More than seven years since his last full Australian run, Aloe Blacc is finally heading back down under. The Grammy-nominated soul artist has announced his Wake Me Up Australian Tour for September 2026, bringing the voice behind modern soul staples like I Need A Dollar, The Man and Wake Me Up to Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and Adelaide.
Beginning at Brisbane’s Night at the Parkland on September 11 before moving through Sydney’s Night at the Barracks, Melbourne’s Palais Theatre, Perth’s Riverside Theatre and Adelaide’s Her Majesty’s Theatre, the tour arrives at an interesting point in Blacc’s career. Rather than leaning entirely on nostalgia, the singer has spent the past year reframing his music around optimism, activism and social connection.
That spirit carried through 2025 album Stand Together, his first full-length release in five years, alongside the release of single Don’t Go Alone. Built around a philanthropic initiative attached to each track, the album became something closer to a social project than a conventional comeback release, reaching the Top 10 of Billboard’s R&B chart and climbing to number one on the iTunes R&B Albums chart. 2024 saw Blacc revisit his Grammy-nominated breakthrough Lift Your Spirit with an anniversary reissue celebrating the album that produced defining hits like The Man and Wake Me Up.
Still, for many audiences, Aloe Blacc remains permanently tied to a particular moment in early 2010s music culture. I Need A Dollar became unavoidable after serving as the theme to How to Make It in America, while his vocal appearance on Avicii’s Wake Me Up helped turn the track into one of the defining crossover hits of the streaming era. Yet Blacc’s musical roots run much deeper than radio-friendly soul-pop.
Raised on salsa, merengue and cumbia before discovering socially conscious hip-hop and later falling into the songwriting worlds of Joni Mitchell, James Taylor and Marvin Gaye, Blacc has consistently approached soul music less as retro revivalism and more as a vehicle for emotional and political connection.
That balancing act between uplift and unease has become central to his appeal. Even his most commercially successful songs tend to carry tension beneath the hooks: financial anxiety, self-worth, loneliness, resilience. His live shows tap into that same emotional duality, moving between celebration and reflection without losing momentum.
For tickets and further information go HERE.
Mastercard presale: Thursday 28 May, 9:00am – Tuesday 2 June, 8:00am.
Mellen Events presale: Friday 29 May, 9:00am – Tuesday 2 June, 8:00am.
General public tickets on sale Tuesday 2 June at 9:00am.
All times are local.
*For more on Night at the Parkland see HERE and for Night at the Barracks see HERE
