Pitchfork: Ben Folds Tours the Heartland

Ben Folds-- or at least his booking agent-- appears to have his finger on the pulse of his faithful audience. It's the Midwest or bust, Silverman!

The affably sardonic singer-songwriter will tour our nation's heartland (and some coastal cities) nearly a year after the release of his last album, Songs for Silverman. Reports on Folds' website message board indicate that his colleagues from Silverman, bassist Jared Reynolds and drummer Lindsay Jamieson, will provide the backing instrumentation for all those ditties we all know and love.

For the first leg of the trip, Chicago singer-songwriter Chris Mills will open the shows. Mills' latest, The Wall to Wall Sessions, was recorded with 17 other Chi-town musicians during two and a half days of a blizzard, so maybe he'll turn his solo electric performances into tirades against the luxuries of summer. Probably not, but you have to admit it's easy to imagine Folds and Mills together in a summer job at a Pizza Hut dough prep counter.

Chris mills, Ben folds:

03-04 Seattle, WA - Paramount Theatre *
03-05 Moscow, ID - Kibbie Dome *
03-07 Omaha, NE - Omaha Music Hall *
03-08 Cedar Falls, IA - West Gym @ University of Northern Iowa *
03-09 West Des Moines, IA - Val Air Ballroom *
03-11 Madison, WI - Orpheum Theatre *
03-12 Milwaukee, WI - Eagles Ballroom *
03-14 Decatur, IL - Kirkland Fine Arts Center *
03-15 Columbus, OH - Lifestyle Communities Pavilion *
03-17 Indianapolis, IN - Murat Egyptian Room *
03-18 Ann Arbor, MI - Michigan Theater *
03-29 Winston-Salem, NC - Wait Chapel
03-30 Raleigh, NC - Raleigh Memorial Auditorium
04-03 Orono, ME - Maine Center for Arts
04-04 Providence, RI - Lupo's
04-07 Lewisburg, PA - Sokja Pavilion
04-10 East Lansing, MI - Wharton Center
04-11 Oxford, OH - Miami University
04-21 Ruston, LA - Thomas Assembly Center
04-22 Nashville, TN - Vanderbuilt University
04-26 Collingswood, NJ - Scottish Rite Auditorium
04-28 Knoxville, TN - Fiji Island
06-16 Manchester, TN - Bonnaroo Festival #

* with Chris Mills
# with Radiohead, Tom Petty, Beck, Cat Power, hippies

Additionally, Folds has plans to visit Australia at some point in 2006, though it's not certain yet when that will occur. But you can pretty much bank on it, 'cause apparently Folds has "adopted" Adelaide as a second home. Wow, adopting a whole city-- take that, Angelina Jolie!