Happy Mondays will go to bed for years after tour, Shaun Ryder says

Ryder said Happy Mondays would stop performing when they wanted to or when they "can't walk on stage"

Happy Mondays will be "going to bed for about three or four years" after their upcoming UK tour, lead singer Shaun Ryder has said

The 61-year-old said he would be taking a break after the Been There Done That Tour in March, and would look to work on other projects.

He said he was "really looking forward" to the tour, which would be "the last for a while".

The Salford band had been doing shows "constantly" since 2012, he said.

"It's now time to make this the last tour... so I can concentrate on [bands] Black Grape and Mantra Of The Cosmos and a few things," he added.

After more than a decade fronting Happy Mondays, a period which saw the band become global stars, Ryder co-founded Black Grape in 1993.

The group went on to top the charts two years later with their debut album, It's Great When You're Straight...Yeah.

He formed Mantra Of The Cosmos in 2023 with fellow Mondays star Bez, Ride guitarist Andy Bell and The Who's drummer Zak Starkey.

'Manchester's always mad'

Ryder said Happy Mondays were not retiring, but added that they would stop when they wanted to or when they "can't walk on stage any more".

"When we were young men, you made an album, you toured it for three years, came back, made another album, and toured that for three years," he said.

"You'd do that for years and years and years and... you learn what touring is about.

"Now, I don't do that."

He said he still did "a lot of festivals all over the place with the Mondays and Black Grape", but he now did it "at my own pace".

"I tour when I want to," he added.

Happy Mondays have been touring since 2012 when the original line-up reformed

He said he was excited by the upcoming tour and especially so for one particular date.

"Manchester's always mad," he said.

"We have more guestlists then we have fans in Manchester... it gets a bit mad."

The tour will also visit Glasgow, Bristol, Manchester, Brighton and London, with the group set to perform hits including 24 Hour Party People, Step On, and Hallelujah.

Happy Mondays signed to Tony Wilson's Factory Records in the late 1980s and blended their love of funk, rock, psychedelia and house with sounds from the UK's emerging rave scene.

The band, who are now without Ryder's bassist brother Paul, who died in 2022 aged 58, finished a tour of Australia and New Zealand in October.