Ali Campbell Biography
Ali Campbell was born February 15 1959 in Birmingham, UK. After leaving school he and some friends decided to form a band. In humorous reference to their unemployed status, they named themselves after the unemployment benefit claim form (UB40). The band’s instruments were all purchased thanks to a £4,000 compensation award that Ali received after a bar fight, and the band played their first gig at the Hare & Hounds pub in Birmingham.
Ali grew up in an area of Birmingham with a predominantly afro-Caribbean population, which heavily influenced his musical tastes. Although a huge fan of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder, (he modelled his singing style on both their voices), his biggest love was reggae, and so UB40 became the first all-white reggae band. This prompted many Ali Campbell tour tickets to be sold, initially for the novelty value alone.
Soon afterward, the boys were spotted by Pretenders’ lead singer Chrissie Hyndes, who invited them to support her band on their upcoming tour. This led to a recording contract, Ali Campbell tickets for promotional gigs, and their debut single, King/Food for Thought. In 1980, their first album, Signing Off, reached number two in the UK, remaining in the charts for seventy-two weeks. Now the best UB40 tickets were hard to get – and more expensive!
In 1983, they released a covers album, Labour of Love, which topped the UK charts, gave them their first US hit and increased demand for UB40 tour tickets. Their most successful singles were (I Can’t Help) Falling In Love With You, and Red, Red Wine and even new fans purchasing Ali Campbell tickets clamoured to hear these old classics.
UB40 were still going strong twenty years after the band formed; UB40 tour tickets continued to sell-out, and they even won an Ivor Novello Award for International Achievement. In 2007, the band headlined the Live Earth concert in Johannesburg, performing a 54-minute set – these were some of the best UB40 tickets to get your hands on.
Soon after, blaming disputes with management, Ali quit the band but demand for the best UB40 tickets remained high, prompting Campbell to release a solo album later that year, Running Free, featuring such guest artists as Smoky Robinson and Mick Hucknall, prompting sales of Ali Campbell tickets to rival UB40’s in popularity. In 2008, after forming a new band called Dep with fellow ex-UB40 member Mickey Virtue, he embarked on an international tour, launched with a sell-out concert at the Albert Hall. The demand for Ali Campbell tickets were at this point at an all time high, and would tour tickets often sold out in no time. While in South Africa, Ali helped record the single Many Rivers to Cross on behalf of Nelson Mandela’s Goal4Africa campaign, to fund education for children in rural Africa, again rejuvenating sales of Ali Campbell tickets.
In 2009, Ali’s single Out From Under was released, and in 2010, his follow-up album Flying High had a mix of covers and self-penned tracks, featuring Craig David and Shaggy. This received some of the most favourable reviews of Ali’s career to date, and caused a resurgence in Ali Campbell tour tickets sales; one reviewer raved that it captured the authentic contemporary sound of Jamaica.
Bio source…..www.eventim.co.uk
Picture source…..images1.fanpop.com