Jah Wobble has announced a mammoth 30-date UK tour for early next year with his Invaders Of The Heart. It kicks off on Thursday 13th January 2022 at the Junction in Cambridge and finishes over three months later in Wimborne on Saturday 30th April. Thankfully there is a Brighton concert as part of the tour and this will see them making a welcome return to Patterns on Friday 4th March 2022 – Grab your tickets HERE.
Stepney born East Londoner Jah Wobble (real name John Wardle) began his musical journey when he met John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten) and John Simon Ritchie (aka Sid Vicious) at London’s Kingsway College in 1973. It was Vicious who not only nicknamed John ‘Jah Wobble’ after a drunken binge, but also lent him his first bass guitar.
John Lydon asked Jah Wobble to join Public Image Limited (aka PiL) in spring 1978 and thus with guitarist Keith Levene, and drummer Jim Walker, the band was born.
Wobble’s distinctive ‘low end’ bass became the backbone of PiL’s pioneering sound on the first two PiL albums ‘Public Image’ aka ‘First Issue’ and its follow-up, the exploratory yet sinister soundscapes of ‘Metal Box’.
Wobble became disillusioned by politics within the band and their reluctance to play live. By 1984, both Levene and Wobble had departed and the group and Wobble embarked on a prolific solo career.
Jah Wobble and the Invaders of the Heart released their debut album ‘Without Judgement’ in 1989 and received a Mercury Music Prize nomination in 1991 for the ‘Rising Above Bedlam’ album, which contained the legendary album opener ‘Visions Of You’ with Sinéad O’Connor on vocals. After the acclaimed ‘Take Me To God‘ album in 1994, which featured the now sadly departed vocal talents of Dolores O’Riordan of The Cranberries on the single ‘The Sun Does Rise’, The Invaders of The Heart split. Jah Wobble then launched his own 30 Hertz record label which has subsequently released around 30 albums.
Over the past four decades, Jah Wobble has ploughed his own furrow as a solo artist, as well as becoming a well-respected session musician, with a genuine passion for Eastern and Global music. He has worked with a diverse range of musicians, including Baaba Maal, Bjork, Primal Scream, Brian Eno, Julianne Regan, Holgat Czukay, U2’s The Edge, Chaka Demus & Pliers and the aforementioned Sinead O’Connor and Dolores O’Riordan.
In 2015, Cherry Red Records released ‘Redux’, a six-CD box set that spans nearly four decades of Wobble’s music. In 2017 Jah Wobble & The Invaders Of The Heart released ‘The Usual Suspects’ on 3m Music, which was followed in 2019 by ‘Realm Of Spells’ hit the streets by Jah Wobble & Bill Laswell with The Invaders Of The Heart, Peter Appelbaum & Hideo Yamaki.
Then Covid strikes! Wobble was determined to still keep recording and thus he called on his immediate family to assist. Thus was born ‘Guanyin’, a ten track album on his own Jah Wobble Records, featuring his wife Zi-Lan and sons Tianqi and GZ Tian.
Jah Wobble & The Invaders Of The Heart were last performing live in Brighton on 24th January last year. The Brighton & Hove News Music Team were in attendance. Read our account of the two hour set HERE.
Snap up your 2022 tour tickets HERE.
More information on Jah Wobble, visit www.jahwobble.com
