Dave Ball has been forced to sit out of Soft Cell’s US tour.
The musician was set to join Marc Almond on the road but has instead skipped the jaunt on the advice of medical professionals after suffering a fractured vertebrae earlier this year.
A statement on the duo’s social media pages reads: “Dave Ball has been advised by his London medical team that his ongoing physiotherapy treatment must take priority at this time, thus he will be reluctantly unable to join this Soft Cell US tour.
.@daveballelectro has been advised by his London medical team that his ongoing physiotherapy treatment must take priority at this time, thus he will be reluctantly unable to join this Soft Cell US tour. pic.twitter.com/W15hJbiZ2t
— Soft Cell (@softcellhq) August 22, 2022 >“Alongside Marc Almond and the full Soft Cell touring band, Philip Larsen, the Grammy-winning producer, will now be standing in for Dave on synthesizers for the five dates. As well as co-producing the current album ‘*Happiness Not Included’, Philip has worked extensively with Marc and Dave in recent years, so is a safe pair of hands and very much part of our Soft Cell team.
“Dave is both disappointed and frustrated after working extremely hard in recent weeks to prepare for the tour, but hopes to be back to normal later in the year. He sends his best wishes for the tour to Marc, Philip and the rest of the band, and looks forward to the next time.
“This is such a great show and Dave knows fans will support Marc and the band, and love these Soft Cell performances.”
The tour sees Soft Cell perform their debut album ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’ in full, alongside recent releases from their current long-player ‘*Happiness Not Included’.
The album features 10 new tracks and, according to Dave, “reflects the dreadful government we have at the moment and the levels of hypocrisy and incompetence”.
Marc adds: “In this album, I wanted to look at us as a society, a place where we have chosen to put profits before people, money before morality and decency, food before the rights of animals, fanaticism before fairness and our own trivial comforts before the unspeakable agonies of others.”
“I think it’s very much reflective of what’s going on in the world,” Dave continues. “The fact we had someone like [Donald] Trump in power. We’re not in a very good place globally.
“Whatever your political beliefs are, the state [of the world] isn’t too good. And obviously, with all the global warming and all that sort of stuff going on, it’s not fantastically happy times.”
‘*Happiness Not Included’ is available now.
Read the full interview in the Retro Pop 2022 Preview Special, out now. Get yours here: Retro Pop Store.
