Lenny Kravitz Tickets

Short Biography
LENNY KRAVITZ SET TO RETURN TO AUSTRALIA
FIRST AUSTRALIAN CONCERT APPEARANCE IN 18 YEARS
JOINED BY SPECIAL GUESTS THE CRANBERRIES AND WOLFMOTHER

Get ready to rock Australia! McManus Entertainment in association with F1 Rocks is thrilled to announce the return of rock icon Lenny Kravitz to Australia in March 2012. Marking his first concert appearance in the country in 18 years, Lenny will be joined by Irish chart-toppers The Cranberries, and Aussie rockers Wolfmother. In addition to playing Melbourne's Sidney Myer Music Bowl during the Australian Grand Prix weekend, Lenny Kravitz, The Cranberries and Wolfmother will also be playing shows in Sydney, Wollongong, Brisbane and Perth.

"Not only will rock fans around Australia get to enjoy these three great artists, highlights of Lenny's performance will be broadcast around the world via the F1 Rocks network to a huge international audience. It's been 18 years since Lenny Kravitz last toured Australia. Lenny is an international superstar and it's a pleasure to bring him back here. And it's perfect timing for those that are at the Grand Prix in Melbourne. Fans can conveniently walk over from the track to the Sidney Myer Music Bowl and enjoy a great night of rock in Melbourne," says promoter Andrew McManus.

Regarded as one of the preeminent rock musicians of our time, Lenny Kravitz has transcended genre, style and class into a 20-year musical career, one which revels in the rich influences of '60s and '70s soul, rock and funk. Lenny Kravitz is a four-time GRAMMY Award winner and has sold more than 35 million albums worldwide. The artist's multiple talents as a writer, producer and multiinstrumentalist have resonated through eight studio albums into a timeless catalogue. Lenny Kravitz released his ninth studio album earlier this year, Black and White America (out now through Roadrunner Records). Marking his first release of new material in three years, Black and White America is a rich rock and funk-infused collection filled with Lenny's signature guitar riffs, compelling
melodies and the undeniable anthemic lyricism that has been his trademark over the course of his 20-year career. In addition to the release of his new album, Lenny Kravitz will appear in the upcoming motion picture "The Hunger Games" set for release in March
2012.
"I am excited to return to Australia after so many years away," says Lenny. "It's going to a great show and I cannot wait to see all my fans there. We are going to bring it!"

The Cranberries, fronted by Dolores O'Riordan, lit up the charts around the world for more than a decade with classics such as Linger, Dreams and Zombie. They have sold more than 30 million records and have had two number one albums in Australia, No Need To Argue (1994) and To The Faithful Departed (1996). Other live favourites include Free To Decide, When You're Gone, Salvation, Ode To My Family and Ridiculous Thoughts. After taking a few years off to raise their families, the band are thrilled to be back with their new album, Roses (released next year through Shock Records on February 10), their first record in more than ten years since Wake Up And Smell The Coffee in 2001.

In 2007 Aussie rockers Wolfmother won a GRAMMY Award for Best Hard Rock Performance for their single Woman. This followed ARIA Award wins for Best Group, Best Breakthrough Album and Best Rock Album for their debut self-titled album. The album Wolfmother has been certified 5 x Platinum in Australia (as well as Gold in the US, UK and Canada). Their latest album, Cosmic Egg, was released in 2009 and debuted at number three in the Australian charts (as well as charting in Europe and US).

Put it in your calendar - Lenny Kravitz, The Cranberries and Wolfmother is a rock show not to be missed!

Proudly presented by Triple M, Wave FM, MAX, Channel Nine, Beat, Brag, Drum Media, Scene, Dangerfield and Australian Guitar Magazine.

Tickets go on sale from 9am on Monday 21 November via the below outlets

In-depth Biography
There may have been other "retro" rock acts before him, but Lenny Kravitz was one of the first to not be pigeonholed to a single style as he touched upon such genres as soul, funk, reggae, hard rock, psychedelic, folk, and ballads over the years. Born in New York on May 26, 1964 (his mother was actress Roxie Roker, best-known for her role as Helen Willis on the popular TV series The Jeffersons, and his father was a TV producer), Kravitz was raised in Los Angeles, where he found himself around countless musical giants as a youngster due to his parents friendships with the likes of Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Bobby Short, and Miles Davis. Kravitz was a member of the California Boys Choir until his teenage years, when he decided to pursue rock & roll while in high school and under the heavily influence of funk rocker Prince. Kravitz's admiration of the Purple One was so great that he at first patterned his style and approach directly after Prince and became known as "Romeo Blue" (complete with blue contact lenses), but failed to land a recording contract.

In the late '80s, Kravitz relocated back to New York City, where one of his roommates turned out to be actress Lisa Bonet (who played the part of Denise Huxtable on The Cosby Show); they eventually got married. During this time, Kravitz wisely discarded his Prince-like approach and looked back to such '60s/'70s classic rockers as Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, Bob Marley, and the Beatles for inspiration. Kravitz found a kindred spirit in engineer Henry Hirsch (who would stick by Kravitz throughout his career). With a back-to-basics approach, his style was quite refreshing in the humorously gaudy late '80s. He inked a recording contract with Virgin Records and issued his debut release, Let Love Rule, in 1989. Kravitz's debut proved to be a surprise hit due to the success of the title track, which became a hit single and oft-aired video. A few critics were quick to assume that Kravitz's retro look and sound were simply a shtick to get the public's attention, but come the '90s, it had become integrated into the mainstream (both musically and fashion-wise), proving that Kravitz was a bit of a trendsetter. It was around this time that Kravitz penned a major hit single, not for himself but for Madonna, who went to number one with the sultry track "Justify My Love."

What should have been a time of happiness for Kravitz quickly turned sour as he and Bonet divorced by the early '90s. Kravitz's heartbreak was very evident in his sophomore effort, Mama Said, which was even stronger than its predecessor, highlighted by the Led Zep-like funk rocker "Always on the Run" (a collaboration with Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash), as well as the mega hit with the Curtis Mayfield-esque soul ballad "It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over," which confirmed that Kravitz's success was no fluke. But the best was yet to come for Kravitz. His third release overall, 1993's Are You Gonna Go My Way, is often considered to be the finest album front to back of his entire career, and with good reason: Every single song was a winner, including the up-tempo anthemic title track, which turned out to be one of MTV's most played videos for that year. The album was a massive hit and Kravitz became an arena headliner stateside, as well as being featured on countless magazine covers.

Despite an almost two-year gap between albums, Kravitz's fourth release, Circus, came off sounding unfocused and was a major letdown compared to his stellar previous few releases. Perhaps sensing that he needed to stir things up musically, Kravitz dabbled with electronics and trip-hop loops for his next album, 1998's 5. Although not a huge hit right off the bat, the album proved to have an incredibly long chart life, spawning the biggest hit of Kravitz's career, "Fly Away," almost a year after its original release. With the single's success, Virgin decided to cash in on the album's sudden rebirth by reissuing it around the same time with a pair of extra added bonus tracks, one of which became another sizeable hit single, a remake of the Guess Who's "American Woman" (which was used in the hit 1999 comedy movie Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me). Kravitz's first best-of set, the 15-track Greatest Hits, was issued as a stopgap release in 2000, while his sixh studio release overall, Lenny, was issued a year later. Baptism followed in 2004. After starting a residential, commercial, and product design company called Kravitz Design, he recorded a funky version of John Lennon's "Cold Turkey" for Amnesty International's 2007 benefit compilation Instant Karma. Before the end of the year it was announced that Kravitz would return in 2008 with a new album, It Is Time for a Love Revolution. The album arrived in February, accompanied by a brief tour.

Kravitz made his acting debut in the Academy Award-nominated 2009 film Precious: Based On The Novel Push By Sapphire. As he was filming his next role -- a spot in the eagerly awaited adaptation of Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games -- he released his ninth album Black And White America in the summer of 2011.

In addition to his own albums, Kravitz continues to pen songs for other artists and his compositions have appeared on albums by such rock heavyweights as Aerosmith and Mick Jagger, while he produced and wrote the majority of Vanessa Paradis' obscure self-titled 1992 release. ~ Greg Prato, Rovi