The Human League Announce First New Album in a Decade

07/14/2011
. The Human League have set August 16 (digital) and August 23 (physical) release dates for their ninth studio album Credo.

They have also announced live dates where they'll share the stage with Men Without Hats, The B-52s, Berlin, and The Fixx.

Their first release in ten years (following 2001's Secrets), Credo will be available in North America via the MB3 Records/EMI Music imprint.

Commensurate with a band who gave us the greatest ever Christmas Number 1 single with 1981/2's 'Don't You Want Me', who have had four Top 10 albums and eight Top 10 singles in the UK, as well as two US Number 1 singles, and sold 20 million records worldwide, they're used to everyone from Madonna to Moby, Pet Shop Boys to Robbie Williams, citing them as an influence. Now the dubstep generation � notably, the acclaimed Darkstar, who cover the League's 1982 B-side 'You Remind Me Of Gold' on their current album, North � have begun to pay homage to the original sound of Sheffield. Then there are the 'L' girls, the new generation of synth-driven female pop artists, who have got in on the League-adoring act: La Roux is a known admirer of the electro pioneers, while Little Boots is such a fan she requested Philip Oakey's input on her debut album. Even Lady Gaga professed to be a devotee when she met them recently at the 'V' Festival.

Produced by fellow Sheffield pop experimentalists I Monster, Credo's style is a refinement of the approach first adopted by The Human League thirty years ago when they first led an experimental art-school insurgency of radical futuristic ideals into the top ten. Songs like 'Don't You Want Me or 'Love Action' that are both hummable shiny pop anthems for dispossessed teens and menacing electronic three minute future shocks, nothing less than radical pop subterfuge.

Credo's eleven tracks still bear all the classic League synth pop hallmarks but are as modern as the sharpest 21st century chart pop. Never Let Me Go (first single for the US) is an ecstatic album opener, with the League still straddling the high street and the art house effortlessly, like Girls Aloud joining Kraftwerk, the sound of a Top Shop branch staffed entirely by robots.

2011 NORTH AMERICAN TOUR DATES

09/01 - San Diego, CA @ Viejas
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/02 � Los Angeles, CA @ The Hollywood Bowl
(w/ The B-52s, Berlin, and The Fixx)

09/03 - Sausolito, CA @ Sausolito Arts Festival
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/04 � Las Vegas, NV @ Mandalay Bay
(w/ The B-52s and Men Without Hats)

09/07 - Lincoln, CA @ Thunder Valley Casino Resort
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/08 � Saratoga, CA @ Mountain Winery
(w/ The B-52s and Men Without Hats)

09/09 - Jacksonville, OR @ Britt Festival
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/10 � Woodinville, WA @ Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery
(w/ The B-52s)

09/11 - Vancouver, BC @ Rickshaw Theatre
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/15 � Denver, CO @ The Summit Music Hall
(w/ Men Without Hats)

09/16 - Kansas City, MO @ Uptown Theatre
(w/ Men Without Hats)