After surprise-releasing this month’s Late Developers — their second album in eight months and their best in years — Belle And Sebastian were set to tour North America this spring. Plans have changed. Due to health concerns for frontman Stuart Murdoch, the tour is canceled.

Here’s the message Murdoch posted to the band’s social channels today:

Hi folks

It’s Stuart from Belle And Sebastian here. We are sorry to have to announce the cancellation of our North American tour for 2023.

As you might be aware my health took a dive around November 2022. While I am hoping that I will improve over the coming months, we felt it would be a safer route to cancel this tour and leave a clear path to recovery, rather than take a risk and have to cancel at the last minute.

We had a great plan in place, to release our second lp in six months and hit America up again! While the record made it out, we’re going to have to wait a bit longer until we can tour it.

We apologise again for the inconvenience we have caused you.

Sincerely yours
Stuart

B&S previously canceled November UK dates and December shows in South America due to the same unnamed health concern; in November, Murdoch wrote, “I’m getting slowly back on my feet after being quite unwell.” The UK dates have since been rescheduled for July, so maybe these North American shows will go forward at some point too. Most importantly, hopefully Murdoch returns to full health as soon as possible.