Best-selling Australian singer-songwriter Xavier Rudd is set to launch a U.S. tour in support of his fourth album, Dark Shades of Blue. Rudd will bring his new live lineup—featuring bassist Tio Moloantoa and drummer Andile Nqubezelo of the late Lucky Dube’s band—stateside beginning June 18th.

A multi-instrumentalist who plays guitars, Yidaki (didgeridoos), Weissenborn slide guitars, stomp box, harmonica, and percussion, Rudd‘s popularity has mushroomed in recent years thanks to an extraordinary stage show that finds him performing guitar, didgeridoo and various percussion parts simultaneously—using a set-up that literally surrounds him with various instruments, singing from behind a stand holding three didgeridoos of different keys. Rudd has led sold-out tours in Europe, Canada, Australia and the US, both headlining and supporting the likes of the Dave Matthews Band, Jack Johnson and Ben Harper. In Australia, he has collected a string of gold and platinum sales awards for his albums and DVDs.

Dark Shades of Blue, produced by Rudd and mixed by Joe Barresi (Tool, Queens of the Stone Age), finds Rudd at his most assertive, heavy and psychedelic. The album is dusky and cool, more sober than any work Rudd has done in the past—though don’t mistake it for temperate. Guitar-driven jams expand on a sound only hinted at on previous releases, and distortion often supplants the squeaky-clean guitars heard on earlier works.

JamBase.com, a leading resource for album and concert reviews, called Dark Shades of Blue “an absolute tour de force and unequivocally [Rudd’s] most powerful work to date.” Rudd’s 2008 Nokia Theater Times Square performance even earned him a nod from the New York Times who praised his ability to “bond with his jam-happy audience, encouraging rapture as well as a sense of belonging.”

Links

Official Page: www.xavierrudd.com

MySpace: www.myspace.com/xavierrudd

Xavier Rudd “Stargaze” on Jimmy Kimmel Live!