocative journey through the band’s extraordinary history.

‘It’s the perfect opener to the uproarious performances that will follow! and an opportunity to create memories with fellow fans.’

The band now consists of Bob Geldof on vocals, Alan Dunn on keyboard, Darren Beale on guitar, Pete Briquette on bass and keyboard, and Simon Crowe on drums and percussion.

The band’s tour will culminate at the Olympia in Liverpool (Picture: Redferns)

News of the Boomtown Rats’ tour comes in the wake of ongoing controversy over the charity single he helped mastermind in 1984.

The Band Aid song, Do They Know It’s Christmas? is still going strong with a 40th-anniversary re-release this year – including re-used vocals from rock icons such as Sting and Bono.

However, rapper  Fuse ODG has criticised the song for perpetuating stereotypes about Africa and making him want to ‘disassociate’ from his roots.

Bob is also widely known as the co-founder of Live Aid (Picture: Getty Images)

Bob has also clashed with The Shape of You hitmaker Ed Sheeran, who said that he did not give ‘permission’ for organisers to use his vocals in the 40th-anniversary mix.

Ed, 33, said that he would have ‘respectfully’ declined to appear in the new version of the charity song, and referenced another post criticising foreign aid in Africa.

Responding to the comments in an interview with The Sunday Times, Sir Bob said: ‘This little pop song has kept millions of people alive.

‘Why would Band Aid scrap feeding thousands of children dependent on us for a meal?’

Bob has come under fire for Band Aid’s 40th anniversary release (Picture: Getty Images)

Bob – who has recently been filming his, uh, zombie movie in Australia – continued: ‘Why not keep doing that? Because of an abstract wealthy-world argument, regardless of its legitimacy?

‘No abstract theory, regardless of how sincerely held, should impede or distract from that hideous, concrete real-world reality.

‘There are 600million hungry people in the world – 300million are in Africa. We wish it were other, but it is not.

‘We can help some of them. That’s what we will continue to do.’

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