Bastille singer Dan Smith says he cringes at some of the band’s early performances – but promises a party for fans as they step back a decade at their Dundee concert.
The English four-piece are celebrating the 10th anniversary of debut album Bad Blood with a UK tour.
The show arrives at Dundee’s Slessor Gardens next Saturday (July 29) for the band’s biggest gig in the city.
Smith says it has not always been comfortable for the group – famed for hits like Pompeii – to look back on where it all started.
Bastille playing ‘amazing outside spaces’ like Slessor Gardens
He said: “Obviously touring has changed and shifted, and now there’s the opportunity to play all these amazing outside spaces around the UK.
“We wanted all the gigs to feel special. Because of the time of year, it’s great to be outside, which in retrospect, given how much work we’ve put into the visual production and the lighting it’s kind of ironic that we’re going to play all of the shows in the daylight because it’s the British summer.
“I think we just wanted this to feel really special and to nod to the past, nod to that era.
“There’s a lot of footage of us being idiots, as we still are, but I think if you’re a fan, if you have been from the beginning, it’ll probably feel quite nostalgic.”
He added: “I think what’s quite nice with this is we look back at all this footage and we are like, ‘God so much of that is so embarrassing’, but just quite funny to show it to people to get a little insight into what it was like, because having a song and an album that are that successful, if you’re not expecting it, it’s such a cliche, but it’s such a wildly life-changing experience.”
On top of Bad Blood in full, Bastille have had hits like Happier – their collaboration with Marshmello – on the setlist from gigs earlier in the tour.
‘It felt like a massive party’
Smith said: “This is just such a nice opportunity, 10 years later, to be able to go back and play the album again, from start to finish.
“I had the most amazing and fun time on stage in the first show in Dublin.
“I felt, as someone that gets quite nervous and doesn’t particularly love being on stage, just really happy and I felt properly able to look out to see thousands of people singing the album from start to finish, word for word.
“I like seeing happy in everyone and it was such a nice, weird, and surreal moment to both be up there still making new music and getting to play our old stuff as well as getting to show a kind of cross-section of everything we’ve done so far.
“It just felt like a massive, massive party. It was one of my favourite gigs ever, so we’re obviously super excited to tour.”
Before then, James and Razorlight take to the Slessor Gardens stage on Friday night.
Tickets for Bastille’s show are available online.
