American Aquarium postpone Europe tour to 2021

In mid-March, while Americans were beginning to reckon with job losses and isolation spurred by coast-to-coast shelter-in-place orders, BJ Barham performed the American Aquarium songbook for shut-in fans via livestream, one album at a time. On the sixth night, he debuted the band’s new album, Lamentations (New West Records).

As Barham performed skeletal, acoustic versions of the songs, he kept reaching back to the title track, “Me + Mine (Lamentations),” to explain the album’s theme. In the song, inspired by the Old Testament’s Book of Lamentations, he relates the biblical Jeremiah’s sufferings to someone who has “woke up from the American dream,” and vows not to be fooled again by the man who swore to “return the jobs God himself cannot bring back.”

“He’s watching his entire country fall apart before his eyes, calling up to ask God for help, and nobody’s answering,” says Barham, whose first experience singing was in a Southern Baptist church in rural North Carolina. “I thought that was a really great parallel [to] 2020 America.”

If only the man who wrote those songs in 2019 could’ve known how deeply the sentiment would resonate in the new year.

Ultimately, ​Lamentations i​ s a thrilling portrait of an artist and his band reaching new levels of skill, consciousness, and potential after 20 years in the trenches. Unruly and sincere, Barham emerges as an important American voice––and an unlikely peacemaker. “I’ve had to work really hard to carry water as a songwriter,” he says. “It feels really good to be in my mid-30s, writing songs that I think matter. I think when you listen to this record, something is going to change in you. You’re going to feel something. That’s the most important part of songwriting: making someone feel."

American Aquarium's European tour in support of Lamentations, which was produced by Shooter Jennings, has been postponed by a year, we're excited to share the new dates today:

TOURDATES 2021:
29/09: Utrecht, NL - TivoliVredenburg
30/09: Leiden, NL - Q-Bus
01/10: Oostende, BE - De Zwerver
02/10: Brighton, UK - The Prince Albert
03/10: Oxford, UK - Bullingdon
04/10: Manchester, UK - Night & Day
05/10: London, UK - Oslo
07/10: Cologne, DE - Die Kantine
08/10: Alkmaar, NL - Poppodium Victorie
09/10: Groningen, NL - De Oosterpoort
10/10: Malmö, SWE - Folk å Rock
11/10: Falkenberg, SWE - Tryckhallen
12/10: Stockholm, SWE - Klubb Nalen
13/10: Oslo, NO - John Dee
14/10: Odda, NO - Bluesklubb
15/10: Sandane, NO - Bluesfestival