Social Distortion Announce Summer 2023 Canadian Tour Dates

Social Distortion has some rad news for Canadian fans: a slew of summer dates across the country, including two-date performances in select cities. Tickets will be available via: www.livenation.com. Now in their fifth decade, Mike Ness and Social Distortion have officially achieved one of the most non-punk things possible: They’ve failed to burn out.

Hard Times And Nursery Rhymes (produced, for the first time, by Ness himself) is the band’s most recent release. For a band with a career spanning over 40 years, Social Distortion experienced a significant amount of firsts in 2011. For starters, Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes debuted at #4 on the Billboard Top 200 and was the highest debut that the band has yet seen. Hard Times was also the #1 Independent Album and the #2 Modern Rock/Alternative Album week of release. Taking their successes to the road, Social Distortion played European festivals, including Reading and Leeds, for the first time. They also booked their first tours of Australia and South America. And finally, Social Distortion played Lollapalooza, Austin City Limits Festival, and Coachella – all of these for the first time.

Here’s how you know you’ve made it in the music business: You’ve stayed strong for three decades on your own terms, on your own time, by your own rules, and over that time, your influence has only grown. Each of your albums has been stronger than your last. You’ve been brought onstage by Bruce Springsteen because he wanted to play one of your songs. You’ve seen high times and low ones, good days and tragic days, but every night you give 100%, and every morning you wake up still swinging.

This is the short version of the Social Distortion bio — the long version could be a 10-part mini-series. But over the past 30 years, the punk godfathers in the band have all but trademarked their sound, a brand of hard rockabilly/punk that’s cut with the melodic, road-tested lyrics of frontman Mike Ness. Their searing guitars and a locomotive rhythm section sound as alive today as they did in ’82, as do Ness’ hard-luck tales of love, loss and lessons learned. “The most common thing I hear is, ‘Man, your music got me through some hard times,'” Ness says. “And I just say, ‘Me too.'”