Today would have been Dave’s 67th birthday. It’s naturally a very sad day for all his children, family, friends and fans, especially thinking about what might have been in the future, particularly after all the successes of the last decade. However, we should all celebrate a life well-lived, and a legacy that will certainly continue long after we’re all gone. So let’s raise a glass of sherry today (Dave’s favourite mid-afternoon tipple) and remember all the amazing music, great times and everything our true supremo of synth has left for us all to appreciate and enjoy. Dave will never be forgotten, keep him close to your hearts by delving deep into his huge back catalogue, and please feel free to post your favourite Dave track, memory, photo or whatever comes to mind. Thank you. DBHQ
We’re releasing a special limited-edition grey vinyl 12” single of ‘Out Come The Freaks’ in June, and pre-orders have now opened at the official Soft Cell Store. Out Come The Freaks is also now available now across all digital platforms. The latest Soft Cell newsletter has also just been posted across Marc, Dave and Soft Cell’s social media. Have a great Easter! @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
We’re excited to present the very first single release from the upcoming Soft Cell album ‘Danceteria’, featuring special guest star @nonahendryx Available to download and stream as of today across all channels at https://lnk.to/PLFXoM Physical release details to follow. We hope you like it! @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
Soft Cell to release ‘Danceteria (Remixes)’ limited edition 12”, including a Mark Moore mix, exclusively for Record Store Day 2026 on April 18th.
Soft Cell have announced ‘Danceteria (Remixes)’ will be released exclusively for Record Store Day 2026. The limited white vinyl 12” features three versions of ‘Danceteria’, the anthemic title track of singer Marc Almond and multi-instrumentalist and producer Dave Ball’s final studio album.
This will be the first material aired from Soft Cell’s forthcoming sixth album, and the first new music to be released since the untimely passing of Dave Ball in October 2025. Almond led the tributes, describing Ball as a “brilliant musical genius” and the world’s media hailing Ball as an electronic music pioneer.
The ‘Danceteria (Remixes’) featuring a remix from Mark Moore, plus an extended mix and a dub version, will be available in selected independent record stores on the 18th April 2026 via Republic of Music.
Over to Marc Almond on his thoughts on ‘Danceteria (Remixes)’:
“It is always exciting being part of Record Store Day. Perhaps it is because I am of that certain age where vinyl holds such special memories. And because it is the title track of our new album ‘Danceteria’, which Dave Ball worked so extensively on and completed just prior to his passing. The Mark Moore and Dan Donovan mix is really special to me and I wanted to thank him personally for doing it - he really understands the references and brings them out brilliantly.”
‘Danceteria (Remixes)’ tracklisting:
A1. Danceteria - Mark Moore & Dan Donovan Remix
B1. Danceteria - Soft Cell Extended Mix
B2. Danceteria - Soft Cell Dub Mix
‘Danceteria’, the sixth and final Soft Cell studio album, is inspired by Marc and Dave’s formative musical years recording in New York and winding up in the legendary 80s Manhattan nightclub after hours. Full information about the album will be announced soon, watch this space…
@marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro@softcellhq
THE HUMAN LEAGUE, SOFT CELL & ALISON MOYET - GENERATIONS USA TOUR 2026
Ticket presale open now. For a full list of dates and ticket links visit the Live page at
Presale password: GENERATIONS
Marc says:
We are looking forward to being on tour across the USA in June with The Human League and Alison Moyet.
Before Dave’s sad passing last year he had prepared the music for the US tours with his co-producer Phil Larsen. Phil has been a part of the Soft Cell team for a long time now and he has stood in for Dave on many live occasions due to Dave’s health challenges in his final years.
Phil will be standing in for Dave on this tour as he did on the last US Tour. Dave is still, and will always remain, the beating heart of Soft Cell and his music and songs will continue to have a life. The forthcoming album, Danceteria, will be the end of any new studio music from Soft Cell because recording without Dave just wouldn’t be Soft Cell.
The Human League were an inspiration to Soft Cell when we started back in 1979 and at last we can be together on tour. Joining us will be the brilliant artist Alison Moyet to complete what will be a once in a lifetime tour.
We look forward to seeing you later in the year. We hope you will enjoy this unique triple bill.
Marc Almond
Thanks to Andy, who travelled to Leeds to leave this tribute for Dave, who was very proud of this Soft Cell plaque. @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
Very sad to hear that #daveball had passed away yesterday
I only met him the once when @softcellhq played Nottingham Rock City 9.4.1981
I don’t remember him saying one word as Marc talked 10 to the dozen
On stage he was the same, letting #Marcalmond take all the glory as he stood stock still sidestage on his keyboard
Thanks for the music David
Say Hello, Wave Goodbye❤️🙏
#softcell @daveballelectro #electronica #80s #80smusic #80sstyle #80sforever #synthpop #synthesizer #synthmusic #newwave #techno #musicphotography #bestmusicshots #nonstoperoticcabaret #blackandwhitephotography
A tribute to David James Ball (3rd May 1959 - 22nd October 2025)
Electronic music pioneer Dave Ball, one half of groundbreaking electronic music duo Soft Cell and successful acid house act The Grid, passed away peacefully in his sleep at his London home on Wednesday 22nd October. He was 66. Singer Marc Almond, Dave's musical collaborator of 46 years and Soft Cell bandmate, leads the tributes, describing Dave as a "wonderfully brilliant musical genius". What turns out to be Dave’s final appearance with the band came only weeks ago at the Rewind Festival in Henley-on-Thames, where Soft Cell headlined in front of over 20,000 fans.
READ THE FULL TRIBUTE HERE: Link in Bio
The Art of Falling Apart : 2025 Edition is available to pre-order now at softcell.co.uk/store 6CD box set, 2CD, double coloured vinyl. Released this Hallowe’en, 31st October 2025… @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
2 of 2 Marc Almond : The Jimi Hendrix medley was a studio jam after a night out on purple haze acid at New York’s Danceteria, when we got the crazy idea of a synth band doing a medley of pure guitar-based songs by one of the most famous guitarists ever. Stick that in your pipe, Phonogram! And, of course, the title track itself about physical and mental deterioration, hardly odes to joy and positivity.
The production is still great and high quality, yet retains the Soft Cell post-punk grunginess - a mix of Dave’s Korg analogue sounds and Mike Thorne’s Synclavier obsession, at the time it was a state-of-the-art synthsiser set up and contrasting the dirt with a cold warmth. Mike Thorne, our producer, hated the album and thought it depressing, according to him, we were killing the golden goose (our pop commerciality with him as producer had had global success). In some respects, maybe he was right, but we felt we needed to have something of a lasting legacy, that we had to move out of the singles market and re-emerge as an album band. By that time, however, we felt demoralised by it all, enough for it not to last beyond another album.
Though the album started in the north of England (with its initial demos), it would become an American record. Recorded in 1982 at New York’s Media Sound Studio (ironically where Jimi Hendrix recorded Electric Ladyland) and where T.Rex recorded Electric Warrior, I believe it still stands up as a piece of art, a pop band self-destructing. I respect it, admire it and are proud we did it, but I still find it hard to love. @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
1 of 2 Marc Almond ‘The Art of Falling Apart’ was a statement: two former art students taking control of ourselves and our music, and in the process committing commercial suicide. We didn’t put one of our biggest hits ‘Torch’ on the record, we were so bloody minded. I suppose we were falling apart as a musical duo, and in many ways, falling apart as people. Yet, somehow, we were holding it together throughout the recording process.
We conscientiously moved away from the simple pop formula that was expected of us, into a darker more ‘film noir’ soundtrack-influenced world: Dave’s John Barry cinematic influences coming through more than his Northern Soul. The bleakness of ‘Baby Doll’ (a low rent strip club in New York) and ‘Numbers’ (after a John Rechy book), the Tennessee Williams-inspired drama of ‘Heat’, the Burton and Taylor-inspired (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) ‘Loving You Hating Me’. ‘Forever the Same’ chronicled the day-to day-mundanity of a factory worker, ‘Where There Heart Is’ a dysfunctional family, through to the bored housewife and her sexual fantasies in ‘Kitchen Sink Drama’, after the 60’s black and white realism movies. The track ‘Martin’, was originally a demo from our very early days in Leeds, and is a homage to George Romero and his film about alienation, a teenage killer with sexual vampire fantasies - is he a psychopath or a real vampire? @marcalmondofficial@daveballelectro
