SOFT CELL announce "Danceteria," the final album from Marc Almond and Dave Ball, will be released on 9/25

SOFT CELL Announce DANCETERIA The final album from Marc Almond and Dave Ball To Be Released via Republic of Music on September 25th Watch the dazzling discotastic video for "Danceteria" The first proper single out today The final album is both a love letter to early 80s New York And a tribute to the late, great Dave Ball.   Pre-order Danceteria on vinyl, CD and digital here. www.softcell.co.uk Currently On THE GENERATIONS TOUR with The Human League and Alison Moyet "Danceteria" Link/Embed: https://youtu.be/P4kE8CNvoOw?si=pYK-HqQu3BlwoL59 JUNE 9, 2026 (New York, NY) -- Electronic music legends SOFT CELL, aka singer and frontman Marc Almond and  multi-instrumentalist and producer Dave Ball, are set to release Danceteria, their sixth and final studio album, on  September 25, 2026 via Republic of Music.   Listen to first proper single proper "Danceteria" through the dazzling discotastic video made by collage artist Vicki Bennett  at the link above. Out today, the title track is a joyous, celebratory burst of disco pop and as the album opener and a statement of  intent. It is Soft Cell at their very best with Almond's iconic vocals soaring over Dave's masterful John Barry-esque minor  chord progressions. There couldn't be a more fitting disco banger to pull back the dusty velvet curtain and beckon you into the  heady, romantic and deliciously dark world of "Danceteria."    Danceteria the album is a big, classy and playful farewell to 47 years of Marc and Dave making music as Soft Cell and  features career-defining performances from our electronic pop legends. Reminiscent of Sparks, Pet Shop Boys and with  lyrics that Lady Gaga would kill for, the album takes you on a vivid journey through a day in early '80s New York, bouncing round the clock from night to bleary daybreak and headlong back into the club. The 12-track album is available to pre-order now  on vinyl and CD, with the CD expanding to 14 tracks including two bonus tracks: "Crackland" and "What Is Your Morality."   Marc provides an initial snapshot into the album:   "Danceteria is a love letter to New York in the early '80s. The time we spent in New York - where we recorded our first three albums - shaped us both as artists and people. To celebrate this period is a fitting farewell to Dave Ball and the final Soft Cell studio album."   Danceteria is equally a tribute to the late, great Dave Ball. The final album is one of the last bodies of work Ball co-wrote  and produced before his sad, untimely passing on the October 22, 2025. Almond led the obituaries, describing Dave as a  "brilliant musical genius". The world's media followed, hailing him as an electronic music pioneer, plus music stars including  Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe from the Pet Shop Boys, Mute Records' Daniel Miller, Cabaret Voltaire and Richard Norris  from Dave's techno duo The Grid contributing an outpouring of elegiac praise. Dave finished Danceteria two days before  he passed away, and it is in full tribute to him that the album release went ahead as planned.   It is also because of Dave's passing that Danceteria simply has to be the last Soft Cell album, as Marc explains:   'There can be no more recordings of Soft Cell without Dave, it would not be possible. The sad reality is that Dave Ball was  half of Soft Cell, and live work aside, I can't write Soft Cell songs without him." SOFT CELL Photo credit: Mike Owen (hi-res) Danceteria is set in the legendary Manhattan nightclub where young Marc and Dave would party until the small hours after  the recording sessions for their seminal 1981 debut Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret. This was a life changing moment for the two art  school students from Leeds Polytechnic: Marc and Dave stepped into a world of unbridled creativity and total self-expression in  New York, swiftly fitting in and making friends with the most up for it in-crowd at Danceteria. Mirroring its eclectic musical  style, Danceteria provided a home for party people from all walks of life, sexualities and recreational appetites, drawn together  by the desire to simply be themselves. More than most, the queer community thrived under the disco ball lights, falling in and  out of love and dancing until dawn - essential solidarity against well-worn societal prejudices and the existential threat  from the burgeoning AIDS epidemic. Within these sweaty club walls, Marc saw Madonna's first ever performance on the  Danceteria floor, following a hot tip by a certain Seymour Stein - a moment the queen of pop is also playing tribute to  on her own new album Confessions On A Dance Floor: Part 2. During that time, Marc and Dave also met Andy Warhol  a few times, the subject of "Polaroid" on Soft Cell's fifth studio album, 2022's *Happiness not included. The duo recorded  their second album 1982's The Art of Falling Apart and the majority of third album 1984's This Last Night In Sodom  in the Big Apple, working with engineer and producer Mike Thorne at Mediasound for the first two and Dave Ball  producing the third. Additionally, Marc Almond lived in New York periodically over 25 years from the early '80s.   “Soft Cell have always had a strong connection with New York, and my Soft Cell lyrics often look at America through  British eyes,” says Marc. “New York in the 1980s was a particularly creative place for me. It was a pivotal era in terms of  changes in my personal life and changes in the city itself. New York shaped Soft Cell as it opened up a whole new  world of possibilities. It was dirty, dark and dangerous – a real Wild West – but it was also deeply inspiring and exciting. A lot  of our original influences came from America anyway: New York punk, Devo, Suicide, Lou Reed, disco and 1960s soul. But  New York was like nowhere else on earth. There were 24-hour nightclubs, music, art and underground theatre. It offered a  cornucopia of energy and edge, and the lyrics on ‘Danceteria’ reflect that time of my life.”   Earlier in March this year, the first new music released from Danceteria in form of "Out Come The Freaks," a cover of  Was (Not Was)'s 1981 mutant disco classic, and the album closer no less. The track conjures the hedonist spirit of  early '80s Manhattan, captured in this Danceteria floor filler spun by DJ Mark Kamins. The final flourish of glitter to Soft Cell's  "Out Come The Freaks" comes courtesy of guest vocals from Nona Hendryx, the iconic singer and one third of Labelle  of "Lady Marmalade" fame. Today's single, "Danceteria," was initially released as an extended mix on limited white 12"  vinyl for Record Store Day 2026, along with a classic house rework by Mark Moore and Dan Donovan, plus a dub version.   "Danceteria" is a love letter to the cultural vibrancy of New York in the 1980s. It’s a fitting tribute to Soft Cell’s creative  inception in NYC, Dave’s pioneering electronic genius and an outrageously great, 47-year musical career as one  of Britain’s trailblazing sonic forces.   Soft Cell and Marc Almond live dates  This summer, Marc Almond will be performing as Soft Cell in North America on the Generations Tour with The Human  League and Alison Moyet throughout June to July. The tour started Tuesday, June 2nd in San Diego and winds down in Niagara,  ON on July 2nd (get tickets here). Marc will also be playing some UK solo shows, including with Gary Numan and  Ladytron at Crystal Palace Bowl, London, on August 6th and as a special guest of The Human League at  Ludlow Castle, Shopshire, on July 18th (full listings and tickets here).   THE GENERATIONS TOUR Featuring The Human League, Soft Cell and Alison Moyet   Jun 11 Salt Lake City, UT Red Butte Garden Amphitheatre  SOLD OUT  Jun 12 Las Vegas, NV Fontainebleau Las Vegas SOLD OUT  Jun 13 Mesa, AZ   Mesa Amphitheatre Jun 16 Dallas, TX Texas Trust CU Theatre Jun 17 New Orleans Saenger Theatre Jun 19 Atlanta, GA Fox Theatre Jun 20 Charlotte, NC The Amp Ballantyne Jun 21 Nashville, TN Grand Ol Opry Jun 23 Chicago, IL The Chicago Theatre  SOLD OUT  Jun 24 Detroit, MI Masonic Temple Detroit Jun 26 New York, NY Radio City Music Hall  SOLD OUT  Jun 27 Boston, MA Wang Theatre Jun 28 Philadelphia, PA The Met Philadelphia Jun 30 Vienna, VA Filene Center Jul 1 Northfield, OH MGM Northfield Jul 2 Niagara, ON Fallsview Casino Resort SOLD OUT  More about Danceteria - an album biography by Adrian Thrills The New York club scene of the early 1980s was a rich source of inspiration for the visiting British bands who had broken  through in the aftermath of the UK’s punk and post-punk explosion. But no group immersed themselves in the city’s  vibrant underground culture – or its hedonistic spirit and seedy underbelly – quite like Soft Cell. The white-hot fervor of  Manhattan’s downtown clubs and the buzz of New York FM radio provided inspiration for the likes of New Order  (on "Blue Monday") and Simple Minds (on "Promised You A Miracle"), but the real trailblazers were Soft Cell.   Singer Marc Almond and multi-instrumentalist and producer Dave Ball made their first two full-length albums, Non-Stop  Erotic Cabaret and The Art Of Falling Apart, plus one of the first remix albums Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing, at  Mediasound in Hell’s Kitchen (the studio where T. Rex recorded "Jeepster"). The duo launched Non-Stop Erotic  Cabaret by throwing a wild party with a Times Square theme (“peep booths and adult performers”) at the Danceteria nightclub.  They drank margaritas in the Rainbow Room, met Andy Warhol at the Factory and danced alongside a young Madonna.   Manhattan was where Marc and Dave went looking for kicks. But it was also the place where they came of age as musicians  and individuals, and those pivotal themes are the building blocks for the sixth – and, sadly, final – Soft Cell album. Named  after the fabled three-story nightclub that opened in 1980 in an old industrial building on West 21st Street, Danceteria is a love  letter to 1980s New York. It explores the duo’s experiences in The Big Apple, soundtracking the course of a symbolic night  out that begins and ends on the dance floor and takes some darker and more enigmatic turns along the way. Like all the best  Soft Cell records, it’s a series of narratives, with Dave’s cinematic soundscapes in perfect harmony with Marc’s characteristically  vivid storytelling.   With Dave Ball’s untimely passing in October 2025 at age 66, the new album is a testimony to his arranging skills and  innovative production talent. The album’s final mixes were completed just two days before his death, and only two months  after his last live appearance with Soft Cell, when the band headlined the Rewind Festival in Henley-On-Thames in front  of over 20,000 fans.   “Dave was a wonderfully brilliant musical genius,” says Marc. “I take some solace from the fact that he heard the finished  record before he died. He knew it was a great piece of work, and the tunes and hooks are unmistakably Soft Cell. The  moment I received the music files from him, it was immediately clear that these songs were among the best he'd ever made.  I was stoked and excited, and that helped with my lyrics. When we played Rewind, we talked backstage about how excited  we were about this record. Our previous album, ‘Happiness not included, was made during the pandemic. I had Covid  quite badly, and it affected my voice and breathing. Dave and I could only communicate with each other through emails  and texts. We were more connected on this one.”   Once Marc had received the instrumental music from Dave’s South London studio, he wrote lyrics and decamped to Dean  Street Studios in Soho for some “very vibey” recording sessions with his vocal engineer Jonny Solway and regular backing  vocalists Louise Marshall, Bryan Chambers and Simon King. Another key contributor was Soft Cell’s touring keyboardist  Philip Larsen. A GRAMMY®-winning mixer who co-produced the band’s previous album four years ago, Larsen worked  with Dave and Marc as the new record neared completion, again co-producing with Soft Cell.   Danceteria is bookended by two floor-filling pop bangers – the title track and "Out Come the Freaks." Following on from  the spoken words and smoky, ambient electronics of ‘Intro’, the title track is a big, euphoric dance number that reflects the  hedonistic spirit of the Manhattan clubs where fabulous fashionistas rubbed shoulders with scene-setters. Among their number  were Andy Warhol, Madonna, the artists Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring, singer Cindy Ecstasy and the  DJ Mark Kamins. The album finishes with a joyous, righteous cover of "Out Come The Freaks," a mutant disco classic  originally released in 1981 by the influential Detroit funk-rock band Was (Not Was). Soft Cell’s cover, with Dave on  vocals, also features a superb cameo from Nona Hendryx, once of Labelle and another former Danceteria regular.   Says Marc: “Cover versions have always been part and parcel of Soft Cell, and I wanted this record to contain echoes of  our debut album. ‘Out Come The Freaks’ was a single on ZE, and I used to play it when I DJed in the 80s. I’d also  wanted to do something with Nona for a very long time. She’s a good friend, but we’d never found the right song – until now.  We had finished making ‘Out Come The Freaks’, so I sent it to her with a message saying that she could do anything she  wanted on it. She took her backing singers into a studio and just sang, adding her own improvisations. She sounds  absolutely fantastic.”   There are further up-tempo moments in "Wave To America" – a star-spangled account of the United States reimagined  as a kaleidoscopic journey through iconic images – and "Heaven (When I Dance With You)," an unashamed homage to  northern soul, one of Dave’s key influences. The latter is an original song, but it stands solidly in the tradition of Soft Cell’s  classic soul covers, from their celebrated take on Ed Cobb’s "Tainted Love" (the UK's biggest-selling single of 1981)  to 1982’s "What!" (originally by Judy Street) and 2002’s "The Night" (a hit for Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons).   In time-honoured Soft Cell style, the bangers sit alongside moodier ballads and more reflective moments. On "The Space Inside,"  we are transported to the leather bars and transgender sex clubs of Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, where the city’s night  owls find themselves “searching for redemption in the night’s decay”. "Times Square" is a mischievous account of  an afternoon hook-up in a B-movie cinema, and the shimmering ballad "The Rainbow Room" offers a blow-by-blow  account of Marc’s visit to the 65th floor of 30 Rockefeller Plaza. "Losing Yourself" and "After Hours" delve into the  darkness that often lurks beyond the dance floor.   “The Danceteria album reflects what we were going through as Brits in New York,” concludes Marc. “We arrived there in  1981 with a bunch of songs that were initially written about London and Leeds. They were songs that reflected the  greyness and repression of Margaret Thatcher’s Britain. But once we hit New York, the same songs became infused  with a fresh, streetwise sensibility. We were in the clubs, where ecstasy was available for the first time, and we felt privileged  to be part of that secret. Our music took on a hybrid quality. We were quintessentially British, but we felt that we  were also an honorary American band. So it feels right that the last Soft Cell album is invested in those myths and stories.  It brings everything full circle for us, and it’s a fitting tribute to Dave.”   More about Soft Cell  Having first forged a creative bond when they were art students at Leeds Polytechnic in 1977, then becoming Soft Cell in 1979,  singer Marc Almond and electronics whizz Dave Ball were propelled into stardom overnight and inadvertently changed the  course of 1980s pop. Soft Cell’s huge success set the template for a tsunami of electronic pop acts, including Depeche  Mode, Eurythmics, Pet Shop Boys and Erasure. They not only topped the UK singles chart with "Tainted Love" in  1981, they were also Number One in 17 countries worldwide, sold over 21 million records and notched up one platinum  album plus two gold ones. Moreover, they brought something deliciously edgy and distinctive to the 1980s pop table,  repeatedly flirting with danger and controversy, bordering on self-sabotage, while their glossier peers played it safe.   The duo followed ‘Tainted Love’ with an impressive run of singles in "Bedsitter," "Say Hello, Wave Goodbye,"  "Torch" and "What!," all of them Top Five hits in the UK. Their seminal debut album, 1981's Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret,  was followed by one of the first remix albums, Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing. Their second full album, 1983’s The Art  Of Falling Apart, witnessed Marc adding greater social realism to his lyrics as Dave moved the Soft Cell sound away from  shiny pop towards something much darker. The third album of the band’s initial phase, 1984’s This Last Night In Sodom,  was a willfully uncommercial farewell now revered as a dark electronic pop masterpiece.   Having gone their separate ways with fruitful solo careers – Marc as a solo artist who explored flamenco, chanson and  cabaret, Dave as a record producer and member of classic techno outfit The Grid – the duo reunited as Soft Cell on  2002’s Cruelty Without Beauty. They famously staged an emotional ‘farewell’ show before 20,000 fans at London’s O2  Arena in 2018, and released a further studio album, 2022’s *Happiness not included, which featured a chart-busting  collaboration with Neil and Chris from Pet Shop Boys in "Purple Zone." The album topped the UK dance chart, reached  the Top Ten in the main commercial chart, and spawned two sister albums in *Happiness now completed and *Happiness  now extended.   With the untimely death of Dave Ball in 2025, the band’s sixth and final album, the much anticipated Danceteria,  finally arrives September 25, 2026. Danceteria  tracklisting:   Vinyl: Side A   1) Elusive (Vinyl Edit) 2) Danceteria 3) The Space Inside (Vinyl Edit) 4) Times Square (Vinyl Edit) 5) Two Of A Kind 6) The Rainbow Room (Vinyl Edit) 7) In Heaven (When I Dance With You)   Side B 1) Decadence Is Hard Work 2) Losing Yourself 3) After Hours 4) Wave To America 5) Out Come The Freaks   CD: 1) Elusive 2) Danceteria 3) The Space Inside 4) Times Square 5) Two Of A Kind 6) The Rainbow Room 7) In Heaven (When I Dance With You) 8) Decadence Is Hard Work 9) Crackland 10) What Is Your Morality 11) Losing Yourself 12) After Hours 13) Wave To America 14) Out Come The Freaks

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