WITH his recently announced 2020 May tour already sold out, music icon Paul Weller gets back on the road in October and November to play a further 19 dates across the UK and Ireland, including 02 Guildhall Southampton on October 30.

Tickets for the date will go on sale on Friday at 10am.

Referred to in music circles as The Modfather, singer-songwriter/guitarist Paul Weller had his fair share of success while leading out mod-punks The Jam in the late 70s and early 80s and soul collective The Style Council in the early to late 80s.

He was a central figure in the Mod revival. As the leader of the Jam, Paul Weller fronted the most popular British band of the punk era, influencing legions of English rockers that ranged from his mod-revival contemporaries to the Smiths in the '80s and Oasis in the '90s.

During the final days of the Jam, he developed a fascination with Motown and soul, which led him to form the sophisti-pop group the Style Council in 1983.

As the Style Council's career progressed, Weller's interest in soul developed into an infatuation with jazz-pop and house music, which eventually led to gradual erosion of his audience — by 1990, he couldn't get a record contract in the UK, where he had previously been worshipped as a demi-god.

As a solo artist, Weller returned to soul music as an inspiration, cutting it with the progressive, hippie tendencies of Traffic. Weller's solo records were more organic and rootsier than the Style Council, which helped him regain his popularity within Britain.

By the mid-'90s, he had released three successful albums which were both critically-acclaimed and massively popular in England, where contemporary bands like Ocean Colour Scene were citing him as an influence.

Paul’s eagerly awaited new album On Sunset, his first on new label Polydor, will be released on June 12.

Tickets from academymusicgroup.com or 023 8063 2601.