During a recent appearance on SiriusXM‘s “Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk,” W.A.S.P. frontman Blackie Lawless shared exciting details about the band’s upcoming “1984 To Headless” North American tour. Slated to run from September 10 through October 31, 2026, the trek will feature KK’s Priest as special guests.
The ambitious tour will see the shock-rock pioneers diving deep into their early catalog, strictly focusing on their legendary first four albums:
- W.A.S.P. (1984)
- The Last Command (1985)
- Inside The Electric Circus (1987)
- The Headless Children (1989)
Lawless explained that the concept for this specific retro-focused tour has been brewing for quite a while.
“It was an idea that we had back in, like, 2018, but when we started doing the groundwork on it, we were rudely interrupted by COVID. And so all that had to be pulled, and when it was time to go out again in ’22, it was time to move on because that was our 40th anniversary. So we took this idea and we put it on the back burner. And so we’re gonna do it again right now,” he said (as transcribed by Blabbermouth).
Demand for the shows has already been explosive. The frontman noted that early sales in specific markets have been extremely promising.
“It’s been interesting because tickets go on sale today in the U.S., but the tickets went on sale in Canada two days ago when the announcement was made,” he continued. “40% of those tickets are already gone.”
While there are currently about 44 dates on the schedule, Lawless hinted that fans in unlisted cities shouldn’t lose hope just yet.
“But what we’re expecting, because we’ve been hearing already complaints that there’s no Michigan, things like that, we are not finished,” he explained. “We are expecting that as these tickets go on sale today, that there’s gonna be more promoters [who are] gonna step up. If I had to guess right now, and don’t quote me on this, but if I had to guess when we finish in Anaheim, we’re probably gonna go back out for another couple of weeks. That’s what it’s looking like. ‘Cause this is a really strong bill. I’m excited about this.”
When it comes to putting the actual setlist together, Lawless wants to make an immediate impact by bringing out tracks that have been absent from their live shows for decades.
“Oh, yeah. he best-laid plans of mice and men — you never know what’s gonna happen until you get into rehearsal. But if I have my way, we’re gonna start with some of the tracks off The Headless Children and work backwards from there. So, I wanna establish that upfront, that you’re gonna hear stuff that you have not heard probably for 39, 40 years. So, to me, like I said, I wanna establish that upfront.”
However, he was quick to clarify that the band won’t be alienating their audience by relying entirely on deep cuts. Lawless recalled a disastrous past experience that taught him a valuable lesson about setlist construction.
“It’s hard, because every time you put a setlist together, you’re asking yourself, ‘If I was coming to a show, what would I wanna hear?’ And you gotta be careful not to get into deep tracks too much, because you have to take kind of an average of what you think people wanna hear, because… And I’ve told this story a bunch of times as well, but it always bears repeating that you hear people that wanna hear obscure B-sides; I mean, we’re talking deep, deep tracks now. And so I remember once we did that, and I thought, ‘You know what? We keep hearing it. Keep hearing it, keep hearing it. Why don’t we try this?’ We were somewhere in Norway, and we went out and we did three or four B-sides from those early singles, and the audience stood there mortified. And no band has ever died an uglier death on a stage than what happened to us that night when we did that. And I thought, ‘I don’t know who talked me into doing this, but we are never gonna do anything like this again.'”
Ultimately, his philosophy for this upcoming tour centers entirely on respecting the fans’ time, effort, and money.
“Again, there’s a learning curve to all that stuff. So you say, ‘Okay, if I was in the audience…’ You have to be careful, or the artist has to be careful, not to get too self-indulgent to do the things that they wanna do because those people… I look at it nowadays. It’s not just the money for the ticket. People have been working all day. They gotta get up, get off their butts, get out there. That’s the big thing. And if you’re gonna coax ’em to go into those shows, you better give them what they came there to hear. So if you’ve got inklings of trying to be self-indulgent and playing deep, deep, deep stuff off those records, you might wanna rethink that again. Because, like I said, you got an obligation to give people what they want. Hey, they’re the ones — like I said, they’re not just paying for it. They’re paying for it with their time to get up, get their butts ready and get to that show. It’s a lot of preparation.”
Addressing the demographic of the W.A.S.P. fanbase, Lawless agreed with the host that while they have attracted younger listeners over the years, a significant portion of their audience has been there since the beginning.
“Well, we’ve been lucky because we’ve been able to turn audiences over. But I would say probably a third of our audience is maybe some of the original people that were there. So whether it’s them or whoever it is, I would imagine they’re getting their money from somewhere, so they probably got a job. So, like I said, to get them out of the house, especially on a weekday, you better give ’em what they came for.”
“1984 To Headless” 2026 Tour Dates:
- Sept. 10 – El Cajon, CA – The Magnolia
- Sept. 11 – Los Angeles, CA – The Wiltern
- Sept. 12 – Riverside, CA – Fox Performing Arts Center
- Sept. 13 – Phoenix, AZ – Celebrity Theater
- Sept. 14 – Santa Fe, NM – Buffalo Thunder Resort & Casino
- Sept. 16 – Austin, TX – Emo’s
- Sept. 17 – Tulsa, OK – Tulsa Theater
- Sept. 18 – Dallas, TX – House of Blues
- Sept. 19 – San Antonio, TX – Aztec Theatre
- Sept. 20 – Houston, TX – House of Blues
- Sept. 22 – Clearwater, FL – Ruth Eckerd Hall
- Sept. 23 – Daytona Beach, FL – Peabody Auditorium
- Sept. 24 – Jacksonville, FL – Florida Theatre
- Sept. 25 – Raleigh, NC – The Ritz
- Sept. 26 – Jim Thorpe, PA – Penn’s Peak
- Sept. 27 – Portland, ME – Aura
- Sept. 29 – Boston, MA – House of Blues
- Sept. 30 – Hampton, NH – Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom
- Oct. 01 – Wallingford, CT – Toyota Oakdale Theatre
- Oct. 02 – New York, NY – Palladium Times Square
- Oct. 03 – Carteret, NJ – Carteret Performing Arts Center
- Oct. 05 – Montreal, QC – MTELUS
- Oct. 06 – Ottawa, ON – Hard Rock Casino
- Oct. 07 – Pickering, ON – Pickering Casino Resort
- Oct. 09 – Des Plaines, IL – Des Plaines Theatre
- Oct. 10 – St. Charles, IL – Arcada Theatre
- Oct. 11 – St. Charles, IL – Arcada Theatre
- Oct. 13 – Glenside, PA – Keswick Theatre
- Oct. 14 – Harrisburg, PA – Capitol City Music Hall
- Oct. 15 – Cleveland, OH – Agora Theatre
- Oct. 16 – Milwaukee, WI – Pabst Theater
- Oct. 17 – Green Bay, WI – EPIC Event Center
- Oct. 19 – Winnipeg, MB – Burton Cummings Theatre
- Oct. 21 – Edmonton, AB – Midway Music Hall
- Oct. 22 – Calgary, AB – The Palace Theatre
- Oct. 23 – Coquitlam, BC – Great Canadian Casino Vancouver
- Oct. 25 – Seattle, WA – Moore Theatre
- Oct. 27 – San Jose, CA – San Jose Civic
- Oct. 29 – Rancho Mirage, CA – The Show at Agua Caliente
- Oct. 30 – Las Vegas, NV – House of Blues
- Oct. 31 – Anaheim, CA – The Grove
