Concert News

Hurray For The Riff Raff: New Album and UK Tour

• 19th Jul 2012

Hurray For The Riff Raff have a new album out on August 20th, and will be touring the UK to promote it.

Hurray For The Riff Raff began when Alynda Lee Segarra left her native Bronx, New York at the age of 17 and started hopping freight trains across the USA to satisfy a yearning to explore its mythical small towns and backwaters and live a life on the road and the rail track. When the roaming was done she settled in New Orleans, a magnet for the creatively dispossessed, and allowed music to properly take hold of her life. She quickly embraced the city's own community of street musicians, who encouraged her to develop her voice by singing old Jazz songs. She was soon performing with many of the traditional bands that cluster the sidewalks of the French Quarter, playing and singing while learning from the music of the city she loves.

Soon Alynda was recruiting a rotating cast of like-minded musicians who started playing in small clubs under the name Hurray For The Riff Raff. The band name is a celebration of the marginalized and a year later they started recording Alynda’s self-penned songs in an old shotgun shack in the Bywater neighbourhood of New Orleans, just a few blocks from the Mississippi River. The resulting eponymously titled UK debut album was one of The Times Top 10 Albums of 2011 and Mojo named them as one of the Top 10 acts at SXSW 2011. Back in the States, Hurray For The Riff Raff were soon to feature in the hit HBO mini series based in New Orleans – Treme.

In her search for a more permanent line-up, Alynda Lee Segarra recruited a young bunch of honky tonkers called The Tumbleweeds. Hurray For The Riff Raff's new album Look Out Mama is the result of the new line-up criss-crossing the USA, playing countless shows in small bars and clubs. Recorded in Nashville and produced by Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes), Look Out Mama is an exploration of classic American music as interpreted by Alynda Lee Segarra. From the Swamp Pop of “Little Black Star” to the Classic Country of “Look Out Mama”, to the Psychedelia of “Ode to John and Yoko” and even the Surf-Rock of “Lake of Fire”, Look Out Mama covers a wide array of musical ground, with every song unified by Alynda’s soulful vocals and expert songwriting.

Tour dates:

30/08 – Glasgow, Pivo Pivo
31/08 – Newcastle, The Central
01/09 – Swansea, The Chattery
02/09 – End Of The Road Festival
04/09 – Nottingham, Glee Club
05/09 – Sheffield, Greystones
06/09 – Manchester, Night & Day
07/09 – Norwich, Arts Centre
09/09 – Winchester, The Railway (SXSC)
10/09 – London, Borderline
11/09 – Brighton, Green Door Store