The Streets were supposed to be no more. Having announced retirement back in 2011 and then again in 2016, the music world had though it had lost one of its more original and idiosyncratic voices.
Mike Skinner has always been the reluctant superstar. Happier in the boozer than with the glitterati.
Despite this reticence to step into the spotlight more often, Skinner was the quintessential forefather for a great number of UK acts. Just think, would we know Kate Tempest, Young Fathers, Ghostpoet, SleafordMods, Slaves and yes, maybe even The Arctic Monkeys without Skinner’s way with words?
Spending a few years away from the studio and performing as a DJ, Skinner told the Guardian in 2016: ''The way I see it, it’s like I’ve retired, and now I’m just doing what I want.’'
It’s funny to assume that through his LPS ‘The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living’, ‘Everything is Borrowed’, ‘Computers and Blues’, the concept record ‘A Grand Don’t Come For Free’ and the classic ‘Original Pirate Material’ that Skinner was hemmed in by his craft and the reputation that came with it.
It is, then, a bit surprising that in 2019 that we find Skinner embarking on a ‘greatest hits tour’.
There have, of course, been a smattering of tracks during the fallow years - and of course there was his project The D.O.T, with Robert Harvey (of much forgotten indie-smashers The Music).
Mike has dropped five brand new tracks over the last year or so; ‘You Are Not The Voice In Your Head’, ‘Boys Will Be Boys’ feat Jaykae, ‘If You Ever Need To Talk I’m Here’, ‘Burn Bridges’ and ‘Sometimes I Hate My Friends More Than My Enemies’ and we are told that he is working on a film soundtrack that will also be known as a Streets record.
Those that have attended a Streets show know the power involved in his genre straddling genius. There are shouts, there are hugs, there are tears and there are cheers.
To win a pair of tickets, please head to our Facebook Page, like the post AND like the page: then tell us your favourite Streets memory.
Oi, oi!
den Atelier, 7pm Sunday 10 February, 2019
