Snow Patrol announce Dublin and Belfast gigs next year as part of new UK and Ireland tour

The group, made up of original lead singer Gary Lightbody, as well as Nathan Connolly and Johnny McDaid, after drummer Jonny Quinn and bassist Paul Wilson left last year, will play in Dublin on February 25 next year.

The tour will also see the Chasing Cars artist’s play in Belfast’s SSE Arena on February 27 as part of the eight dates on the tour. There are no other Irish venues as part of the UK and Ireland tour.

It coincides with their eagerly awaited return with a brand new album, The Forest Is The Path.

The album is the Northern Irish band’s first in six years, following 2018’s Wildness, and is set for release on September 13, via Polydor Records.

Lead singer Gary Lightbody said the group wrote the entire album in one day from “start to finish”.

Johnny McDaid said: “And he (Lightbody) did the vocal in one take, straight after writing the lyrics. So it has this mind-collapsing quality to it where you feel like you’re seeing into someone’s soul.”

The Forest Is The Path was written by Gary Lightbody, Nathan Connolly and Johnny McDaid and features twelve tracks.

It is produced by Fraser T Smith (Adele/Dave/Stormzy) and the band.

The Beginning is the cornerstone of the band’s eighth studio album, written on a trip to Somerset.

It has been described as being “rooted in reflection, introspection and interrogation”.

One of its key building blocks, says Lightbody, was the idea of “love from the distance of time”.

“I haven’t been in a relationship for a very long time, 10 years or more, so love from a distance to me meant the way a relationship sits in your memory from a distance of, say, 10 years.

“That’s not something I’d previously thought about as a way to write about love. So it’s like, when you’re in love, you’re standing in the lobby of the Empire State Building.

“When you’ve broken up with that person, you’re out in the street. You can still see the building, but you’re not in there anymore.

“And when it’s 10 years later, now you’re standing in Brooklyn looking at the Manhattan skyline,” he said.

He added that the album is “a way of looking at various mistakes, any pain I may have caused, from a place where nothing is hurting anymore, except the memory when you pull it back into your mind”.

“The memory itself is full of hurt but everything around it isn’t. You’re holding in your hand this ball of fire, but now you’ve got gloves on,” he said.

Tickets for the 3Arena concert go on sale Friday June 7 at 10am.