Seizing the Spirit

Crowded House are proving popular in the UK as a second concert at Birmingham’s Symphony Hall was added “due to phenomenal demand after tickets for the first night went on sale,” the Express & Star reports. The band, which draws its members from New Zealand and Australia, will appear at Symphony Hall on May 24 and 25. Crowded House, led by singer Neil Finn and featuring bassist Nick Seymour, Mark Hart on keyboards and guitar, and Matt Sherrod on drums, is returning to the stage with a tour that includes appearances at festivals and theatres all over the world. The band is set to release a sixth studio album later this year, their first since Time On Earth in 2006. Finn told the Sunday Star Times: “Our reason for getting back together and becoming a contemporary band was not nostalgia. It was trying to seize the spirit of what we had and push it forward a little more.” Crowded House will play a one-off New Zealand gig at the Auckland Town Hall on April 8.