The Mars Volta will headline at Manchester’s O2 Apollo in just two weeks, one of three UK dates the hugely influential band are playing.
The Manchester gig lands in the middle of dates at Glasgow’s Barrowland and London’s Troxy and comes after a non-stop year for the band following the release of their seventh studio album The Mars Volta in September 2022 and recent reimagining of the album Que Dios Te Maldiga Mi Corazon in April.
Formed by guitarist/composer Omar Rodríguez-López and singer/lyricist Cedric Bixler-Zavala, The Mars Volta rose from the ashes of El Paso punk-rock firebrands At The Drive-In in 2001. On a mission to “honor our roots and honor our dead”, The Mars Volta made music that fused the Latin sounds Rodríguez-López was raised on with the punk and underground noise he and Bixler-Zavala had immersed themselves in for years, and the futuristic visions they were tapping into. The albums that followed were one-of-a-kind masterpieces, their songs of breath-taking complexity also possessing powerful emotional immediacy. After the group fell silent, a legion of devotees (including Kanye West) kept up an insistent drum-beat for their return.
A year after their self-titled seventh album announced the critically acclaimed return of Omar Rodríguez-López and Cedric Bixler-Zavala as The Mars Volta, the group recently released Que Dios Te Maldiga Mi Corazon in April, a potent reimagining of that reunion opus
When do The Mars Volta headline at Manchester’s O2 Apollo?
The Mars Volta headline at Manchester’s O2 Apollo on 17 June 2023. The Manchester gig is one of three UK dates they are headlining:
16 June – Glasgow, Barrowland
17 June – Manchester, O2 Apollo
18 June – London, Troxy