Pop sensation Sam Smith is set to perform at the Resorts World Arena in Birmingham on Tuesday 25th April for their anticipated GLORIA the tour. Gloria, their most recent studio album, was released on 27th January 2023 and debuted at number one in the UK upon release. 

Smith rose to fame after they featured on Disclosure’s track ‘Latch’ back in 2012; they then featured on Naughty Boy’s “La La La” which rose to the top of the charts in 2013. Their debut album In The Lonely Hour was released in May 2014 and won multiple awards, including the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album. Since then, they’ve released three more albums: The Thrill Of It All (2017), Love Goes (2020) and Gloria (2023). Sam Smith’s voice remains the lyrical power-house that it always has been, despite the departure of their trademark ballads for the more experimental R&B and disco. 

Their chart-topping collaboration with Kim Petras has brought them back into the limelight in recent months with the controversy of the song’s lyrics and performances. However, ‘Unholy’ made history for the duo, with the song being the first time a trans or non-binary artist has topped the Billboard Hot 100, as well as Petras being the first openly transgender artist to receive a Grammy Award for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance for ‘Unholy’ (2023). The duo performed an outstanding performance at the Brit Awards in February, with iconic dancing and stand-out vocals. If their upcoming tour is to follow this, we can expect lots of risky outfits, sensational backing dancers, and the exceptional voice that is Sam Smith.

Even though we don’t know the setlist for GLORIA the tour yet, it seems, from recent gigs, that we can expect a blend of old and new tracks. Expect to hear the classics, such as ‘Stay with me’, ‘I’m Not the Only One’, to ‘Too Good at Goodbyes’ and ‘How do you sleep’, alongside new songs such as ‘Gloria’ and ‘Unholy’. It is uncertain how many songs off Gloria that Smith will perform but hopefully we will get to hear a fair few tracks off the new album given its short album length of 33 minutes.

Sam Smith has faced a lot of controversy with their Brit Awards outfit and performance, recent music videos, and has received mounts of homophobia over the years, but one things for certain: Sam Smith is determined to thrive in their true self and it is clear that their big arena tour will show haters just what they’re missing from Smith’s outstanding ‘award-winning’ voice that we get to hear live.

The UK tour will begin on 12th April in Sheffield, and will come to Dublin, London (for 2 nights), Glasgow, Birmingham, and will then finish a month later in Manchester on May 24th. 

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