Courtney Barnett Announces 'The End Of The Day' Australian Tour Dates

Courtney Barnett has announced a string of Australian tour dates in celebration of her latest album, the instrumental End Of The Day, for January and February 2024.

Starting the run on Saturday, 20 January, Barnett will perform at the City Recital Hall as part of next year’s Sydney Festival, followed by a show at Melbourne’s Recital Centre on Friday, 2 February, The Rechabite as part of Perth Festival on Saturday, 10 February and Sunday, 11 February, and will soon announce a date in Hobart.

For her upcoming tour, Barnett will perform two sets per show – one bunch of instrumental songs from End Of The Day, followed by a second set of solo numbers from the remainder of Barnett’s rich catalogue.

Tickets to her appearances at Sydney and Perth festivals are on sale now via their respective websites, with the Melbourne date on sale on Monday, 30 October, at 11 am AEDT via the Melbourne Recital Centre website.

End Of The Day was released on Friday, 8 September, and features 17 tracks written to score the documentary Anonymous Club.

However you parse its title, End Of The Day is an undoubtedly significant release for Barnett, ticking off some key items on her artistic bucket list and bridging the gap between Things Take Time, Take Time and her impending fourth studio album.

The concept for End Of The Day came about nearly two years after the documentary about Barnett, Anonymous Club, premiered at the 2021 Melbourne International Film Festival. “I didn’t really intend to make it an album,” Barnett told The Music in a recent interview. “We just thought, ‘Let’s make this the best music we can for this specific project.’ But I kind of like the journey it took, you know?”

Barnett described the album’s creation as “a really slow process”, during which she spent weeks poring over its ambient ebbs and flows. “I found myself listening to the tracks for hours on end,” she says, “and I wasn't sure if I wanted to add new instrumentation or how much I wanted to change.

“It was a bit like a puzzle, I think, putting it all together in the end – just finding those transitions and figuring out how to make it all flow very naturally. I wanted all the songs to bleed into each other and not have a sense of pause or distraction in between them.”

COURTNEY BARNETT

END OF THE DAY LIVE IN AUSTRALIA

Saturday, 20 January – City Recital Hall, Sydney Festival

Friday, 2 February – Melbourne Recital Centre

Saturday, 10 February and Sunday, 11 February – The Rechabite, Perth Festival

Hobart TBA