AS EVERYTHING UNFOLDS ANNOUNCE 2027 UK HEADLINE TOUR
Photo: SUEDE
Fresh from a monumental, career-defining performance at Download Festival last weekend, Buckinghamshire alternative powerhouses As Everything Unfolds have officially announced a massive UK headline tour locked in for February 2027.
The highly anticipated run represents the band's first UK headline tour in three years. It will kick off in Manchester on February 5th, hitting major cities including Glasgow, Newcastle, Leeds, Birmingham, Nottingham, Exeter, Bristol, Southampton, and Norwich, before reaching a grand crescendo with a prestigious London headline finale at Scala on February 19th.
This upcoming tour serves as the live awakening for their deeply personal and sonically expansive third full-length album, DID YOU ASK TO BE SET FREE?—marking their momentous debut release since signing to the renowned Century Media Records.
Speaking of the tour, vocalist Charlie Rolfe says: “We’re incredibly proud to be stepping into this new chapter with DID YOU ASK TO BE SET FREE?, an album where we really pushed ourselves to explore themes of identity, inner conflict, and what it means to truly break free and take control of your own narrative. It’s our most honest and ambitious work to date, and bringing these songs to life on stage feels more important than ever. This tour also marks our first UK headline run in three years, making it even more special for us as we’ve missed that direct connection with our fans. We can’t wait to return with a show that feels bigger, more emotional, and more immersive, carrying those messages of self-discovery and liberation into every room we play. This is us at our most open, most driven, and we genuinely can’t wait to share it.”
FEBRUARY
05: MANCHESTER Club Academy
06: GLASGOW Cathouse
07: NEWCASTLE Northumbria Uni
09: LEEDS The Wardrobe
10: BIRMINGHAM O2 Institute 2
12: NOTTINGHAM Rescue Rooms
13: EXETER Phoenix
14: BRISTOL Thekla
16: SOUTHAMPTON Engine Rooms
18: NORWICH The Waterfront
19: LONDON Scala
For frontman and lead vocalist Charlie Rolfe, artistic creation is fundamentally defined by an unyielding search for meaning—an infinity loop of complex layers that unravel slowly over time. This intrinsic need for substance has completely re-contextualized how she views both her own creativity and the art she treasures most.
“As I’ve got older, I’ve appreciated the depth of anything in my life,” she explains. “I can never accept something for how it is on the surface, I have to understand it.”
Whether drawing inspiration from the intricate allegories and sharp social commentary embedded within Blade Runner, that profound hunger for intellectual and emotional depth remains a constant guiding force. “I love absorbing information,” she adds. “I think that information is one of the most powerful tools in the world, and it’s undervalued by a lot of people. The more you know, the more you can potentially set yourself free.”
At the heart of the new record lies a labyrinth of existential questions regarding the delicate tightrope walked between a protective dream state and harsh reality. The band challenges listeners to consider whether it is worth leaving the safe haven of fantasy, and if true freedom actually awaits at the end of that journey.
These heavy thematic concepts were forged through profound real-world grief. Tragedy struck the As Everything Unfolds camp in August 2024 when drummer Jamie Gowers, who was also Charlie’s boyfriend, tragically passed away. Mid-way through the grueling process of writing the record, the remaining quartet banded together tightly, choosing to intentionally re-ignite the creative flames of the band rather than walk away.
“It’s going to be shit and it’s going to be horrible, but running away from it felt like the wrong thing to do,” recalls Charlie. “This is the hardest record we will ever have to do, how can we flip it into something we’re proud of, and give it the longevity and legacy it deserves?”
Honoring that legacy meant taking two full years to give the writing and pre-production phases the meticulous care and attention they truly deserved, eventually tracking the entire album across three intense weeks in February 2025.
Though the material initially felt like a disjointed record of two separate halves, Charlie refused to settle for anything less than a completely unified concept. The ultimate breakthrough arrived when an old university friend recommended Rick Rubin’s book The Creative Act, sparking an immediate eureka moment.
“I really took the idea of subconscious, secondary-action writing,” she explains. “The stuff that comes out is tapping into a completely different part of your brain.”
Embracing her natural disposition as a chronic multi-tasker, Charlie stopped forcing creativity into rigid schedules, instead allowing ideas to flow organically into her daily routine. The track ‘GASOLINE’, for instance, famously manifested while she was casually making a cheese toastie.
Sonically, DID YOU ASK TO BE SET FREE? completely propels As Everything Unfolds out of the standard, predictable metalcore box. The quartet has successfully discovered a distinct signature sound flourishing directly at the crossroads of multiple genres. “I’ve definitely steered away from metalcore, and I think we all have,” says Charlie.
The modern world's unhealthy obsession with the trivial details of other people's lives, combined with a highly self-centered, egotistical broader society, heavily influenced Charlie’s lyrical perspective during the writing process.
“I don’t want people to idolise me, put me on a pedestal and think that I am this person that just does no wrong, because that’s literally impossible as a human being.”
Ultimately, DID YOU ASK TO BE SET FREE? provides an alternate psychological lens through which Charlie examines modern reality, meticulously analyzing the sharp dichotomy between hiding from pain and boldly confronting it. Utilizing her personal experience with maladaptive daydreaming during the traumatic early days of her grief, she discovered the exact storytelling tool and throughline necessary to share her truth.
Following a turbulent and emotionally testing few years, the immense creative depth fueling DID YOU ASK TO BE SET FREE? ensures it stands definitively as their strongest, most resilient body of work to date.
“It’s told its story, and I don’t feel like I need to take it any further,” she boldly declares. “It’s a capsule of that moment, of the things that happened to me, and I’m now in a new part of my life. That’s why drawing the line under it is important.”
